On Friday, February 15 I made a birding excursion to Fir Island to take advantage of beautiful, sunny weather.  Sun can often be a friend to a photographer, but depending on each individual shot, it can also be an enemy.

I first toured March Point hoping for some waterfowl.  I was disappointed in that regard but there was a reward.  For the first time ever, in many, many trips around March Point, I found a single Black oystercatcher along the rocky shoreline on the south side of the refinery.  I was a little too far away and the sun wasn’t my friend for photos of the bird, but I felt I had to record it for its perceived rarity at that location. I’m much more accustomed to seeing these birds in Washington Park on my early morning walks.

Black Oystercatcher

Just slightly further along I found a Northern flicker on the side of some driftwood.  It wasn’t a place that I would have expected to find a flicker but they are in the area on the inside of the loop road.

Male Northern Flicker

In driving Channel Drive along the Swinomish Channel I encountered a Red-tailed hawk with an elongated beak. This is apparently a problem in the Red-tailed hawk population.  The elongated beak makes it difficult for the birds to eat the food they catch and they can eventually die of starvation.  (I’m getting a little beyond my knowledge base here!)  I sent photos to the area’s raptor expert… I think he occasionally traps these birds and shaves the beak down to a size where it is again useful.

Red-tailed Hawk with elongated beak

Next up was the wildlife access at the end of Rawlins Road.  I’ve noticed that the Great Blue heron that frequents that area is getting a lot more used to people.  A few short months ago it would fly with the slightest human provocation, but it seems willing to continue to gather food while being watched from not very far away.

Great Blue Heron

Moving on down the road, I found the main crowd of geese along with a very substantial crowd of onlookers.  (In photographing the geese, the sun is usually your friend!) These eruptions are usually caused by a Bald eagle flying in the vicinity.

Snow Geese on Fir Island

So now for the most interesting puzzle of the day’s outing!  What do the following birds have in common?

American Robin

European Starling

(As they are fond of saying in  films, “actual birds filmed on location”).

In birding the Dodge Valley area, after retreating from Fir Island, I encountered a substantial number of birds flying to and from the ditch beside the road.  They were quite some distance from me and I assumed that they were sparrows (I must start wearing glasses!) but found as I crept closer in the car that they were actually robins.  And while a few were going down to the ditch (where I presumed there was water) many of them were frequenting an area back from the road where there was a short but thick patch of salal and grass growing.  There seemed to be no depression, no water and no other attractant to the birds.  Yet the robins seemed desperate to congregate in an area about eighteen inches in diameter!  There was some preening taking place but I could see no behavior that would lead me to believe that they were accessing water or eating.

Soon after I arrived the robins were displaced by a large flock of starlings which had the same goal in mind… to congregate in that same small area.  I took several photos of as many as 7-8 birds in that small area at one time and the activity was very vigorous.  I considered getting out of the car and investigating, but that would have disturbed the birds and I didn’t want to try to cross the ditch.  (You’ll hear about a prior ditch-crossing disaster in a future post!)  So I left with the mystery unsolved.

I’m finally back to home turf with regard to photos and have quite a backlog dating to the first of the year.  Yesterday I decided that there was really no reason to post photos from my excursions in chronological order, so for this post I’m using the old ‘lifo’ (a cost accounting term for ‘last in, first out’) methodology.

Yesterday, February 16, 2013 was a somewhat uncertain weather day but I decided to take my chances and it turned out to be a very good decision.   Since it was a Saturday, I knew I wouldn’t be alone.

I began my journey by driving around March’s Point, mainly to look for waterfowl.  The waterfowl were in short supply but I did find this pair of Bald eagles in a tree.  These were to be only a couple of the many, many eagles I would see during the day.

Pair of Bald Eagles on March’s Point

Next up was an American Kestrel along a road that I usually don’t frequent but which will now be on my regular itinerary.  I’ve found kestrels to be extremely skittish but this one, I must say, was very accommodating.

Male American Kestrel

I returned to the same location several hours later and again found the kestrel.  This time as I photographed it, it flew to the ground and brought something back up to a fence post.  As best I can tell, it’s a small green worm of which it made very fast work.

