On September 10, 2018, we had dinner guests due at 5:30pm.  I was finishing up a salad in the kitchen as our guests arrived.  I glanced out the window and as I did so several birds flew out of the watercourse and scattered around the yard.  One that was slightly larger than most of the others caught my attention.  I grabbed my binoculars and after a brief study concluded that it was a female Western tanager, only the second one I had seen in the yard this season.

I apologized to our guests as I rushed for my camera and made a quick exit into the yard.  The bird had been preening and I had high hopes that it would return to the watercourse,  but of course that was not to be.  But as I sat waiting I managed to separate another bird out of the crowd based on its behavior.  I quickly determined the bird was a Warbling vireo, only the second appearance of one for the season.  (The prior appearance for one was at least two months previously.)

I watched as the vireo few all around the watercourse, periodically “dip-bathing” as is the vireos’ habit.  (Instead of standing in the water and bathing the vireos fly quickly into and out of the water, a habit shared by at least the White-eyed vireo I see in Texas.)  I managed to take at least a dozen photos, two of which I share with you now.

Just as I was ready to give up on the tanager I noticed a female House finch sitting atop the only cluster of ripe madrone berries in the yard.  I knew I needed to get back to our guests and only managed a few shots of the finch eating madrone berries, but the photos were taken hand-held with my camera without the aid of my monopod, so the quality wasn’t up to my usual standards.  But since the photo is somewhat interesting I’m including it here.

Sunday  (9/9/2018) morning, I looked out our kitchen window towards the watercourse and spied what I thought was an Orange-crowned warbler. I grabbed my camera and sneaked into the yard and the bird, which had actually been a Yellow warbler, returned.  Over the next hour or so our yard filled with birds, including at least 30 House sparrows that are living in the neighborhood and I obtained many ‘better than most’ photos.  So here were some of our visitors which don’t include a male Wilson’s warbler that I wasn’t able to photograph.

The Yellow warbler…

The Orange-crowned warbler…

A Brown creeper…

A male Spotted towhee…

A Pine siskin with an unusually large patch of yellow…

A Chestnut-sided chickadee…

A Black-capped chickadee…

A male Anna’s hummingbird…

And a Red-breasted nuthatch…

And I want to mention a special visitor that we had on 9/6/2018… a Warbling vireo, our second visit during this fall migration…

I had a nice weekend for warbler migration.  Not great numbers but three different species on 9/1/2018 and two species on 9/2/2018.

The first warbler I saw on Saturday was an Orange-crowned...

Followed by a male Wilson’s warbler…

Finally, I had a visit from a Yellow warbler…

Only a Yellow warbler visited more than once, so it was a lot of time spent for only a little photography.  From my photos there seem to have been two different Yellow warblers.

On Sunday, 9/2, I had a rare visit from a male Black-throated Gray warbler, I think only the third visit I’ve had from that species this year.  As I believe I’ve previously said, this species was virtually unknown to me until two or three years ago when one was a frequent visitor for several weeks.

Late in the afternoon, almost too late for photos, I had visit from an Orange-crowned warbler.  These photos are both of the same bird.  If you look closely at the second photo, you can see some orange in the bird’s crown, something difficult to discern in the field.

It’s been awhile since I posted to my blog.  It’s not that I haven’t been busy… I’m logging at least a warbler a day.  Most of the warblers seem to be juveniles, which makes them more difficult to identify and especially to distinguish from females of the same species.  But the photography and the processing have kept me very busy, and as usual I’m running behind on the processing.

On August 19, 2018, I watched as a Turkey vulture flew from a neighbor’s yard to the top of a fir tree in our yard, the first time I’m aware that a vulture has actually perched in one of our trees.  A handsome devil that will soon be heading south!

Here are a couple of female Anna’s hummingbirds that are hanging around the yard.  We have at least two male Anna’s fighting for control of feeders and still have at least one female Rufous hummingbird still in the yard.

A male Bushtit perched above the watercourse.  The Bushtits almost never access the water in the watercourse.

Photos of a female Wilson’s warbler accessing the watercourse.

For contrast, here is a beautiful male Wilson’s warbler who visited the yard on August 29…

This is an Orange-crowned warbler, which has turned out to her our most frequent warbler species visitor this year (displacing Wilson’s warblers).

On August 26 I received a visit from our second Black-throated Gray warbler for the year.  I consider this one of the rarest warbler visitors to our yard.

I consider the Brown creeper one of our best camouflaged birds and you can see why in this first photo.  The second photo shows the bird accessing our stone bird bath.

After grousing about the lack of warblers this past summer (just two sightings of any warbler species between July 1 and August 12) I had an exceptional sightings day on Sunday, August 12.  On that day I had a single visit from a relatively rare warbler, a Black-throated Gray.  I ended the day keeping 46 photos of the rarity, a tribute to the occasion!  And it was this visit that opened the proverbial floodgates!  

I hoped the bird would return the next day (Monday August 13) so that I could enhance my portfolio (as if it needed enhancing at this point!) but although I spent considerable time in the yard I saw no warblers.  I did obtain some nice photos of Bushtits, including young ones being fed suet from our feeder.

Tuesday, August 14, brought both male and female Wilson’s warblers and at least one adult Orange-crowned warbler.  Other relative rarities included a House wren (a summer breeding migrant not seen for the past coupe of months) and a Warbling vireo, a very rare visitor.  

(Photos for this day covered in prior post.)

Wednesday, August 15 brought a single male Wilson’s warbler.  

On Thursday, August 16, we had a visit from a male Yellow warbler, a somewhat rare migrant to our yard.  We also had flyovers by a sub-adult Bald eagle and an Osprey.

Friday, August 17 brought a juvenile Orange-crowned warbler (distinguished from the adult I saw three days earlier) and another (male?) Yellow warbler visit, both coming late in the day and approximately ten minutes after a neighbor’s Texas relative left after spending the better part of three hours birdwatching in the yard.  It wasn’t a total loss for the visitor… she was able to add California quail to her life list.  

Saturday brought yet another rare warbler visit… a female Townsend’s warbler (some of the 24 photos I retained were taken from about four feet away!)!   (Yes, that’s two exclamation points to mark the occasion plus the third one at the end of this sentence!)

Least you think we’re running a zoo here, on each of these days I spent approximately 3-4 hours in the yard, mostly in the afternoons prior to 5:30pm when I abandon my post to catch the national news and see just how much greater this country has been made during the day.  Add to the watch time processing time for the several hundred photos I’ve taken during the week and you can see just how a very happy retiree spends much of his time.  And don’t forget posting to the blog, sending special emails to friends regarding sightings and trying to maintain relationships with friends scattered across the country.  

Everything must end, and our run may be ending.  My wife looked out the window this morning and saw an accipiter surveying the yard from a low perch on one of my prominent staging rocks.  I’ve seen very little in the yard since!  

I should perhaps add a note of clarification… when I describe a bird as ‘rare’, the term applies only to sightings in our yard and not to the region as a whole.  What I consider a rarity in my yard my be more common in someone else’s yard or in other areas of the county.  And if you’re out birding ‘on the move’ you will naturally tend to see more birds than just sitting in one place and hoping to attract birds to photograph.  

This said, I want to welcome birding friends who would like to bird the yard.  I ask that you call me first to let me know you want to drop by, wear clothing of subtle colors (not white or bright colors!) and refrain from excessive movement if I am in the yard with you actively trying to photograph.  Conversation is usually acceptable except when we have a visit from a rarity.