EAGLE DAYS

From February to early March most years, bald eagles' migration path pauses along a stretch of the Mississippi River not far north of here. Apparently the fishing is good. The Missouri Department of Conservation has a very nice visitors center there with exhibits, events and walkways along the river. They did special presentations this weekend. 

The center cares for several eagles who had injuries and are no longer up to life in the wild. It's hard to appreciate the size and strength of those talons from a photo. We saw a few birds out in the trees but they were so far away they looked like just a smudge, even using my longest lens.         

 

NOT KANSAS

The Sunflower State, although we'll be there in a couple of weeks. Mrs. C and I went on an excursion yesterday to an out-of-the-way corner of the suburbs, tucked behind the confluence of the Missouri and Mississippi Rivers. In one of the few good works of our benighted state government, the Missouri Department of Conservation maintains the Columbia Bottom Conservation Area, https://mdc.mo.gov/discover-nature/places/columbia-bottom-conservation-area, bottoms in the sense of river bottomland. It has planted 14 fields of sunflowers, staggered to bloom in sequence through the summer. Quite a sight.

The only issue with these pictures is the haze from the Oregon fires a half-continent away. This picture has been heavily edited in Photoshop and still lacks something, in my opinion.