A quintessential, but young wet robin perches on a popular perch in rain and sprinkles. Not sure why the perch seems popular with small and large birds, raptors included.

Migration: www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/American_Robin/maps-range

Larger view: www.flickr.com/photos/jan-timmons/52998468789/sizes/o/

Many thanks to all who take the time to comment.

These Bleeding hearts AKA Dutchman's breeches are always a welcome dash of color in the garden. This is one of eight species of Dicentra (two spurred) that are native to Eastern Asia and North America.

Continuing to post some prairie dwelling critters.

Black-tailed Prairie Dogs have one of the most complex vocalizations/languages of any mammal.

Perhaps the most conspicuous prairie dog communication is the territorial call or "jump-yip" display. A prairie dog will stretch the length of its body vertically and throw its forefeet into the air while making a call. A jump-yip from one prairie dog may cause others nearby to do the same. One theory for this behavior is that the instigator of the jump-yip 'wave' uses the jump-yip to assess the vigilance or watchfulness of others in the colony - a longer jump-yip wave indicates watchful neighbors and leads to increased foraging by the instigator. Another theory is that the jump-yip may be sounding an "all clear" after a potential threat has moved on.

Photo note: The jump-yip lasts about a second or two, and it's not easily predictable. I've been trying to photograph it for years. The quality of this shot could be better, but the rarity of getting two prairie dogs performing it at once is worth posting.

Unlike the secretive female of the species, the male Yellow-headed Blackbird likes to maximize his visibility while he vocalizes, in what the Cornell Lab says "sounds like a rusty farm gate opening".

The icon of the prairie photographed in Badlands National Park.

Continuing my moms and babies series.

Giving a hug without arms can be a challenge, but this bison calf figured it out. Photographed in Custer State Park, South Dakota.

Missing Common Redpolls. This one is a female without the reddish feathered breast of the male. We enjoyed an irruption of Redpolls for several years living in Alaska. Pine Siskins often accompanied the Redpolls. Feisty little things, and beautiful.

After my post of the badlands (Mako Sica) yesterday I'd like to remind those who haven't visited Badlands National Park that much of the parks 244,000 acres is mixed grass prairie.

Mixed grass prairie is prime habitat for an amazing mix of plants and animals. I'll showcase a few of them in the next few days starting with this Western Meadowlark singing from its perch of a bison dumpling.

I'm posting this impressive bison bull to set up tomorrow's post. The Plains Bison is a North American giant. They stand 6 ft. tall at the shoulder. Average weight for bulls is 1,600 LBS and they weigh up to 2,000 LBS. Wood bison are slightly larger with an average weight of 1,800 LBS and they max out at around 2,200 LBS.

Took me quite a while to decide what to post this morning. So I asked myself what I haven't posted for quite a while. Answer...a bear.

So here's a Coastal Brown Bear photographed in Lake Clark National Park, Alaska.

A bull and cow elk seem to be performing a duet during the rut in Rocky Mountain National Park.

My bighorn sheep post yesterday served as a reminder that I haven't done a North American Ungulate series lately. So here we go.

Continuing a brief series of images from the prairie and badlands of South Dakota.

Driving through Custer State Park in western South Dakota, we spotted this pronghorn buck relaxing atop of a grassy mound near the road. Getting this shot was as easy as pulling over on the shoulder of the road, pushing the window down button of the rolling rental car blind and snapping a couple of shots.

Wildlife photographers face plenty of challenges to get good shots. We deserve an easy one now and then.

A couple of muskox cows relaxing during a rainy day on the Seward Peninsula.

Continuing my horns and antlers series. In antlered species, only males have antlers, but in horned species, both males and females have horns with the female versions usually smaller.

Continuing with a wildlife close-up theme with this profile head shot of a Rocky Mountain Goat, photographed on Mt. Evans, Colorado.

Though the bighorn sheep rut won't be occurring yet, but the rams should be bulking up and approaching prime condition. We hope to see them during the latter stage of our upcoming trip.

This pretty bighorn ewe is the last of my brief tribute to the feminine side of the rut.

This lady bighorn was photographed in Banff National Park, Alberta.

I'm outta here for a couple of weeks.

We watched this Mountain Bluebird go through an extensive preening routine which included this unusual maneuver.

Perched on a barbed wire fence in Custer State Park, South Dakota.

I may not be able to comment much today. Will be away from my computer most of the day.

This beautiful scene in Waterton Lakes National Park would look quite different today, because about year after this was taken, a devastating fire burned over 19,000 hectares (almost 47,000 acres) in the park.

