Up at 6:30 again after a great night’s sleep.  I took the dog with me over to the American River Bend Park for our walk.  I wasn’t looking for anything in particular, just enjoying the exercise and the cool breeze of the morning… The first thing we saw was a pair of Western Bluebirds.  The male kept parking his butt on the NO PARKING AT ANY TIME sign, and I just thought that was sooo  funny.  We then saw some male wild turkeys chasing and kicking the crap out of each other, and then a female Common Merganser duck came flying through the area.  It circled a couple of times, quacking away, and then flew into a tree.  I think she had a nest around there somewhere and was upset because the turkeys were scrabbling around where it was.  Later, as we were walking, I came across a Tree Swallow who was chasing a nosy squirrel away from her nest: dive-bombing him and chasing him along the branches of the tree.  While this is going on, I can see one of the babies looking out of the tree, so I got some photos of him.  His mom checked on him several time, and brought him some bugs while I watched them…  We also saw a mama wild turkey with two of her babies… It’s so neat seeing all this life around here.