Non-Breeding Cattle Egrets

Today the temperature is 45 degrees but it feels like 35 degrees. This is the park by my house.

I stopped here after a trip to the library, the dollar store, and a hobby store. I saw one cormorant and several gulls.

My friend, Cathy, identified these as non-breeding cattle egrets. Whew! My inability to identify them has been driving me up a wall all dang day.

 

The Fixer Upper

 Mary Kay Andrews is the author of The Fixer Upper. Golly this book had me laughing out loud as I drove around Texas. Maybe I will stick to humorous books for audio books for a time. Dempsey Jo Killebrew is an assistant in a lobbyist office. She gets caught in a scandal and has to leave town. The FBI finds her in a small town in Guthrie, Georgia where she is temporarily living. Her father wants her to fix this house up so they can sell it and split the profits. Dempsey learns new skills such as scraping the paint off of pine cabinets and using a sander to sand the kitchen floor. Nobody could learn those skills that fast but this is fiction so there you go. I totally enjoyed the book. One part of the surprise ending was unbelievable though. The FBI would NEVER do what the author wrote they did.

Pictures From San Jacinto

The monument when I arrived.

This is from my deck as I edited pictures from two  nights ago. This is my personal great blue heron that comes here to eat twice a day.

The beginning of the boardwalk looks inviting.

Is this a swamp cactus? I guess it is.

Information about invasive species.

The end of the trail for me!

Baby piggies foot print and scat.

Here is the tree from where the three little piggies emerged.

This great heron was at the Nature Conservancy.

The ducks were here too. I think I see the Nike swoosh of a blue winged teal.

I'm on the ferry watching dolphins from the comfort of my own car! Whooppee!

The view of the monument from the far side of the reflecting pool.

I parked my car here and walked around the park. The park has QR codes so I scanned one. I listened to the Galveston Orchestra playing music they labelled as bold.

What are these birds anyway? I cannot figure it out. But I will.

So many ducks in the air.

 