The next installment in my moms and babies series is this Bighorn Sheep mom and her very young baby found in Badlands National Park.

Continuing the antlers and horns series with this head-on portrait of a Bighorn ram in the Badlands.

The horns of male bighorn sheep can weigh at much as 30 LBS.

This guy's impressive headgear might be approaching that weight.

Harsh afternoon light for this one. Oh well.

My puffin post yesterday wrapped up the seabird series and kicked off a series of multiples...shots with multiple (two or more) subjects.

Here, a herd of bison grazing in a fresh dusting of snow in Grand Teton National Park. The challenge on this one was that the bison were a considerable distance from the road. I wanted to include as much of the heard as possible and zooming to 400mm didn't do that. So I backed off to 200mm which allowed most of the herd to be in the fame, but way too much featureless snow in the foreground. I played with the crop options and settled on this pano crop.

Wrapping up my tribute to the ladies with this pretty pronghorn doe. To quote Stevie Wonder, "Isn't she lovely?"

I'll be off of Flickr for a couple of weeks. Time to get back out there for some new photos.

Third and final installment in my Alaska min-series.

This bull moose was eyeing some leaves on a low hanging branch for his next snack. Well, they weren't that low hanging...probably eight feet off the ground.

Bringing some more color to my photo stream.

A Roseate Spoonbill shakes vigorously during its preening routine.

South Padre Island, Texas.

A bull moose entering a small stream in the Bighorn Mountains of Wyoming. Ending my wildlife in water series with this bull almost in the water.

Near Green River Wyoming, about 1500 wild horses roam the sagebrush landscape. Here are nine of them hanging out near the Pilot Butte Wild Horse Scenic Loop Road.

Second in a mini-series of birds on Saguaros. Many desert dwelling passerines perch on the tops of the tallest cactus...the Saguaro. This is especially true during mating season when the males want their songs to carry the maximum distance and they have maximum visibility.

Saguaros typically reach heights of 40 feet. The tallest one recorded was 78 feet.

This Pyrrhuloxia was singing its heart out in Sabino Canyon National Recreation Area.

A windy day on Mt. Evans had this Yellow-bellied Marmot flattening itself on a boulder to lower its profile.

My theme for the next few days will be a tribute to the small critters, starting with this pika found at an elevation of around 12,000 feet in Rocky Mountain National Park.

From The National Wildlife Federation:

"Despite their cuddly appearance, American pikas—the smallest members of the lagomorph group—are among North America's toughest animals. Pikas are one of the few mammals in the lower 48 states that can survive their entire lives in alpine terrain, the windswept no-man's-land above tree line.

Pikas have short, stout bodies with big, round ears and do not have a visible tail. Pikas reach a size of about seven to eight inches (18 to 20 centimeters) in length.

The American pika has a brown and black coloration, which is meant to camouflage them among rocks. Pika fur is thick to keep them warm in the winter. During the summer, they put on a much lighter coat of fur—however, the hair is still thick enough that a pika might overheat if exposed to temperatures above 78 degrees Fahrenheit for prolonged periods."

There are two night heron species in North America...the Yellow-crowned and the Black-crowned. We were fortunate enough to see both on our recent Texas coast trip. I posted the Yellow-crowned yesterday and here's the Black-crowned. Tomorrow I'll move on from birds and Texas...back to fur, hooves, antlers, horns, etc.

An impressive muskox bull stands atop a small ridge on the Seward Peninsula, Alaska.

Continuing my archive excavation, I came across this shot from my first ever trip to Alaska's Seward Peninsula to see these shaggy, prehistoric looking creatures. I was hooked, and we made four more muskox safaris after this one.

From Wikipedia: "An Ice Age relic, muskoxen (Ovibos moschatus) have been wandering the Earth for over 600,000 years. They roamed the tundra with sabertooth tigers, woolly mammoths, and other long extinct megafauna."

From the Cornell Lab:

"Dapper in looks and cheerful in song, the Pyrrhuloxia is a tough-as-nails songbird of baking hot deserts in the American Southwest and northern Mexico. They’re closely related to Northern Cardinals, but they are a crisp gray and red, with a longer, elegant crest and a stubby, parrotlike yellow bill."

This one was vocalizing high in a tree in Sabino Canyon Recreation Area, Tucson, Arizona.

We're heading back to that area so this will be my last post for a little over two weeks. Hasta La Vista everyone.

