Wildlife Hike

I reserved a day-pass for Colorado Bend State Park for Sunday morning and planned to get out there early before it got too hot. For some reason I was wide awake by 4:30AM on Sunday morning, and decided that I might as well get an early start as it is an hour and half’s drive to get there anyway. So I had some breakfast, made a thermos full of coffee and headed out. I hadn’t identified a good place for a sunrise photo out there and it was another mostly cloudless morning anyway, so I wasn’t worried about getting there before sunrise. But I did get there just after sunrise and hoped I would see some animals still active in the morning sunlight.

View from the river trail at Colorado Bend State Park

I saw a lot of deer on the road but unfortunately none on the hiking trails. But the river was full of herons as it usually is and I got to take several photos from along the river bank. The heron are very easily spooked so, I did have to shoot from quite a distance. I have taken close-ups of the birds before but I thought that I’d try for more of an environmental photo showing the bird in its surroundings. The photo below shows the heron looking toward the rising sun with the trees and their reflections in the background. My favorite photo of the outing.

Down the river I found another heron holding a little fish. I couldn’t tell it was a fish until I got back home and looked at the photo.

And for a detail shot, a dragonfly against an out-of-focus river bed in the background.

I hiked down the river trail and then up the Gorman Spring Trail to its source and then on the way back I ran across a little hognose snake crossing the trail. It wasn’t much more than a foot long and it mostly just froze there considering whether to play dead or flee. This gave me a chance to appreciate the beautiful patterns on its back and take some photos. This is a western hognose snake and they are quite common in these parts, they aren’t venomous, don’t bite, and go after smaller animals like lizards and rodents.

I got a bit lower to try to get a better photo of the snake’s head. The hognose snake has an upturned snout from which it gets its name and that may be useful for burrowing. You can also notice that the snake has round eyes and pupils, therefor you can tell that it is not a venomous viper like the rattlesnake or water-moccasin which have vertical cat-like pupils, and thus it is harmless to humans. I did actually see a water moccasin in the spring earlier, but only got a quick glimpse of it as it took off into the water.

They also flatten their neck out and puff up like a cobra when threatened, which is what this one did as it crawled off into the leaves. It is an impressive display with the large black patches behind its head.

That was my nature hike. I never know what kind of wildlife I am going to see out there, but I usually see something interesting.

18 thoughts on “Wildlife Hike”

  1. Love the photo of the heron with the trees. I agree its the best one.
    I wouldn’t think a tiny fish like the heron had in its mouth would be very satisfying.
    The snake may be small, but not small enough for me, LOL!
    Like i said your heron photos were great. 🙂 Oh, and the dragonfly.

    Liked by 2 people

      1. No worries! I had my suspicions when you said I may or may not like the photos. And it is great to see wildlife in its own habitat. Just as long as the slithering snakes stay far enough away from me. Jason was actually hoping to see a rattler when we were in Texas.
        I would rather see slithering wildlife than creepy, crawly, so you are safe.

        Liked by 2 people

  3. I love the heron shots. I’ve seen them too, heron there. In the first heron shot, I think there are three hippos in the water. Such beautiful animals.

    All the photos are great, but my favorite is any one of the hognose snake. I’ve never seen those snakes in the wild before. I don’t know much about them, but I’ve heard you can make delicious bacon from them.

    Liked by 2 people

  5. Yep… I’m going for the road again. Predictable, I suppose. But I like the sense of mystery.
    The dragonfly was cool though. It made a nice crop when zoomed.

    Cool snake. Nothing poisonous locally. Benefit of a colder environment.
    So, an off-the-wall question… I’m certainly not a herpetologist and I don’t think I’ve ever looked at a snake all that closely, but is that a “parietal eye”? As I recall from somewhere (probably some college bio class), snakes don’t have them. And a couple of quick searches seemed to verify that. Just wondering?

    Like

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