And some good medical news.
It’s been over a month since I’ve posted to Feathered Photography and readers deserve to know why. The reasons are all medically related and they have nothing to do with my bad back. Following is an explanation. It’s complicated, so many of the details will have to be left out but here are the basics.
I’ve already told readers that I have an aortic aneurism that a recent CT scan revealed has grown to the point that it will have to be repaired fairly soon (potentially a complicated and dangerous surgery). But a recent visit with my vascular surgeon revealed that that interpretation of my scan wasn’t completely accurate. It turns out that my aneurism hasn’t grown since my previous CT scan a year ago so I’m in the clear, at least for now.
The same CT scan also revealed that I have something going on in my liver which the radiologist said needed to be checked out by further testing – it could be a relatively harmless hematoma but it could also be liver cancer. I stewed over that one for a while before I eventually got a phone call from my primary care physician who said that he had contacted the radiologist and the two of them compared my most recent CT scan to another scan from six years ago. It turns out that I had the same liver abnormality six years ago that I have now, so it’s almost certainly a hematoma and not cancer.
As you can imagine, I’m incredibly relieved by two bits of very good medical news in such a short time. But the entire process took about six weeks of CT scans, specialized sonograms, medical tests and doctor visits. Between all the medical stuff going on and the worry and stress it generated, bird photography and posting to my blog weren’t high on my list of priorities. So I didn’t post for over five weeks.
OK, with that out of the way, let’s move on to something more interesting.
In the early evening two days ago I was sitting on my patio with my camera on my tripod, waiting for something interesting to happen on or near one of my four bird feeders. Eventually I got bored and turned my attention to my phone. After nearly five full minutes of being involved in a text conversation I finally looked up again and this is what I saw.
The neighborhood Cooper’s Hawk was perched on my grape vine less than 30′ away from me (I measured the distance later).
I have no idea how long ‘he’ had been there but I know what he was doing. He was hunting birds in four places from the same secluded hunting perch – my feeders to his left, my friend Shane’s feeders on the other side of my fence and grape vine, the grape vine itself and he was also hunting birds that had flown in a panic when he arrived and hid beneath my wooden deck to his right. About a week ago I saw him catch a sparrow that made the mistake of coming out from beneath my deck.
I took a quick (blurry) cell phone photo to document the setting. The hawk is circled in red. That’s the end of my lens on the left side of the frame.
He was so close I had to shoot vertically to give him any room at all in the frame. This photo is full frame (uncropped).
I had to remove my teleconverter to shoot horizontally. This photo is also full frame.
He almost broke his neck every time a bird flew over, which was fairly often.
Eventually he’d been there for so long he needed to stretch and…
preen.
He also let fly with a pretty impressive poop.
Finally, after I’d been with him for 39 minutes, he turned around on his perch to provide a pretty good look at his front side.
Another wing and tail stretch.
About a minute later I saw his head and eyes follow an overhead bird from his left to his right. From the direction he ended up looking I could tell that the bird of interest landed on top of the grapevine to his right. The hawk was so tucked away beneath the branches of the grapevine I’m almost certain that the bird hadn’t seen him. That bird wouldn’t have landed where he did if it had.
The hawk took off after the bird so fast I clipped his bill.
When I pulled my eye away from the lens the last thing I saw was the hawk hot on the tail of the bird as they both flew over my house behind me. The bird he was after turned out to be one of my very favorites – the only Yellow-headed Blackbird, a handsome male, that visits my feeders.
Here he is. Photo taken last week.
The blackbird visits reliably several times every day. So when I didn’t see him for most of the day yesterday I was afraid he was a goner. But he finally showed up again late yesterday afternoon.
I’ll admit it, I’m relieved. I’m very fond of that bird. Not many can say they have a Yellow-headed Blackbird visiting their yard.
Ron
Note: Some readers may wonder why my grape vine looks dead. About ten days ago we had two back-to-back nights of hard frost, followed by four more nights of lighter frost. Those two coldest nights froze all the leaves on my grape vine and four catalpa trees and badly damaged my roses and trumpet vine. At this point I still don’t know if some of them will survive, especially one of my catalpa trees.
If 80 is your unspeakable number, you’re all still wet behind the ears. Turned 86 last month, and still trying to cope with the idea that people think I’m ‘old’. I’m reserving that for 90. Health scares are the same at every age…so glad yours have been resolved and you’re back at it Ron! And I love the burrdoo shot!
The Cooper’s’ colors are so beautiful – subtle but intricate. And I had never seen a yellow-headed blackbird until the photo you included in this post! Also, great to hear the good medical news.
I am so glad all is okay!
