Saarioisjärvi Forest in August

Below I would like to share with you a poem by Hortensia Pineda. She was inspired to write this beautiful piece after viewing the picture above.... Nature can speak to us in so many ways, it is so incredibly touching and beautiful. Thank you Hortensia, for this shared experience!

My branches reach towards the sun,

My roots attach to Mother Earth,

I AM in transition now,

preparing to support the birth,

A new Earth of love and peace, this is an invitation to join me!

Let us come from a place of pure love, where life is respected,freed, and pure as a dove

I accept you as you are and you accept me , together we will heal our Earth

Together we will sing in joy,

Together we will bring the unconditional love, for every girl and boy.

We will sing the melody of a harmonious choir and our voices will be heard throughout beautiful Gaia. We uplift, heal, and support each other as our new Earth begins its ascension.

It is a joyous occasion,

this time we will not fail,

We know we are each others mirror,

and turning back is to no avail.

So join us on this odyssey,

of freedom, truth and light,

So we can sing together, and together shine bright!

We are each others keeper

So our hearts beat as ONE

There's no more separation,

The battle will and IS won!

 Here are some pictures I took on a little trip to our local nature reserve called Saarioisjärvi. I really love this place and I have been going there since I was a little girl with my dad and my uncle on their bird watching trips. There is a really beautiful path trough the forest to the small lake where all the beautiful birds can be spotted.

Below you can see the pictures I took by the lake. We saw two Western Marsh Harriers (Ruskosuohaukka) and we were able to spot their nest on top of this tree on the other side of the lake as well. There were some crows and other birds disturbing the nest so the birds were chasing one another in the evening sky.

European goldfinch

I took a bike ride with my parents last week and we happened to see this little beauty! I have not seen this bird before in my life! It is called Europen goldfinch or goldfinch, Tikli in Finnish. I am sure if I tried to pronounce this name it would come out as European Goldfish...!

We do not have very colorful birds in Finland so seeing a bird this colorful was very striking. (also my dad was a little envious that I happened to have my camera with me and he did not! Since this bird is relatively rare around here...)

I was trying to figure out what seeds the bird was eating, but I did not yet solve that mystery...

Rough-legged buzzard

 Last weekend my dad noticed a hawk flying above my parents house and I of course ran and grabbed my camera. My dad is into bird watching, so with his help its always so much fun to try to recognize the birds we see. I remember going on bird watching trips with him since I was a little girl, so getting more into it now has opened up a whole new world for me.

This bird of prey is called a Rough-legged buzzard or Rough-legged hawk or piekana in Finnish. My dad pointed out that this species should not be in our area in the middle of the summer, they only pass by in the spring or in the autumn, so this one must have just decided to hang around for some reason...