Raven Run and McConnell Springs

Raven Run

It was very wet

This past Saturday Erin and I went to Raven Run, then McConnell Springs. We headed for Raven Run after lunch, and got there a few hours before closing. There were a surprising number of people there, but I guess it was actually a pretty nice day for hiking. It was a nice mild temperature and overcast. The hiking was... ugly. It was extremely muddy. I guess that shouldn't have been surprising since it rained most of the past week. I did spot a snail on the trail, and that was pretty much it for my pictures here.

Erin says it's cute

Well there was also this wildflower. It took us a while to figure out what it was, but we did it. Go us!

Fire pink

 

McConnell Springs

Next up was McConnell Springs, which turned out to be much more fruitful for photography and surprisingly, wildlife. It was also much less muddy, since their trails are either paved or mulched pretty well. It's a great place to visit, especially after a rain, and I'm always searching for a repeat of something I witnessed here a couple years ago that I'd love to get a picture of.

I was sad to see that part of the roof at the nature center had burned.

Burnt over the picnic area

 The blue hole was looking very blue. There is a path going through with one sided flooded due to heavy rain, and the blue hole is on the other side. The side-by-side below shows how blue it appears.

Left image - normal water, Right image - the blue hole

 The heavy rain had the boils really going. I took a brief video since pictures don't really do it justice.

Link to Video (I can't seem to embed it anymore)

The final sink was also flowing well. Erin and I have been to McConnell Springs 6 or 7 times, and this has definitely been the most active we've seen the water.

Lots of water

There are a lot of tent caterpillar webs around during this time of year in Kentucky. We happened to see a tent caterpillar.

Tent Caterpillar

They've done a lot of work over the years to build up a marshy area in the park. Which leads me to the prize of the day.

Great blue heron

There were also these birds that we watched zig-zag around the pond and splash into the water briefly. We're pretty sure they were chimney swifts. I didn't manage to get a picture of them hitting the water. Maybe someday...

Chimney swift (mostly certain)

While I was watching the chimney swifts, I happened to catch a glimpse of a larger bird flying into the trees. I didn't manage to get any particularly good shots of it. I would have cropped closer if I had. This one is blurry at full resolution, but pretty good at the standard upload size (2048 pixels wide).

Cooper's Hawk

And because I can't resist, another shot of the great blue heron.

Vertical

Then came a really lucky moment. The heron started preening and looking restless, then decided to take flight. I wish I could say that the flight sequence were my best pictures of the day, but I got my camera caught on my jacket while I was lifting it. Hopefully next time I'll do a bit better. In the meantime, this is still a pretty good picture when it is downrezzed.

Great blue heron in flight

And finally as we were leaving, we managed to scare a groundhog and watched him quickly scamper for cover. I thought my opportunity was lost, but was saved by a cute bunny.

Bunny, grooming

And while I was taking a few pictures of the bunny, this fat little guy decided to pop back out.

Groundhog

So overall a very fruitful visit to the springs. We also saw a few other creatures... squirrels, which I've had a surprisingly difficult time getting a good picture of. Robins - they are plentiful around here, and I've got a ton of photos of them. Cardinals - they were singing loudly today, but I didn't get any pictures worth posting. I also think I caught a glimpse of a red-headed woodpecker, though it was too fleeting to know for certain. Definitely a great day, and I'm glad that even though we were exhausted after trekking through all the mud at Raven Run, we decided to go ahead and visit the springs.