I love your COHA experience! Phenomenal photos! And bravo the Yellow-headed Blackbird is ok, I hope you get to hear him sing!
A few days late catching up on my email! Congratulations on the great news about your health and so sorry that you had to spend so long worried!
I love this post – it’s entertaining and the photos are great as usual. I’m glad you’re back in a photographing space!!
Thank you, Joanne.
Missed you…
1. Good news!
2. Good news!
Thanks, Susan. It sure is.
Oh wow. It seems like if we watch something nothing happens. Take the eyes away and we almost miss it. Interesting and good shots you took. Glad the Yellow Headed crow is safe for another day. Good news on your medical problems. The Hellgate Osprey in Missoula who is 30 years old just laid an egg and hope Iris and the newguy2 raise a nice group of chicks this year.
Thanks, Trudy. Good luck to Iris and Newguy2.
Great to hear about your medical results – though it didn’t include anything about your back.
Your commentary on the hawk – and black bird – as usual – was very interesting. I have never seen one of those black birds – so THANKS!
Stay well – as best you can – and have a GOOD #79???
Thank you, Judy. I was thinking about you a lot today as I perused the second cookbook of yours that you gave me. I used a yellow highlighter to mark some of the recipes I want to try. A bit late, since you gave it to me many years ago, but better late than never… 🙂
Is there such a thing as a “good” 79?
Your medical news is terrific. I really appreciate your updates, and I especially appreciate your way of conveying such news, both good and bad. You don’t whine or make obvious bids for sympathy as some do; it’s very much a ‘just the facts, ma’am’ approach, and I like that.
I like your hawk, too! Mine are going to have to hunt elsewhere for a while. The rats have shown up en masse, so the feeders are down for a while. Since I live in an apartment, I can only place my feeders right next to my patio: too close for the four-footed ones that are showing up. Once it’s clear the squirrels and birds have given up and gone elsewhere, we’ll tackle the rats and be ready to put feeders up again in the future.
Thanks very much, Shoreacres. I especially appreciate some of the observations you made in your first paragraph.
Echoing all your friends – so glad you are doing ok! I woke up this morning wondering how you were – though I was thinking more of your back. So anxious-making, tests and “it could be…”
That Cooper’s is so well hidden in the grape vine – wily bird! And love the casual right leg extension in photo #3. What a beautiful bird. And very glad yellow-headed blackbird was not on the menu! They were my mother-in-law’s favorite bird – whenever you post a photo of one of yours, I always say a little thank you in her memory.😊
Thanks, Carolyn. Good to know that you have a mother-in-law whose memory you cherish.
Awesome pictures as always!!! Thank you so much!! Love the story they tell.
I’m glad you enjoyed the photos and the story, Travis. Thanks for letting me know.
I was just talking to my wife this weekend about not seeing any posts from you for a while and how much I missed them. Great to see this post and hear that you got some good medical news as well!
And thanks for the great photos of the Cooper’s. And that beautiful Yellow-headed Blackbird – I haven’t seen one of those in a while around here.
Much appreciated, Bill. Yellow-headed Blackbirds are pretty special, despite their unappealing call.
Sorry you had to go through all that stress! Hope things stay stable. 😊
Thanks, Laurie.
Dear Ron,
Thank you for letting us know what you’ve been dealing with. Along with your other fans, I’m relieved to hear that you’re in the clear. I hope you have many more birding and gardening delights in your future.
Thank you, Pat.
Good to have you back. I was checking in every couple days, but figured it had to be pretty serious to keep you away that long. Glad to hear the tests turned out well for you. Thanks for sharing the good news.
Great photos of the Cooper, thanks!
Thanks very much, Quentin.
Count me among the *many* concerned that your absence was overly long and now gratefully relieved to find you in my inbox this morning! ❤️
So glad all the scary possibilities turned out to be less than suspected and you’re back with us (at least occasionally, I hope—no pressure here).
Wonderful photo shoot with the Cooper’s Hawk, and I’m glad you didn’t have to worry too long about your friend, the Yellow-headed Blackbird. I have that same feeling about my beautiful Hooded Orioles when I know a Coop is in the neighborhood. Can’t we all just get along? 😉
I hope to continue the “occasional” trend, Chris. But that depends on several things, and not just birds.
Jealous, very jealous, of your Hooded Orioles.
I join the chorus in being delighted that your medical news is so positive and seeing you in action again. I swear, you are able to get and share photos from your backyard that most of us would be proud to get after traveling long ways. Congrats!
Sometimes I get lucky, Kent. But I have to admit that I spend more time in my back yard watching for interesting birds than I probably should.
