Today I took Sam with me on a field day on my outdoor beat. Sam is a beautiful Border Collie who lives with three Greyhounds that are rescues. Sam is going to be the featured dog hero in a book series under my Bow Wow Detectives® imprint. I'll announce the title of that series at a later time.
We hiked to the river, and Sam helped me solve a couple little mysteries in our time outdoors today. Sam seemed to enjoy our time sitting by the river watching the river flowing by, listening to the sounds of the blue jays, a passing eagle, and the sounds of all the other birds.
Sam was with me to help discover eagle nest nine, one I wrote into my journal as a new nest today. Not much activity going on for such a warm January day in Minnesota!
Sam and I arrived at another of my stops and found 18 Trumpeter Swans feeding in the open slough, the count has more than doubled since the January 2. The young gray cygnet, seems to be a loner, doesn't hang out with the other swans at all and that makes me curious as to why he drifts away? Last night he remained behind with his duck companions, while the two adults flew off to another slough at sundown. He is surrounded by mallards that stay close, and feed off plants he drops in the water, but he doesn't seem to mind feeding them. He preens with them, he swims with them, he camps with them. I'm calling him Lonan.
Maybe I'll write a children's story about him. You'll love the pictures. He's already included in my side documentary for this year, a book I'm calling Ghost Dancers.
For the record: I name subjects in my wildlife studies by names I decide for my stories. To you, or another photographer, you can call them Subject 1, Bird 2, or 342125, or by the band number they wear--if you have really great eyes and happen to see underwater! Sometimes (many times actually) I end up writing a children's story based on a real animal I've spent time studying, based off the details through changing seasons, their growth, age, characteristics, behavior, and other details I keep for my research.
Thank you, Tammy and Sam's family of Greyhounds for letting me take Sam along to hang out with me on Day 6 today!
––See you on the journey,
Lisa