Beautiful Backyard Birds (and my cat) In The Snow!

Greetings and Salutations, Y'all!

Over the last weekend, my little corner of Dixie experienced something that we rarely get, even during the winter months: an actual accumulation of snow.

This was due to a powerful bomb cyclone and winter storm that hit the American Southeast over the weekend of Saturday, January 31st and Sunday, February 1st, which dropped a large amount of snow -- about six inches deep where I live in Chester County, South Carolina....deeper in other places! Thankfully, despite this unexpected blast of severe winter weather that did end up causing power disruptions and a few serious injuries and even deaths; where I live there were no major power outages, or any serious injuries.

Both during the storm and the days after, my backyard was a winter wonderland that I enjoyed watching visiting backyard birds from the comfort of my heated office with a nice mug of hot chocolate. The beautiful feathered visitors and their various colors contrasted wonderfully with the white background and with the bushes at the back of my yard.

From my window facing my backyard bird feeders I was able to capture some outstanding photos of these winter visitors, among which include: male and female Northern Cardinal (Cardinalis cardinalis), Black-Capped Chickadees (Poecile atricapillus), Mourning Doves (Zenaida macroura), Tufted Titmouse (Baeolophus bicolor), Carolina Wren (Thryothorus ludovicianus), Song Sparrow (Melospiza melodia), a female American goldfinch (Spinus tristis) as well as a Brown Thrasher (Toxostoma rufum) that I captured briefly in one photo.

Here are the photos I took over the weekend of the winter storm and its aftermath between January 31st and February 2nd of these gorgeous backyard birds in my snow-covered yard....along with a few appearances of my backyard buddy, Loki the cat (aka Mr. Kitteh).

As usual, I hope y'all enjoyed my photos of these backyard birds as much as I enjoy posting them. Its a joy for me to share these images of these remarkable creature with all of you. Until next time have a wonderful Dixie day and y'all come back now, you hear!

Night Sky Photography -- 02-02-2026 -- The Moon Occults Regulus

 

Last night our beautiful still Full Snow Moon passed in front of the bright star Regulus -- the brightest star of the Constellation Leo the Lion.

Regulus (Alpha Leonis) is the 22nd brightest star in the night sky. Its a blue-white main-sequence star, also known as the "heart of the lion". As I've mentioned before on this site, Regulus may appear to be a single point of light, but its actually a quadruple star system composed of four stars that are organized into two pairs. This system lies approximately 79 light years (or 24.2 parsecs) from our Solar System.

Beginning about 9:00 p.m. EST here in North America, Luna passed in front of (or occulted) Regulus and -- for about a little under two hours -- replaced Regulus to become a part of the Constellation Leo!

I was able to capture three great shots of the occultation of Regulus by our beautifully still mostly full Luna: one before with both bodies shinning through the tree branches, the second during the occultation, and the last after the Moon's orbit eastward finally passed away from Regulus.

Unfortunately I was unable to capture all of the stars of the constellation due to the bright full moon's glare, but I was able to capture the two other bright stars of Leo: Denebola (Beta Leonis) the "lion's tail" and Algieba (Gamma Leonis) during the occultation of Regulus.

Monday Meme: Its Groundhog Day!

"Babe (duh duh, duh duh, duh duh, duh duh) I got you, babe...."
Now its going to be stuck in your head all day long! Happy Groundhog Day, Y'all!

Night Sky Photography -- 02-01-2026 -- The Full Snow Moon After The Snowstorm

Good evening fellow stargazers!

Tonight, I captured some outstanding photos of February's full moon in the evening sky, along with a beautiful show of Jupiter and the bright star, Sirius, rising in the eastern sky between the recently snow-covered trees.

The February full moon is known as the Full Snow Moon here in North America -- a beautiful irony since it's a day following the bomb cyclone that hit the Carolinas; ushering in more snowfall that we usually see in these parts, even in the winter!

The first shot shows Jupiter, the largest planet in our solar system, with the bright twin stars, Castor and Pollux, close by. A close-up of Jupiter shows three of its four largest moons: Callisto, Ganymede, and Io. Europa, the fourth moon, was currently behind Jupiter in its rotation. Sirius, the Dog Star, is nearby further to the southeast clearly visible through the bare trees (a few of which still have snow on them).

The Full Snow Moon is hidden behind the trees for another hour before finally appearing in all her glory. The final shot is the close-up of our lovely full Luna.

A fun fact: because the month of February only has 28 days and the full moon on average only happens once every 29-30 days, there are years where there is no full moon in February! This only happens about once every 19 years, give or take. The last time that happened was in 2018. The next time February won’t have a full moon will be in 2037.