Eastern Meadowlark and Savannah Sparrow from Grass Lake this past weekend.
White-throated Sparrows and a newly arrived Towhee made an appearance under the feeder yesterday.
on Nov - 09 - 2012 under Digital Ink
Shore of the Cosmic Ocean
“The surface of the Earth is the shore of the cosmic ocean. On this shore, we’ve learned most of what we know. Recently, we’ve waded a little way out, maybe ankle-deep, and the water seems inviting. Some part of our being knows this is where we came from. We long to return, and we can, because the cosmos is also within us. We’re made of star stuff. We are a way for the cosmos to know itself.”– Carl Sagan, Cosmos
Happy Carl Sagan Day! Apple pie and cosmos for all.
on Oct - 16 - 2012 under Field Sketches
Late Fall Migrants – Bruce Caves
A handful of sketches from my holidays last week, fit in during the little bit of decent weather that broke on Friday. Fox Sparrows were a nice surprise.
on Aug - 02 - 2012 under Space
Curiosity Landing
At 10:31 PST on the evening of August 5th, 2012, the rover Curiosity will be gently lowered to the surface of Mars by a team of NASA-trained astropigeons.
Wait … that’s not right. She’ll hit the Martian atmosphere travelling at over 13,000 miles per hour, deploy a supersonic parachute 7 miles above the surface, shed her aeroshell (charred by the intense 2100°C atmospheric compression experienced during the descent), fire up a set of retrorockets to further slow herself down, navigate to her landing site, lower herself on a set of cables down to the surface from the hovering sky crane, and then simultaneously cut all of her tethers so that the rocket pack can safely fling itself off into the distance. And since it takes a good 14 minutes for signals from Mars to reach Earth, she’ll need to handle the full 7 minute landing sequence entirely on her own.
It’s going to be frikkin’ awesome.
There are a lot of potential points of failure here, and the whole process sounds completely insane to me. But it’s necessary to get the car-sized rover down to the surface — she’s just too big to rely on previous methods. Curiosity will be our best bet yet for finding evidence of life (past or present) on Mars, and she’s got some pretty cool toys on board. I am seriously looking forward to some HD video of Martian dust devils.
on Jun - 10 - 2012 under Field Sketches
Grass Lake
Bobolinks and Savannah Sparrows. Usually I have the place to myself, but a (unconfirmed) report of a Dickcissel drew a small crowd this morning. Two women walking their dogs stopped me to ask what all the fuss was about, and I had that somewhat amusing and slightly awkward conversation I’ve had many a time with non-birders, where I attempt to explain why everyone’s so exicited about a little finchy thing.
on May - 26 - 2012 under Digital Ink, Space
To Catch a Dragon
“Houston, Station, it looks like we got us a Dragon by the tail.” — Don Pettit, May 25, 2012
History was made yesterday as the SpaceX Dragon became the first commercial spacecraft to dock with the ISS (it was also the first American craft to arrive at the station since the retirement of the Shuttle program last year). Though this has been a demonstrational flight, the Dragon capsule also delivered supplies and hopes to begin carrying astronauts to the ISS within three years. The era of private spaceflight has officially begun. Exciting stuff!
Artwork done in PaintTool SAI. Textures courtesy of BittBox.
on Jan - 14 - 2012 under Digital Ink
Infinite Sammies
I miss having a dog. Every once in awhile I catch myself poking around on breeders’ websites, until I’m reminded by a sensible little voice (and a demanding little parrot) that now just isn’t the time. My first childhood dog was half samoyed, and he was always the saddest, mopiest-looking old boy, but full-blooded sammies are big, happy, fluffy teddy bears. I love ‘em.
on Jan - 02 - 2012 under Field Sketches
New Bird, Bluebird
I was a bit bummed to dip out on the Barred Owl that’s been hanging around Guelph Lake during my last outing on New Year’s Eve, but my first lifer for 2012 made up for it — a little female Mountain Bluebird eating berries along a rural road near Morriston. A chance find by a couple of local birders, and a very good one.
on Dec - 04 - 2011 under Digital Ink
Griffins
I spent Sunday at my parents’ place (it’s tradition for me to be the one to wrestle with the tangle of Christmas lights, and I still drop by the first weekend every December to light the tree). The rain didn’t let up once all day, so in between decorating, my neice and I passed the time playing video games or messing around with my tablet. She asked me how long griffins had been extinct.
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