You know there's never a camera around when you really really want one, right?
Like yesterday afternoon when I was returning home from a birthday party for a friend, for example. It was at a good restaurant, so I had a large bag with a couple boxes of leftovers in it. Across the top of those was my purse because I needed my driver's license and credit card, plus bunches of other stuff for "what iffs". The large bag I'd had to walk around the car to pick up since they were on the passenger side floor with the bag handles looped around the parking brake so a quick turn or braking wouldn't spill food all over. You never know what nearby idiots are going to do or when a deer might run out.
Hmmm, I guess that might be redundant if one considers deer who cross a highway in traffic are by definition idiots. Puts true meaning into thinning the herd.
I was a bit tired from a non-stop day, which included a stop at a favorite garden center on my way home, just to see if they had iris in yet, and if so, what colors. Online searches the day before of a couple large metro garden centers had no iris listed yet, but this more local place I stopped at has always had a great selection of plants and whatsits, as well as helpful staff. After looking at the amount of walking involved in searching through tiny tags to see what species they even were, much less varieties, I opted for heading inside and talking to the woman at the counter. She looked up their inventory, showed a couple photos of current stock, and then offered to head out and bring me a nice pot of the one I liked best. She actually brought two pots so I could see there was a definite "best" in her choices. It's one of the things I like about these people.
The gallon pot of tiny iris leaves was, like all pots, tippy, so she gave me a small box to put under it to catch any spilled dirt, which it did. I still had 25 miles left to drive home after buying it, and stoplights were included. So was a gas fill-up. (The pot of iris with seven separate tops poking up was less expensive!) I know you haven't asked, but the iris will bloom mostly pink, with a bit of white and yellow. Look up "Pinkerton".
Anyway, I was just loaded up and ready to lock the car doors when a neighbor stopped to chat. She was hoping I wasn't offended that she stopped by to look at my flowers. Right now there are lots of daffodils visible behind the home, but clearly visible from the paved path that goes between the streets as a shortcut to the community center. I assured her that not only was I not offended but I considered it a compliment! But my armfuls were getting heavier each minute and I needed to excuse myself.
Just as I turned, a little bird I was unfamiliar with hopped across the grass and up into my raised circle bed, looking for his next meal. Seeds? Bugs? The leaves from iris and day lilies are up about 6 to 8 inches at the moment. No clue what this bird was except it was startlingly different and gorgeous. And then gone!
I made a point of noting all the details I could in those ten seconds or so, before heading inside and taking care of what I was toting. Refrigerator for one part, water and a catch tray on the porch for a short time for the other until planting in a newly opened bed now that most of the rhubarb plants have been gifted away. No chance at all for any camera in all that activity, just trying to multitask by remembering the details of this strange bird.
Later I tried looking it up online. I knew what it wasn't. With no name to search for I started with colors and patterns. It was about sparrow sized, larger than a finch but smaller than a robin, mostly black with bits of white scattered through it. Had that been all there was to see, I wouldn't have looked twice. But when its wings were folded down, like they were when it was hopping across the ground, there was a bright stripe of a golden orange - or orange-ish gold - under the wing most of its body length. Not on the chin or under the tail. The effect was spectacular!
Google offered me a robin. Then a Baltimore oriole. I know those birds well, having lived with them most of my years in Minnesota, and as close as in the yard, a nest in a tree or over the front door, or even an oriole encouraging its newly fledged young to hop-fly over a fence and into the branches of a cherry tree for some yummy fruit.
Sorry, Google, epic fail! I tried other ways of describing this bird, different things to stress first, and nothing helped. Not a sparrow, a finch, a meadowlark either. Time to contact a human expert. Considering the time of year and the possibility this bird was strange because it was migrating much further north, I emailed my sister-in-law up in Bemidji. Between her and my brother, they know birds. Lots of other things as well, but between educations and occupations, if it's outdoors, somebody there will know. I just needed to do my best version of describing this bird and what I know it wasn't, however much Google might argue.
This morning I got a quick answer back, looked it up in sources with a lot of photos, and while I found a lot of examples with very inferior coloration (females?) I did find several good photos in the bunch, enough to verify that the bird stopping by was indeed a yellow rumped warbler. Thank you!!!
But damn, I wish I'd had my camera ready! I might have gotten a shot in during those 15 seconds, right? Let's see, 5 to drop the bundles, or ten to do it without damaging them, 5 to pick up the camera if it had been, say, in an accessible pocket, 3 to turn it on, 4 to aim it, 2 more to zoom, and twelve to make sure it had already left the yard the second I scared it by dropping my armfulls.
Sigh-h-h-h......
