Sweet Sweetwater Waterfowl

Sweetwater Wetlands is a marvelous birding hotspot that is right in the city of Tucson itself.  In addition to hundreds of Northern Shovelers, we saw Pintails, Mallards, Wigeons, and plenty of other waterfowl.  I thought that Tom got a great shot of the handsome Green-winged Teal shown above.

Of course, there were plenty of American Coots in residence.  This is a rather funny shot of a coot that just crash landed in the water.

There were also a few Common Moorhen mixed in with the coots.  I first saw a Common Moorhen in California a few months back, but since I never added it to my lifelist, seeing this one sort of counts as adding a lifelister!

The diminutive Ruddy Duck will always be one of my personal favorites.

We also saw Gadwalls and we even saw (but I failed to photograph) a Cinnamon Teal.

We were especially lucky to see a rare winter visitor to Sweetwater: a juvenile Snow Goose!  We were on the lookout for the Snow Goose because my son told me it had been seen in the area, but I doubt I would have located him had I not seen him coming in for a landing.  He settled into one of the rear ponds, so we couldn't get close enough for a very good shot.  I got a good enough look to positively ID the little guy, but he wasn't in the mood to pose for pictures!

Arizona Birds

This is my first time on the computer in weeks, because I'm still pretty sick from my accidental and idiotic exposure to toxic quantities of metal dust. At this point, metal dust (and glue!) is embedded in every inch of my skin and it feels like slivers of glass. Pieces are coming out my eyes, ears, mouth, and nose, and today I found out my right cornea has been cut yet again! I'm too scared to think about what is in my lungs (which hurt more every day), or what that will do to me.

I am going to the Environmental Health Center at Cambridge Hospital on Thursday. They are experts at exposure to toxins AND inhalation and skin exposures to metal dusts of all kinds.  At least they can tell me how bad it really is, which has to be better than what I've been imagining.

In the meantime, I thought I'd post some pictures taken by my son on his visit to Phoenix, Arizona last October.


These beautiful ducks are Gadwalls. I've never seen one (at least, I've never seen one clearly or up close), but I think they're lovely.


This is a gorgeous shot of two American Wigeons.


Look at this crazy bird! This is an American Coot, and I can't wait to see one with my own eyes. How cool is he?


My son must have been thrilled with this Says Phoebe, since he took about 50 pictures of it. Personally, I'm a bit underwhelmed.


Just some domestic geese, but I like the coloring of the one on the right.