the birds in mom's backyard

Today while I was in the backyard reading, mom came out with the dog. Buddy. After a few minutes, mom said to Buddy, in a voice calibrated to cause excitement, "Buddy, do you wanna see the birds?" And Buddy started jumping and wagging and then, as if on cue, an enormous hawk wheeled across the sky and Buddy looked up at it and got even more excited.

Mom wasn't talking about that hawk, though, she was talking about the birds that hang out in the retention canal. She walked across the yard and stood gingerly on the edge and Buddy and I followed.

The canal itself is deep, but only a few inches of water stand in the bottom. Still and murky, but full of life. Ducks, ibises, herons, egrets and cranes were all in there when we peered over the edge. Amazing, the ecosystem in mom's backyard. Besides the ducks, all these long-legged water birds look positively prehistoric. You can see dinosaurs in their peircing eyes and their crook'd beaks. Incredible.

Cool enough even to amaze the dog.