Male American Kestrel with ‘prey’

Male American Kestrel with ‘prey’

I next descended into the Samish Flats area and encountered a Rough-legged hawk on the most common perch they have in the Flats… a power pole.  This was the first Rough-legged hawk I had positively identified this year and in processing my photos I was reminded of just how beautiful the birds can be.  They are much more tolerant of humans than their Red-tailed cousins and I was able to drive almost under this hawk and photograph it without disturbing it.

Rough-legged Hawk

I drove less than half a mile and discovered yet another Rough-legged hawk, and it was indeed a rare one… it was in a deciduous bush with few intervening branches!

Rough-legged Hawk

While I was maneuvering my vehicle the hawk flew and landed on a sign within maybe 30′ of my car!  A sign is down the scale from even a power pole but it didn’t stop me from taking more photos or telling the tale!

Rough-legged hawk

My final featured raptor from this trip was a Northern harrier I found hunting along the side of the road.  The harrier was intent on flying just over the weeds along the road and it gave me several opportunities to photograph it in flight.  I’m fairly certain that this bird is a female.

Northern Harrier

On Christmas Eve of 2012 I visited Fort Marcy Park in Santa Fe, New Mexico.  There I found a flock of maybe ten Western bluebirds.  The temperature was just above freezing and the birds were intent on getting water from a few trickles from runoff.  And I found a few eating berries from the cedar or juniper trees around the park.  All of these photos were of male bluebirds, but there were females in the flock.

The odd-man out is a male finch, presumably a House finch. 

These photos will be the last of the ones taken at the Randall Davey Audubon Sanctuary in Santa Fe, New Mexico. This series should be titled, “Here’s Looking At You!”.

White-breasted Nuthatch

Curved Bill Thrasher

Canyon Towhee

Moving north from the Socorro, NM area we arrive in Santa Fe, and one of my favorite places to bird in Santa Fe is the Randall Davey Audubon Sanctuary at the end of Canyon Road.  The sanctuary has several feeders out and they attract a variety of birds, some of which I’m going to display.  These photos were taken right around Christmas when snow is almost invariably on the ground.

This first bird is a Townsend’s solitaire and I included the photo not because of its quality, but because for me it’s a fairly rare bird and I’ve never seen one in New Mexico previously.

Townsends Solitaire

This next bird is a Mountain chickadee, a bird that we have here in the Pacific Northwest but that I’ve never seen visit our yard.  I have seen one at the Reifel Refuge in British Columbia and at Washington Park here in Anacortes, and I’ve had friends who have had these birds visit their yards but I can’t seen to attract one!  They are almost always in evidence at the Randall Davey Sanctuary.

Mountain Chicadee

Now we get into the interesting aspects of bird observations at the Randall Davey Sanctuary.  There are at least four different races of Dark-eyed juncos at the sanctuary and I think I probably photographed four.  This next bird, and the one that follows it, are the Gray-headed race.

This one can be identified fairly easily by the brown patches on the shoulders and on the top of the head (if you look closely).

Dark-Eyed Junco, Gray-Headed Race

This next bird is also of the Gray-headed race as evidenced by the brown crown.

Dark-Eyed Junco, Gray-headed Race

This next bird is rather interesting.  It’s a Dark-eyed junco and it probably has to be of the Slate-colored race, but it differs significantly from Sibley’s illustration in that it has a shorter bib.

Dark-Eyed Junco, Slate-Colored Race

And here is a Dark-eyed junco of the Oregon race which is the most common junco we have in Skagit County, WA.

Dark-Eyed Junco – Oregon Race

Finally we come to what I consider a mystery junco in that the photograph, at least from my limited knowledge, doesn’t reveal enough of the bird to make a definitive determination as to its race.  It could be another Oregon junco (which would be my guess) or perhaps a Pink-sided junco,, both of which are found in this area.

And if you’re not thoroughly confused by the junco races yet, you should know that there are White-winged, Red-backed and several other variations all of which can be found in the general New Mexico area!