Joseph Robbins sent a photo of a bald eagle with a fish in its talons that had been scavenged along the James River.
Samuel R. Brown II sent photos of seagulls at the Oceanfront in Virginia Beach.
Cindy Hamilton sent a photo of a snowy egret foraging for breakfast at Pleasure House Point in Virginia Beach. Snowy egrets eat mostly aquatic animals and may flick their wings when gathering prey.
Connie Owen sent a photo of a sanderling searching for food at Cape Charles Beach on the Eastern Shore.
Mike Earp sent a photo of a cownose ray that commercial fishermen had caught that morning near Cape Story by the Sea in Virginia Beach. A cownose ray has a crease in the lobes and a notched head that give it a cownose like appearance, giving this ray its name.
Rami Yoakum spotted dolphins leaping out of the water near the Lynnhaven Inlet in Virginia Beach.
Mike Weirich got a closeup photo of a ghost crab scurrying on the beach while doing a bike ride through False Cape State Park in Virginia Beach.
Jonathan Snyder photographed a king rail at Mackay Island National Wildlife Refuge in North Carolina. The king rail blends in with the grasses where it lives and has mottled brown and rusty upperparts. They are very elusive and can quietly disappear between the grasses.
Debbie McNulty sent a photo of a Cooper’s hawk that she caught peeking at her from her kitchen window in the Greenbrier section of Chesapeake.
Reuben Rohn photographed a field sparrow at the Harris Teeter Retention Pond in Virginia Beach. Field sparrows have a pink conical bill and a rounded head and can be found in areas with tall grass and brush.
Kathy Shambo spotted a leucistic crow that Chris Michaels photographed at Larrymore Elementary School in Norfolk. The leucistic crow “tends to hang with two black crows behind our school,” wrote Shambo.
June McDaniels sent a photo of a yellow-throated vireo perched on a branch in the Ocean Lakes area in Virginia Beach. “A surprising fall visitor to Virginia Beach,” wrote McDaniels.
Gary Williamson saw what he thought was a monarch butterfly while paddling on Pocaty Creek in Chesapeake but upon closer examination he realized it was a viceroy butterfly.
Lara Mortimer spotted a red-spotted purple butterfly in her yard in the Highland Biltmore neighborhood of Portsmouth.
Raymond McPherson sent a photo of a red-spotted purple butterfly that his granddaughter Madison had taken at Northwest River Park in Chesapeake.
Stacy Elliott Apelt sent a photo of a painted turtle that was sunning itself on a log in the Alligator River National Wildlife Refuge in North Carolina. “You can tell its great age by the reticulated shell,” wrote Apelt. “Just like people, the older they get the more wrinkled their shell gets.”
Rich Thiesfeld photographed an alligator that was soaking up some early fall sunshine in his section of the swamp at the Alligator River National Wildlife Refuge in North Carolina.
Paul Kotarides sent a photo and an update on the groundhog that has found its way to West Ghent in Norfolk. “I see them fairly often in the meadows on Norfolk Southern Railway’s yard property,” wrote Kotarides. “I think I know how some of my tomatoes disappeared this summer.”
Vickie Shufer, wildfood@cox.net
![A nearly century-old Oklahoma company that supplies stock for rodeos had as many as 70 horses die a week ago after receiving what an owner believes was tainted feed. Rhett Beutler, co-owner of Beutler and Son Rodeo Co. near Elk City, told KFOR-TV that the horses died shortly […]](https://www.pilotonline.com/wp-content/uploads/migration/2023/04/14/3X2JI5FLARG3XCZMNVHACWQSAA.jpg?w=535 "A nearly century-old Oklahoma company that supplies stock for rodeos had as many as 70 horses die a week ago after receiving what an owner believes was tainted feed. Rhett Beutler, co-owner of Beutler and Son Rodeo Co. near Elk City, told KFOR-TV that the horses died shortly […]")