Yellow-rumped Warbler (Audubon's)

Friends, Cathy and Terry, and I left Calgary early morning on Wednesday (14 May 2014) and got home at something like 12:15 a.m. midnight yesterday (Thursday, 15 May 2014), after two long, wonderful days in the Rocky Mountains, west of the city. Wednesday night was spent in a spotless motel, in a place that had so many Mountain Sheep roaming the streets, lol! Though we were hoping to see at least one Bear, I was happy as can be to see absolutely anything beautiful : )

Over the two days, we had 7 bear sightings, with three definitely different Black Bears (no Grizzlies), and possibly four. The rest of the sightings were of Bears we had already seen.

We made many stops and at each one, we usually came across something different. This time, it was a little Yellow-rumped Warbler, which looked like a black silhouette until I brightened the image. They are such pretty birds. I usually see the Myrtle form, which has a white throat, but this yellow-throated bird is an Audubon's form. (Thanks, Dee!)

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yellow-rumped_Warbler

www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/yellow-rumped_warbler/id

One thing that was proven to me while we were away was that taking photos, even with a fairly light-weight point-and-shoot camera, is what is either causing, or making much worse, the awful pain in my arms and shoulders. Not a good thing, and it made it very unpleasant, every second of the day, unfortunately. In fact, the whole of my body felt as if it was inflamed. Just holding the camera and trying to keep it as steady as I could, was really awkward as well as intensely painful. Too much mouse clicking when using the computer at home is another cause of this pain.

Thanks SO much, Cathy and Terry, for so kindly inviting me along on this trip. It's always so much fun to spend time with you guys, and you are both so knowledgable. Thanks for so many chances to take photos of such a variety of subjects!

And now I'm back to all the frustrating problems of Flickr, including search problems and very definite Stats (views) problems. Ha, I'm away for just two days (didn't post any photos for just one of the days) and now things aren't working? Barely any new photos from My Contacts showing, either. What a mess!