The Ides of March

"Beware the Ides of March", the soothsayer warned Julius Caesar. That was the day he was assasinated by his friends. So it went down in history that March 15 was some kind of a "bad luck" day.

Ides or not, we decided to go to Placerita Canyon, albeit a tad later than usual. Again, we were fooled by the weatherman. There's a storm front arriving Saturday morning, he predicted. So we thought we'd just stay in bed a little longer since it would be pointless to go birding on a rainy day, wouldn't it? But when I rose to pick up the newspaper at around 8 am, the sun was joyfully shining!

We did a quickie breakfast, then sped to Placerita. We got there just a little after nine. There were birds all right, we just couldn't see them. Cynthia kept reassuring me because she heard all the twitters and tweets all over the place (I can't - I'm a little hearing impaired). Then we would see movements in the bushes or trees. Or a bird would suddenly fly and then promptly get lost in the underbrush once again. Ten am and we still have not taken a single shot, even after we have completed the trail loop.

At the picnic area, we got a little bit luckier. The Western Bluebirds, the males of which had taken on the deep blue breeding plumage, were a bit more cooperative, except that they stayed mostly in the shades of the oak trees. 

So did the Oak Titmice. Then a Red-shouldered Hawk came crashing in, scared all the little birds, and then took off after a few minutes.

Finally at noon, I decided to call it a day. The Ides of March certainly applied to our photography. So I just declared our trip a birding sortie instead - we did see quite a number of species - and be happy with that.