San Jacinto National Monument

 Today I drove north to visit the San Jacinto National Monument that I read about in the Texas Historical Commission travel guide. The monument was a 30 minute drive and I found it easily. The monument was tall and the top was shrouded in fog. I walked up a series of twenty stone steps and looked up I immediately felt dizzy. I walked around the monument and read the words. I walked down the steps on the far side and saw a map that said there was a 3 mile nature trail. It was 11 a.m. I figured I could walk 3 miles before lunch so I took off walking. The path was asphalt followed by a board walk. I scanned the pond from an elevated platform and saw some ducks. I kept walking. The platform ended and now I was to walk on sand. I heard some rustling in the grass under a tree right there and out of the grass came a little piggy, a black one. Aloud I say, "A little piggy?" Out comes a brown and white piggy followed by another black piggy. Three little piggies! Then I think back to the sharp teeth of the feral pigs that I saw at the Houston Botanical Garden and decide to head back to my car and exchange my sandals for boots. After putting on my boots and exchanging my wool plaid shirt for a rain coat, I come back to the same spot. As I get there I see a middle aged couple and the man is carrying a 30 pound bag of dog food. I tell them about the three little piggies. He says he is there to feed the pigs and the coyotes. He throws a handful of dog food at the base of the tree. These people come here all the time to feed the pigs and the coyotes. What an unusual hobby! He is angry that people shoot the pigs and coyotes. I agree about the coyotes. We keep walking and see little piggy foot prints in the mud. We talk about nature. He says he was at work when the tornado hit last week. He was in a small metal shack holding onto a pipe. He felt the shack lift up. He called his wife and said he loved her and would she please raise their son? He was uninjured. They stopped by a bench. I said I was going the three miles. He said sometimes that path is blocked but it is pretty. He has seen bobcats in here too. I walked to the end and the path was blocked. So I walked back to my car again. But then I saw a large pond to the side of the monument so I thought I would walk around that. I pulled my sandwich out of my fanny pack and proceeded down the hill to the pond. Swamp sparrows were tweeting and I heard a white winged dove (a first for me). Pelicans and herons flew by. I got to the far side and took a picture of the monument again. I saw a man walk down to the pond from his car and put a remote controlled sailboat in the water. His boat costs nine hundred dollars. He suggests that if I buy one, I should buy a RTR (ready to run). Behind us we hear music playing. A lady in a sleeveless dress is going to have a photo shoot. I keep walking to my car and drive off taking the prairie drive. I think about flying my kite. I check the weather. Now we have too little wind, for Pete's sake. I drive to the Park Headquarters. I push the doorbell. A woman answers. I ask about the museum. She said it is closed on Mondays and Tuesdays and that this is only the administrative building. Oh, well, thanks anyways I say. I see a sign for a ferry. I think about taking the ferry. Their website talks about fees. I really don't want to pay a fee so I park at the park and walk around this historic place. I look up the price of the ferry again and it is free. Free is my favorite price. I take the ferry with 7 other cars. From my seat and in the comfort of my own car I see dolphins jumping. Holy cow! The ride is over in 8 minutes and off I go to another nature center. When I get there the woman says the price is four dollars. I lie and tell her I didn't mean to come in. She allows me to drive out. Now it is rush hour. Why am I always driving around during rush hour? I stop at a MacDonald's to use the restroom. When did MacDonalds start having televisions on the wall? I am very near a branch of the University of Houston. I use the restroom and come out and turn the wrong way. I am going into the men's room? Woah, wrong way I say and I laugh. The man walking in laughs too. I find a Nature Conservancy park that is mostly on my way home. I drive there. Golly, this place is beautiful. I see a flock of foot high, totally white birds pecking in the grass. What are these? Egrets? No. Herons? No. They are all over the place pecking at the grass. I see twenty white birds. I take too many pictures. I start walking around this large pond. I see ducks in the grass. I take their picture. I see a heron in the lake. I take a picture. I see ducks flying over head and take too many pictures. I keep walking. I am a little cold walking in my sandals and shorts so I try to go faster by taking smaller steps. I am not supposed to run but I am kind of jogging. I keep taking pictures. A lady with a dog walks by. She is walking but she is way faster than me. I go back to walking normally. I use my bird guide book in my car and cannot find those white birds. I use the Audubon app on my phone and I can't find those white birds. I don't know what the white birds are. Maybe the others are right. I should join INaturalist. I make it home by 5:30. The pictures are not loading for me today. Tomorrow is laundry day and then I will go to the library again. Or else I might try again in the morning. I get better service in the mornings.

Texas City Dike

Today I drove to the Texas City Dike. My goal was to seen a loon and a roseate spoonbill.

As I was gingerly climbing down these giant pink rocks, a 12 year old boy came out of the van and asked if I needed help. I must have looked like I needed help I guess.

Lots of gulls hang out here because people feed them junk food and fish.

This guy caught a black drum. He said it weighed over 20 pounds so he had to put it back after he let his dog smell it.

Brown pelicans are excellent at catching fish.

They let me get real close too.

This picture would be better if someone would pick up their trash. There is a lot of trash in Texas.

I a bunch of sanderlings, some plovers and some killdeer. I watched two red throated loons swimming and diving back and forth. That was cool to see. I saw Neotropic Cormorants and white pelicans.

The picture is blurry but there, right before your eyes, is a roseate spoonbill. Success!

Another snowy egret. As I walked back to my car both the roseate spoonbill and this egret were gone. I guess I was lucky to see them at all.

I walked up this big hill just to get some exercise. That big propeller had many notches taken out of it and I wondered why.

This is why.

The Rotary Club helped to build this cool lighthouse. Inside were information boards about the dike and the water shed and the gate they use to keep water out during hurricanes.

I wanted to go to Virginia Point. Google didn't know that the exit to that area is closed so I ended up going over the big bridge to Galveston. I went under this bridge to your left and I tried to keep going but Google didn't know that road doesn't go through. I almost got stuck in the mud. Rain is falling hard so I have to have my wipers on double fast.

