Lance Armstrong's Home For Sale
Lance Armstrong's 4,241-sq.ft. ranch house at Deadman's Hole, sitting on 447 acres of Texas hill country in Dripping Springs, is on the market for $12 million. No reason given, but he's had an expensive run-in with the neighbors. To see property photos, house specs...
Redhead Duck in Prescott
A bit of driving today trying to see my first Harlequin Duck ever. I finally was able to see him using another birders scope, but no chance of a photo. I couldn’t even see him in the binoculars. The good news is I also added 4 other new birds to my life list… a...
Aziza's world view changes
At Christmas this year, we met Aziza, a young lady from Kyrgyzstan. Phaedra's folks host one or 2 foreign exchange students each year and Aziza is their 18th so far. Aziza is an exceptional young lady and we really enjoyed having her as part of our Christmas...
3 Pileated
Friday, the male Pileated Woodpecker stopped by to eat and this was the 1st time we had seen him since 12-15-08. Saturday, we had our first sighting of all 3 Pileated Woodpeckers ever. A large male and 2 females (1 a bit smaller) were in and out of the back yard for...
Visit to the MN Raptor Center
Woke up to a bright sunny day but cold temps, so we decided to try something new. We picked up Zander (our 4 yr old grandson), and drove to the St. Paul U of Mn campus to visit the Minnesota Raptor Center. The center was founded back in 1974 and has grown into a rehab...
Building an R2-D2
Yesterday, Zander and I spent 3-4 hours building a R2-D2 model out of legos. The unit contains a battery driven motor and actually walked/spun around when we were finished. [flv:https://bnwilson.com/wp-content/uploads/r2d2.flv 320 240]
Raptor Center busy with snowy owls
The scientists at the Raptor Center at the University of Minnesota are having a busy winter. They're nursing starving birds back to health and setting broken bones. They're also seeing a lot of snowy owls, as the big white birds are are turning up again in Minnesota....
Favorite Moments of 2008
I have had a wonderful year learning bird species and how to photograph them. As 2008 comes to a close, I wondered which ones were my favorites. There have been so many great moments both here in the backyard and out and about. I’ve met new friends and neighbors....
Visit to the Tropical Encounters exhibit @ Como Park
Here is a picture of a “Violaceous Euphonia” singing loudly. The weather yesterday was a bit dreary, so I took my folks to the Como Park Conservatory for a look at the new Tropical Encounters exhibit. They have about 12 different bird species flying in an open...
Snow Buntings at the Airport
Today was a bit cool… 6 below when we got up, but the sun was shining, so we thought we go out and stand around at the airport and look for a Snowy Owl. There have been reports of a Snowy Owl on Cargo road. The wind chill made it about impossible to stand for long...