Last of my small critter series is this American Pika chowing down on some leafy greens. The setting may be a little busy, but I like the autumn colors in the tundra plants and the profuse lichens on the rocks.

Photographed at around 12,000 feet elevation in Rocky Mountain National Park.

This is the first in a three image mini-drama that played out in the waters just off of South Padre Island, Texas.

Do you think this Great Blue Heron could down that giant fish?

Stay tuned.

I feel like a virtual trip to Alaska. This brown bear wading in the Brooks River in Katmai National Park kicks off a three shot series of Alaskan wildlife.

Next in my horns and antlers set is this Rocky Mountain Bul Elk giving a nice pose during the rut in Rocky Mountain National Park.

A little information about the difference between horns and antlers. From the National Park Service:

Antlers—found on members of the deer family—grow as an extension of the animal’s skull. They are true bone, are a single structure, and, generally, are found only on males.

Horns—found on pronghorn, mountain goats, bighorn sheep, and bison—are a two-part structure. An interior portion of bone (an extension of the skull) is covered by an exterior sheath keratin (similar to human fingernails). Horns are usually found on both males and (in a diminutive form) females.

Antlers are shed and regrown yearly while horns are never shed and continue to grow throughout an animal’s life. There is a notable exception to that, which I'll discuss in a future post.

A pair of endangered whooping cranes vocalizing to warn others to stay away. The White-tailed deer bucks just seemed to be thinking "what's the ruckus about?"

From The Friends of Wild Whoopers website: "...loud calls are used by crane pairs to help defend their territory. When defending territory unison calls means “Keep out, this piece of wetland property is ours”."

For those who haven't heard Whooping Cranes vocalizing, here's a link to some recordings on Cornell's website.

www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Whooping_Crane/sounds#

Following my shook-up spoonbill with this Yellow-headed Blackbird doing its own version of the shake during a preening routine.

Third in my splash of color themed posts, this shot was taken in Bear River Migratory Bird Refuge, Utah.

This 7x7 bull elk seemed to be just showing off as he raised his head and high stepped across a high-country meadow in Rocky Mountain National Park.

This post kicks off a series of North American ungulates also known as hoofed animals.

Standing his ground on the plains landscape of South Dakota.

An Alaskan Brown Bear hustles across a shallow creek in Lake Clark National Park.

Three bighorn sheep youngsters testing their agility on the challenging terrain of the badlands.

This kicks off a brief series of young wildlife images.

A Great Egret has a challenge in downing its catch. It took several minutes, but it was eventually successful.

South Padre Island, Texas.

If elk drank beer, I'd say these guys have beer bellies.

The reality is that bull elk must bulk up before mating season, because they can lose 20-30% of their body weight during the rut. So the bulkier they are at the beginning, the better condition they'll be in at the end. These two guys seem to have a very good start with roughly five weeks to go before the frenzy of the rut begins.

I have no theme in mind for my next several posts. But I guess random can be considered a theme, so this is the start of my random theme.

Upper Antelope Canyon, Arizona.

I took this shot almost exactly 10 years ago. It was one of my very first posts on Flickr. So I thought I'd repost it for current Flickr friends.

Despite its popularity and the constant flow of tourists through this slot canyon, it remains one of the favorite spots we've visited. The crowded conditions have prevented us from going back but I'm sure glad we did it once.

Staying with a bird theme but switching families to Laridae (Gulls, Terns and Skimmers).

We found this Forster's Tern hovering above a pool in Bear River Migratory Bird Refuge.

It took me many bursts to get a few decent shots. Though the terns would hover in one spot, it was usually for just a few seconds. That gave me minimal time to lock on and shoot. Add to the equation that I was handholding "the beast" (500mm prime lens). Lot's of blurred, and out of focus shots, but this one turned out ok.

After a satisfying dust bath that lasted a few minutes, the bison bull posed for a few more clicks as it took the dust a while to settle. Wind Cave National Park, South Dakota.

An American Badger prowls a prairie dog town in Badlands National Park.

This will wrap up my prairie wildlife series. Not sure what's next...

We just returned from our third visit to Badlands National Park this year. The park is so beautiful and has such a rich wildlife population, it keeps drawing us back.

Driving and hiking in the park, it can be challenging just to decide where to point the camera. In this case, the morning light on the rusty/tan layers of clay rich soil topped by some darker clouds invited me to make a few clicks.

Happy Muskox Monday! This muskox cow standing on a ridge was one of the first muskoxen I photographed. I was hooked...and we've subsequently made several trips back to their home on the Seward Peninsula, Alaska.