It started as many other days had.  I was in the mood to go take some pictures, so I grabbed my camera and headed over to Wood Lake.  Once I got to the main boardwalk, I noticed that there were some barn swallows sitting on the wire railing.  I started taking some pictures, slowly moving closer after each until I was close enough to get them basically full frame.

Barn SwallowClick to Purchase Barn SwallowClick to Purchase

Then I looked up and spotted a 4 or 5-year-old bald eagle slowly circling overhead (that's the age at which the head turns white).

So far, nothing all that unusual.  Except that, apparently, the eagle caused some egrets to take flight.

EgretClick to Purchase EgretClick to Purchase EgretClick to Purchase

As I stood there, chatting with a naturalist who works there, watching a muskrat and the eagle and everything else, one of the egrets landed in the top of a tree for maybe a minute, then took off again.

EgretClick to Purchase

Looking back, the eagle had left, but an osprey showed up briefly, as did a great blue heron.  Then the heron dropped down to water level and started flying at us

Great Blue HeronClick to Purchase

only to fly past maybe 5 feet away.

That was pretty much it for the birds, except that, on my way out I decided to stop at the dock to see if there was anything interesting going on there.  And there was cormorant swimming past, showing off the fish that it had caught.

Double-Crested Cormorant with fishClick to Purchase Double-Crested Cormorant with fishClick to Purchase

As a sort of post-script, I need to share one last image.  This was the first time I saw a snapping turtle at Wood Lake.  And next to this one was the weirdest, freakiest thing I have seen for a long time.  Some friends tell me it is a bryozoan, which were around before the dinosaurs.

Snapping Turtle with BryozoaClick to Purchase