This past weekend was a mixed bag of weather and activities, starting with a visit to Humber Nurseries Saturday morning with my friend, Rosanne, where we attended a seminar on how to prepare our gardens for winter.  Armed with enthusiasm, a roll of burlap, and some wooden stakes, Steve and I spent the mild and sunny afternoon in the yard raking, cleaning the leaves and debris from the eaves troughs, and protecting some of our shrubs and small trees from the harsh winter sun and wind.  Then we enjoyed a fabulous dinner at The Keg, thanks to another friend, then it poured.  So much for our Sunday plans…

But, we woke up to sunny skies and our plans were back on.  Off to the Mountsberg Conservation Area we went – somewhere we had put on our “must visit” list.

Our first stop was to collect a pumpkin from the Welcome Centre – free with admission because of Hallowe’en – that we could have carved with provided tools but chose to put into the car instead, for something yummy to eat in the near future.

This conservation area, one of seven parks in Conservation Halton, has a Raptor Centre – a home for injured or abandoned birds of prey – a Bison Centre, a petting farm, and lovely trails to hike.

With 30 minutes before the Raptors show, we were really excited to meet up with a Great Horned Owl sitting on the arm of a park employee so took advantage of that photo op.

              

The centre has several outside cages housing various raptors and we did our best to capture good enough shots of them through the fencing.

Injured Bald Eagle:

     

Gyrfalcon:

    

Red-Tailed Hawk:

     

And another bird of prey whose type I cannot remember:

We got seats in the front row and the show began – two specimens, first a beautiful Barn Owl with the heart-shaped face, then the tiniest Eastern Screech Owl that looked like the fuzziest bird alive.  The exhibit lasted about half an hour, just long enough to entice us to return another day for the Raptor Encounter, a 45-minute behind the scenes, close-up event.  Stay tuned for that future post.

                                      

             

The Bison Trail started just behind the Raptor Centre.  I love walking in the fall, surrounded by beautiful trees, crunching on fallen leaves, and soaking in the aroma of decay (it’s not as bad as it sounds).

                

           

We continued along the path and spent some time along the shore of the reservoir.

                              

Although Mountsberg has many, many kilometres of hiking trails, we never did get past the other side of the Welcome Centre where the goats and sheep are.  Have I mentioned before that I love goats???

               

The grounds are beautiful… especially at this time of year.

                                 

Of course, the clocks went back an hour the previous night so the sun was starting to hang low in the sky – time to head home and make plans to come back another time to hike off in the other direction with my hubby.