Great Blue Herons

[Tom Wilson]

Here are some photogenic gentlemen from this morning on the lake. I'm pretty tickled with these, it's not very often that they let you get too close.

[Steve Foss]

Gotta love the sweet angle on that light! Sheesh, don't you ever work for a living, or what? Everbody posting all these bird shots and I have to dip into two years of computer archives to post back, and then you go out morning and evening and throw up this stuff every day? Jealous is all I am man, jealous.

Oh, and how do you know they're "gentlemen?" Might they not be "gentlewomen?" Sexes alike, you know.

[buzzsaw]

I was going to make a comment about working as well! I wish I could have been out doing the same thing today. It's obvious were all on the computer right now, shouldn't we be doing something more productive?? Nawwww

[Tom Wilson]

Well, I'm argumentative, so I might as well be sexist too! (that was sarcasm by the way)

I am not sure whether they were male or female. In my experience the females do not seem to get as much of the breeding feathers as the males do, and they were a little on the larger size. I do believe the males are larger than the females, but gulp..deep breath...I could be wrong.

As for your other issue...I do work, but I had a doctors appointment this afternoon, so I fished in the morning and sat on the deck in the afternoon after my appointment. I do work--actually quite a bit including a lot of weekends, but I work second shift so I have each morning, to do what I love...fish, hunt, and photograph birdies.

Personally, I think it'd be kind of cool to live in Ely.

[Steve Foss]

Well, Buzz, it's 9:15 p.m., and I'm on the computer AND drinking beer after a 14-hour workday with one half-hour break. So I ask you, is there any way to be more productive than that?

Tom: I used to work second shift alot myself, but that was years back when I lived at 10,000 feet in Colorado and worked for a gold mining operation (TRUE!). Man, stars you could touch, snow in June and days of 60 degrees (above) in January, elk bugling out my back yard. And there was the time the day after deer season closed when I opened my front door just after sunrise and looked up the mountain and saw a mulie buck, a 6x6 with a classic typical rack so big I thought I was looking at a tree. For a second there, I though I'd get out the Stihl and lay in some more for the woodburner, and then I realized it was a DEER. Well, in that little town everyone had a rifle leaning against the wall (for wandering bears, cougars and Republicans), and I cast a desperate eye toward the .30-30 perched upright behind the door. That stinking mulie was 50 yards away through a medium snow, and looked at me like he knew how to read a calendar. My freezer was empty of venison, and winter was coming on. I almost reached for the rifle, but couldn't do it.

OK, NEVER MIND, or I'll start wanting to move back there.

It is cool to live in Ely, but be warned — the cost of living is about the same as Duluth. Housing is cheaper, but not very much cheaper, and all other aspects — food, gas, beer, not to mention utilities that are nothing short of robbery — are higher, so it about evens out. My spouse and I both took 30 percent pay cuts to move here, and our research that indicated the cost of living was cheaper here than Duluth was a CROCK!

So, no wonder why I'm trying bring in a little extra filthy lucre by freelancing and selling photos on the Web site. It's no secret I'd love to be able to support us totally with photography, but that's a toughie to make happen.

Meanwhile I slave, and slave, and slave . . .

[buzzsaw]

ahhh, a beer sounds good! think I'll go open a Paulener and then doze off...

This one was taken on Lake Minnetonka this spring.

[Tom Wilson]

Here's one I got the other morning on Waconia...

Thought I'd throw in an Egret too...

[jonny_redhorse]

an egret even!.holy moly!.i never seen an egret let alone get a pic of one .... ...you guys must live by a zoo!

[DTro]

yeah, there's not very many up there, at least I never seen them, however I see them ALL the time around here.