Great to hear from you and to hear that your recent medical news is positive! What a treat to get all those photos of the Cooper without traveling in your truck. I love the first wing stretch photo – very dramatic. We had a family of Coopers nesting nearby one year and they used our backyard as a training ground for the youngsters. I got some amazing pictures, but I felt bad they were going after ‘my’ backyard birds.
All the best,
Kathryn
Thanks, Kathryn. We become pretty attached to some of our yardbirds, don’t we.
Wonderful photos and commentary – such a satisfying meeting! Glad to hear things are looking more hopeful on the health front. Many years ago I had an abdominal scan (turned out I had endometriosis) – but the first thing the radiologist said to me was “you’ve got something in your liver”. Although he somehow knew immediately that it was a hematoma, he didn’t say that until the end of the scan, leaving me to panic about it – luckily for a shorter time than you had to.
You sound like me, Alison – an inveterate worrier. The moment I hear “something in my liver”, or anything like it from a medical professional, I’m in instant panic.
The Cooper’s Hawk looks so cute looking up! Plus wing stretch plus poop shot? Oh you spoil us!
Wonderful to see a post from you, even better to hear good news regarding your health. I figured you’ll post when you post, and we’ll be here waiting patiently. Health takes priority after all. 🙂
Thanks, Amy.
Speaking of “looking up”, yesterday I tried to look straight up into my elm tree to figure out where a pile of bird poop was coming from on the ground. For a second I wondered if I broke my neck. None of my joints are what they used to be.
Ooh I have to be careful with my neck too. No sudden jerking movements, no quickly looking up and down or I wake up the next morning with a crick in my neck.
Not to sound like a fitness peddler but I have found stretching exercises to be helpful. These neck stretches around 15:37 mark have helped with neck pain and soreness. Just go slow and ease into it. I’ve found it helps to lay your hand on your head and gently pull to lengthen the stretch.
Hope this will help you too.
https://youtu.be/tf77HZVDI80?si=T9qIC1VDuloQEGBN&t=937
“I wake up the next morning with a crick in my neck.”
To this Montana farm boy, a “crick” has running water in it… 🙂
My neck doesn’t bother me unless I really push its limits. And those limits keep changing over the years.
Just said to my husband the other day, I haven’t heard from Ron… who’s Ron!! Glad to know you’re doing well.
I’m in a slump of slow or no birds. Because of rats I change to the spicy seeds, supposedly the birds don’t mind. Not sure they like the new menu😕
Diana, the last part of your first sentence made me smile.
Thankfully I haven’t seen a single rat so far this year. Two years ago they were a problem.
It’s a beautiful day in the neighborhood when your posts show up! What a scary story you tell, but then it got better when you spoke of the observant surgeon and PCP – they’re your advocates. Sounds like you’re in good hands there. So often in medicine, and especially typical as we get older, the worst case result is assumed to be correct and then it’s acted upon. We either have to be our own advocate or rely on someone to advocate for us – or both.
Enjoyed your bird story and photos as always. Thanks Ron.
I’ve started feeding the birds this year and I can’t explain to people how happy it makes me to be able to watch them out in my yard. Such a variety, and they all bring me a thrill.
I see you have a hummingbird feeder up. Do you have a stock recipe for the sugar water you use?
You make some good points in your first paragraph, Nina.
I use the standard recipe – 1 part sugar to 4 parts water. Never any food coloring. I boil it and then keep it in the fridge.
Saw my first hummingbird at my feeder two days ago – a male Black-chinned.
Thanks. This kind of feeder is a first for me.
I saw a hummingbird this morning that looked like it had a yellow breast, but it must have been pollen.
First, very glad to learn that you are not in immediate danger regarding your overall health. Good news for sure. Interesting Cooper’s photos and observations. We have feeders out back in trees and often have visiting Cooper’s Hawks. Fortunately for the
birds they rarely make a kill. We have seasonal Yellow headed Blackbirds about a half mile away at our Willow Lake, but never in the back yard.
Everett, I want you to know that you deserve some credit for the first part of this post. It was your email of concern that made me realize that I needed to let folks know why I haven’t been posting.
thank you Ron
Welcome back! Always a pleasure to wake up to your posts.
Good. Thanks, Brett.
Such a treat to see you in my inbox this morning, Ron! VERY relieved to read the good news on your medical front. 💜 As the song goes, “The wai-ai-ting is the hardest part.”
Envious of your time with the Coop! Glad he gave you so many interesting shots. Love all the stretches! Also happy to learn that your yellow-headed buddy lives to visit your feeders another day.
When I saw you were posting from your garden, my mind immediately went to your rhubarb plants. I hope they weathered the frost and that your injured plants come back. I’d hate for you to lose that catalpa or your roses — or anything, especially after all your hard work to create such a lovely garden.
