I spent a rather limited time in the yard on the afternoon of July 31 but had a lot to show for my time.

But before I get into 7/31 photos I want to mention that I saw my first warbler in the yard in a month on 7/29.  Unfortunately I didn’t have my camera and am somewhat uncertain of the species, although I believe it was a Yellow warbler.  It’s almost inconceivable to me that I wouldn’t have had many visits by warblers of many species during the month of July.

We have a yard full of House finches, none more conspicuous than this male.  And sadly, we have a female House finch with the worst case of tumors on her face that I have ever seen.

The premier bird for the day was this (single) Cedar waxwing that twice came to the yard, the second time for a quick bath.

We also had four Northern flickers in the yard at one time, one adult male, at least two juvenile females and another female. One of the juveniles has a stash of ants that live under a rock in the yard, and some of my photos actually record ants in the flicker’s beak!  I think the photos shown here are of females.

This is one of the virtually-grown female California quail in the neighborhood, distinguishable from the adults only by plumage.  After what seemed like a slow start to the breeding season we now seem to have a plentiful population that will carry us through the winter.

We apparenty have two male Downy woodpeckers in the neighborhood.  I determined this by observing that a visitor from the previous day had some sort of problem with its right eye.

And as sort of a bonus I had a visit by a Brown creeper, which I initially misidentified as a Bewick’s wren when I first saw it among some shaded leaves.  And just a reminder… the creeper usually travels UP the tree trunk and the Red-breasted nuthatch DOWN!