Grouse chicks

Pyrola Chlorantha (green pyrola)

Finally, I went on a Nature walk again. I had some busy days, that took me away from the wild. The wild never totally leaves me though. On several occasions I saw a little Chipping Sparrow. It's a little inconspicious bird with a beautiful reddish brown crown. It hops here in my yard and one on the side walk down town Whitehorse, close to a beautiful wild garden opposite Phillip's Bicycle shop.
Because I had been away for a few days, I kind of had to start again, and went back to the Birch trees, where I started my first stories in early May. As back then, it took me a while to slow the chatter in my head down. No sooner I started to see the pleasures of Nature. First the Birch trees I tapped for sap, looked very good, as healthy as the others, nothing showed that they had given me such an abundance of sap. I looped through a Spruce forest into the willows towards the little meadow. It's beautiful, the green grass, different kinds are blooming, in the middle a silver green patch of Coltsfoot. I can see an animal has recently walked through, and it appears it ate the yellow flowers of a Geum (avens).On my way back I suddenly see many more flowers. There's a patch of little Dogwood(Cornus canadensis) close to the Birchtrees. And later by the creek I find the taller Red-osier Dogwood (Cornus stolonifera). In and close to the swamp, there are the different Pyrolas. In the swamp there is a flock of Bohemian waxwings. Some fly around from dead tree to dead tree, some just sit quietly. And then the real treat. On the path ahead of me a Grouse moves away in a suspicious way. I follow her, that's what she wants, I think she is trying to lead me away from her young. Indeed as I go back to the path, there is one chick. I try to photograph it, but it is amazing how well it knows how to hide. Ha, as I am following the chick, mom comes back with her tail fanned out and hissing. I let them be.