Hope Saturday is a great day for you and that you get to have some fantastic Bourbon as part of it! 💜
“The wai-ai-ting is the hardest part.”
That’s especially true of me, Marty. I don’t handle stress well. Never have. And my middle name is “worry”.
My rhubarb survived with no damage. In fact, I just finished off a pan of rhubarb cobbler (with ice cream) yesterday.
My roses were just about to flower when the frost hit. It froze ALL of the flower buds but most of the leaves survived, some with damage and some without. I pruned off all the frozen flower buds but now I have to wait quite a while for more flowers.
I’ve had a couple of health scares and have driven myself up the wall wondering — I’m getting a bit better now and figure whatever’s there was there before it showed up on a scan or test, so I’ll try to go on with my life until I know more. Of course, that sensible mindset goes right out the window when I’m concerned about someone else’s health. 😂
I can taste the cobbler from here (and am quite envious!).
I probably gained 5 pounds on that cobbler and ice cream. But it was worth it.
WHEW! I was becoming “concerned” over you lengthy absence! The “joys of aging”………. Glad everything is holding steady – at least for now……. 😉 Wonderful series on the Coop behavior “up close” telling a story and glad the yellow headed blackbird “made it”:)
Glad you mentioned the hard frost doing damage as I noted the absence of leaves on the Grape – hope all recover. We have a hard frost predicted for tonight. Most trees aren’t that far along here sooooooo but other ground plants are.
A jaw dropping sight about a week ago with a pair of unusually high flying rooster pheasants coming across the creek. One hit the higher power line! Fortunately, forward speed was slow enough he recovered and made a safe landing with a few ruffled chest feathers.
Interesting story about the rooster pheasant, Judy. Yes, seeing one flying high will get your attention. I’ll bet he squawked when he hit that power line!
I’m so glad to see your “by-line”. ! Those Cooper’s hawks are
such successful hunters that it’s a wonder they haven’t taken over the avian world ( hope they won’t in the future ! ). Your health saga recalled to me an NPR story I heard yesterday about the one really
unmixed advantage of AI technology–much, much superior reading of scans over that done by human radiologists…..glad you’re “up and at ’em” again……..
Thanks, Kris. I’m glad there’s some advantage to AI, Generally I’m not a fan.
Just yesterday I was wondering about you and hoping health issues weren’t the reason for your long blog silence. I’m very happy to learn that all is well, and I’ll take this opportunity to say Happy Birthday and welcome you to the short time that we will be the same age. I can tell you to enjoy this year, because next year at this time you will be feeling as I do right now—–dreading the number I am about to see! And that is all I will say about that!!
Great photos of the birds!!
Thanks, Sue. I’m dreading “that number” already and I still have a year to go.
I remember when my mom faced “that number” and we had a pretty big party for her—-my brother and sister-in-law came with the twins who were 2 years old. She didn’t mind the party but she forbid anyone from saying her age. We made fun of her for it mercilessly. I now understand what she was experiencing, and I’m truly sorry that I was so silly to make it into a joke. Duh
What’s scary is that I remember my mother having a similar reaction when she turned only 75. Hell, 75 is still wet behind the ears…
Great news on the health front! It was getting to be quite a long time without a post and I was beginning to worry about you. Can only imagine what you were going through.
When I saw the title of your post this morning it put a big smile on my face. You had resurfaced and it was about a Coops! A twofer.
He is a handsome young fellow. You gotta love these kind of close encounters where you get to observe for such a long time. Like that photo #4 where you caught that classic one-legged extension stretch.
It is nice to see a Coops in the yard, but I know what you mean about not wanting them to snatch a favorite local.
Life goes on. Glad you are ok, and and happy to see a post.
“It was getting to be quite a long time without a post and I was beginning to worry about you.”
Michael, I don’t enjoy posting medical stuff but I know that some of my readers were concerned about my lengthy absence so it needed to be done.
Hopefully that’ll be the end of it for a while. And thanks for your concern.
What a beautiful hawk! I am a new reader of your blog and have been working my way back through the archives over the past few weeks, was excited to see this update pop up!
Welcome to Feathered Photography, Evelyn.
What an impressive series of photos, and two beautiful birds. Thanks so much for sharing all of that, especially your good medical news. I hope your days are now free of scans and full of birds and relaxation.
Thanks, Mark. For the first time in a couple of months I have nothing medical scheduled. It’s a nice feeling.
So happy to know your health scares were scares. High anxiety for sure! Missed you! 👋💕
Glad you noticed my absence, Kathleen. Thanks.
Glad all is well with you and you have had good news from your doctors !! Great images as usual !! And you didn’t have to go far to get them !!
Thank you, Gary.