Mission Accomplished! (Meep Meep)

Today we had an absolutely awesome morning at Bosque Del Apache wildlife area just south of Soccorro, New Mexico.  We got there just after sunrise.  On the road to the preserve, we saw sandhill cranes flying overhead.  We saw a group of ten cranes, another group of fifteen cranes, a group of twelve, a group of thirty and suddenly a group of fifty cranes flew low right over my car.  One of the cranes left a deposit on my windshield.  I said, "Oh, goodness, a crane crapped on my car!  Do it again!"  Hundreds of cranes filled the sky above the road.  We saw a parking area on the right next to a shallow pond. We stopped there and watched cranes walk by and fly off for at least 20 minutes.  It looks hard for a crane to take off.  Some cranes lift right up but others have to hop and flap for a time.  As they leave the ground, their legs hang down.  With each flap of the winds the legs ratchet up one notch until by the tenth flap of the wings, the legs are straight back.  We visited the nature center. At the bird feeder there we saw white crowned sparrows, red winged blackbirds, rofous towhee, pine siskins, crows, and a couple rodents.  As we drove on the wildlife drive, we saw a Cooper's Hawk, Northern shoveler ducks, and coots.  Offspring #2 spotted something white on the side of the road.  I thought it was a piece of paper.  With binoculars we could tell we spotted a burrowing owl.  Offspring #2 is an awesome bird spotter!  The owl was just sitting on top of a lump on the ground, watching us watch him.  We also saw American wigeons, pintail ducks, bufflehead ducks, red tailed hawks, a flicker, and three Wilson's snipe.  The snipe were in a field with many sandhill cranes and a group of crows.  Suddenly another black bird started chasing the crows away.  It was large and black but flew differently than the crows.  It turned out to be a grove billed ani.  The road was wet from the rain overnight.  Mud splashed so high I even had mud on the roof.  Sometimes I had to concentrate on getting through the mud and could not stop to look for birds.  As I took one muddy corner, Offspring #2, the awesome bird spotter, screamed into my right ear.  I laid on the brakes.  She yells, "It was running on the road."  On my left, I spotted a road runner run behind a bush.  We backed up the car a few times and got a couple good looks at the state bird of New Mexico.  We also saw a Northern Harrier hawk, snow geese. Ross' geese and a western meadowlark.  As we left the park, the nature finale, the icing on the cake, was a pair of kestrels (Mr. and Mrs.) flying up and landing in the same tree.  The Bosque Del Apache is an awesome place to watch birds.