Walking at San Joaquin Wildlife Sanctuary

Monday, June 20, 2016

Walking at San Joaquin Wildlife Sanctuary

Every weekend, my husband and I have walked around our neighborhood and enjoyed watching beautiful wild animals such as rabbits, humming birds and ducks. During our walking, I thought we should go to San Joaquin Wildlife Sanctuary again to watch more of wild birds. :) That's why we finally went there last Saturday. It's been a year since we went there last time.

San Joaquin Wildlife Sanctuary in Irvine

There are many huge ponds there. We had only walked around two ponds before, so we decided to walk around as many ponds as possible this time. :) It was a very hot day but was cloudy mainly, so we could still enjoy walking there.

San Joaquin Wildlife Sanctuary in Irvine

The first pond was much smaller than last spring. I thought it might be dried out soon by this strong summer heat.

San Joaquin Wildlife Sanctuary in Irvine

However, other ponds had enough water. There were so many water birds such as black-necked stilts and American avocets which I don't see around our neighborhood.

Black-necked Stilts and American Avocets

She is a black-necked stilt which had long pink legs. As its name, she had a beautiful black neck.

Black-Necked Stilt

San Joaquin Wildlife Sanctuary

She is an American avocet. She had long legs and a long recurved bill.

American Avocet

These small birds are killdeers. They ran very fast.

Killdeer

There were many small tree swallows sitting on the branches.

Tree Swallow

Tree Swallows

There were some wooden bird houses which were set toward the ponds. My husband noticed the sound of baby birds crying from the bird house. The house might be a swallow' nest now.

There were many very cute baby ducks swimming with their mother.

At the third pond, there were many mallard ducks.

Mallard Ducks

They are ruddy ducks, which have bright blue bills.

Ruddy Ducks

Mallard Ducks

They are American coots, which have red spots near the top of the bills. I don't usually see American coots but saw ones at Woodbridge North Lake in Irvine before.

American Coots

The trail looked like wild animals' trail. I was thinking what if I encountered a mountain lion there... It's not a joke at all. It might happen in Southern California.

San Joaquin Wildlife Sanctuary

At the fourth pond, there were some black cormorants. It was pretty surprising to me because I had only seen cormorants at the coast in Southern California such as La Jolla, Dana Point and Redondo Beach. I didn't expect that I would see cormorants at the pond there.

Cormorants

Cormorant

There were many Canada geese which I often see in Orange county.

Canada Geese

These are mountain doves, which I also see around my neighborhood.

Mountain Doves

San Joaquin Wildlife Sanctuary

Rabbit

San Joaquin Wildlife Sanctuary

Rabbit

This time, I also used my Canon PowerShot SX50 HS to take pictures of wild animals without a tripod. Because it has 50x optical zoom, it's very useful to take picture from very far away and I was also able to use my camera just like binoculars to watch wild animals. My husband used his Canon DSLR camera with the telephoto zoom lens, and he took better pictures than mines. I would share those with you in my tomorrow's entry.

I uploaded this video, which I took with my Canon PowerShot SX50 HS.