Pelicans flying at Nags Head

Cloudy morning, cool

These are Brown Pelicans (Pelicanus occidentalis). Most pelicans sit on the water and scoop fish with their bills, but these pelicans plunge dive from great heights--as high as 60 feet. They open their pouches and scoop up everything, then drain the water and keep the fish. Seagulls often steal fish right from a pelican's mouth while the pelican is decanting.

Nature Conservancy Preserve

This morning, we went for a walk at the Nags Head Woods Ecological Preserve, operated by the Nature Conservancy.
You can see a little how the preserve contains different ecosystems...you start out in the swamp, then climb into the forest, then come out onto a sandy hillside with pines...then back into the woods.

Lots of algae and many biting insects, plus frogs hiding under the green

I don't yet know what this is.

An interesting bright yellow fungus with tiny, shiny black bugs (beetles) on it

Sandy hillside with pines

I thought maybe this was a salt-loving fern, but Wikipedia says the word "bracken" just comes from an
Old Norse word for fern.

Sassafras tree

A mushroom with a red top--not sure what kind

Growths I saw last year at Lums Pond

Blueberries

Myrtle

Osprey family at Lone Cedar

This is one of the osprey parents on the nest outside Basnight's Lone Cedar Cafe in Nags Head, North
Carolina. We have been to this restaurant each summer over the last few years and seen ospreys with their chicks.

This parent sat on the nest the whole time we were eating, with the three chicks popping up from time to time. The other parent finally came back; then both parents left the nest for a time.

You can see a rainstorm in the background.

Wasp

Sitting on the steps at DEEC,  Friday, May 30, 2014.