This is the bridge going back to Texas City.

When I got home rain wasn't falling so I took a walk around the block and came upon this beautiful bird hunting for fish in the ditch next to the road right by the San Leon water rower.

 

Houston Botanical Garden

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I signed up for a class on medicinal herbs today at the Houston Botanical Garden. Last night I packed my lunch and set out my clothes so I would be ready first thing. I bought a coffee at Starbucks with my retirement gift card and drove north to Houston. I arrived a half hour before it opened so I drank my coffee in my car. At 10 a.m. I went up to the desk to get my ticket.

This is an artist's rendition of a termite mound. Looks real to me.

My class didn't start until noon so I walked around until 11:15.

This is barrel cactus. And that is when I realized that I forgot my lunch at home.

This turtle shell was in a tiny building called House of Curiosities. I asked the woman in the gift shop about where to buy a vegetarian lunch. She laughed. She said the food truck outside has great avocado toast and delicious smoothies.

I went to the truck and asked. The lady there asked what I had packed in my lunch. I told her vegan pepperoni on focaccia bread with butter and a cut up mango. Eventually I ordered a smoothie with mango, berries, peaches, spinach, oat milk and almond milk. The cup was bright green and huge and deliciosioso! I couldn't finish it all.

This is a tarantula in a terrarium. I brought it to my class. A lady asked if she could sit next to me so we worked together. The teacher was a fantastic teacher.

The teacher looked to be about 25. She said she was born in Mexico and was diagnosed with ADHD at age 12. She was put on medication that took a terrible toll on her body.

That Texas stone is gorgeous. The teacher had about 25 students. Two of the students were children which was cool. One was a nurse and she had good questions. Two ladies run their own herb farm. They were there when I came in and they mentioned how early I arrived.

This art work looked like a six foot tall bush with a depression in it. When I got closer I saw it was made of metal letters. That is just darling! It's like a word salad.

I was nodding in approval at what the teacher was saying. I agreed with her almost 100 per cent.

Big Pharma interrupts my evening news hour every night and irritates me to no end.

She makes a good point here!

The teacher asked many questions and the students gave the answers.

Maybe I should visit an allopathic. Ok, I took like 50 pictures today.

We got to go outside and collect our herbs. She suggested we taste each one that we put into our jar.

I bet I ate a dozen herbs and possibly a few bugs.

We put our herbs into our glass jars after we chopped them up with sharp knives.

We added at least half of the jar with apple cider vinegar.

Then we topped it off with honey collected from her bee keeping friend.

We put wax paper over the jar before putting the lid on it.

And then we shook it up like Taylor Swift.

She also gave us food to eat. I took a banana but there were berries and pastries available.

Every day we are supposed to shake out bottle and keep it stored in the refrigerator.

In two weeks we are to strain the mixture through cheesecloth or muslin and compost the herbs.

Then we can add some to our salads.

And then she gave us each a plant of Calendula!

She had to hurry us along because she had another class to teach in 30 minutes.

I asked her about the 2 cups of dried rose hips I have at home. She said I could definitely use them to make a syrup. So that's cool.

I am go glad I came here today. Traffic in Houston was lighter because it is a Saturday.

She suggested we use Ever clear in our tinctures. Man, I remember that stuff from parties in Saint Cloud.

Absolutely fantastic class.

So then I walked to the children's side of the property.

They had a Lego exhibit.

A Monarch made of Legos.

A preying mantis.

A rototiller? Fabulous.

Oops, pictures are coming out of order.

This was supposed to be the last picture. I walked with a lady named Lupita.

I used the QR codes to download music to listen to while I walked around.

Mallard!

I saw turtles in the water but I didn't get any good pictures.

Lupita was born in southern Mexico. She needs to get out of the house every day just like me.

Lupita used INaturalist and she had a ton of pictures on her phone.

She wanted to take the class I took so I told her all about it.

My grand girls would love this place.