A welcome bout of warmish, sunny days meant we had a couple of days last weekend to plan a couple of semi-ambitious daytrips (ie, we left town). On Saturday we drove up to Sauvie Island to get our crane fix. Sandhill Cranes bugled away in big numbers, while we also counted Snow Geese in the hundreds, and Canvasbacks in the dozens. It’s always worth a winter tirp to Sauvie, even though we typically only make it up there once or twice a year.
Sandhill Cranes
The view of Mt. Saint Helens from Rentenaar Road
Afterwards, we decided to take a look for the Yellow-bellied Sapsucker that had been found earlier in the week, not far from there. Not to be confused with the one in Beaverton that’s been hanging around reliably for months. This new one, in Columbia County, had been found along a paved trail that runs just behind the residential area. Sure enough, it turned up at the precise intersection (with Bird Rd., appropriately enough) where others had seen it.
It was nice to get YBSA for the state to complete our sapsucker set for Oregon. I miss seeing them reliably like we did when we lived back East, but at least we still manage to see them every year when we travel to Texas for the holidays. This one flew a circuit between only three or four trees, and never left the tiny perimeter it established for itself.
The sapsucker sees a couple of saps
While the sapsucker was busy sucking sap on high, the lower trunk had a
couple of Brown Creepers creeping, until one of them stopped creeping
and started sunning. It found a cushy patch of moss and spread itself to
soak up some rays. It's hard enough just to catch one staying in one
spot for more than a second, it was unprecedented that we found one in
good light and posing in all its Certhiid glory.
Brown Creeper
We were heading to Beaverton next to run some errands and pay a visit the best noodle house around (Frank’s), so we figured we might as well pull a twofer, and see if we could turn up the other Yellow-bellied Sapsucker. We pulled up to Commonwealth Lake Park, and found the sweet gum trees easily enough. We even spotted a sapsucker right off the bat, but it ended up being a Red-breasted. We walked the path around the lake and found the resident ducks and grebes totally, ludicrously photogenic.
Pied-billed Grebe
American Wigeon
The American Wigeon were as tame as domestic Mallards, either swimming right up to the edge of the lake, or feeding en masse on the lawn and chasing breadcrumbs. A pair of Green-winged Teal even got into the action and rooted around in the mud and the puddles while I crouched down a few feet away.
Green-winged Teal
The following day we drove over to Newport for a quick coast trip. We strolled around Hatfield Marine Science Center where we picked up some year birds, but nothing mind-blowing. Our best find of the day came later at Ona Beach State Park, and it did actually blow our minds, even if it looked like it had been dead awhile (R.I.Petrel). From a distance it looked like a sub-adult gull, but up close we made out the naricorn. The bill was too short and stout for a shearwater, and eventually we figured out we had a Northern Fulmar on our hands. Pretty damn cool.
Northern Fulmar
From there we visited the Beaver Creek Natural Area where the clever Steller's Jays were finding a way of getting around the suet baffle
Just a couple of birds hanging out
We wrapped up the weekend by heading over to Yaquina Head Outstanding Natural Area, where you can always see the pair of Peregrine Falcons that call the cliffs outside the visitor's center home. One of them had a small bird that it spent some time plucking and tucking into. Not a bad finale to a pretty packed weekend.
Peregrine Falcon
Underneath its tail you can see a leg and foot of its prey sticking out
Now that wintering waterfowl have mostly moved on, I think back to some of the loveliest ducks we've seen. The American Wigeon is always a delight to see! They're both adorable and elegant. They're not too big, not too small - just right.
Coming in for a smooch?! Or just wanting to feed on the same duck weed patch… Likely but not as cute.
A nice little trick to figuring out duck species is to think about "Where's the white?" Other than the head, you can see just a little tease of a strip of white on its wing and white hip patch.
The first set of American Wigeons in this post are ones we saw at Talking Water Gardens in Albany, OR. There so many of them this past November when we birded this quaint little spot. This sunny late fall/early winter day really highlighted the gorgeous colors in these birds.
As through most of this winter, I had the luck of spotting out a couple of Eurasian Wigeons in the bunch. I just love these cinnamony cousins of the American Wigeon. I always get excited when we can find one of them!
The cinammony delicious Eurasian Wigeon
This next bunch of American Wigeons we spotted at Green Lake in Seattle, WA (where we also got lifer Redpolls!). The typical Seattle overcast gave these birds a more moody, grungy feel. Hipster Wigeons?
This one is just feeling so emo...
This male is just so over it. (But isn't he lovely?)
You can spot American Wigeons with their stout little bodies and smoothly rounded heads. The males have this creamy, buttery yellow or buffy on it's face and going mohawk style over the top of its head, but it's that glimmering emerald green going from its eye all along the side of its head that gives it an air of mystique and just wows you.
Although we haven’t been in the Pacific Northwest very long, we somehow had already acquired some nemesis birds. One in particular isn’t necessarily a difficult bird to get, but it eluded us a number of times. We would see reports of a Black Phoebe in an area we had just birded, or we’d go to that area after a report with no results. What was particularly irksome for Nick was that he *swore* he saw one once at Ankeny NWR, but it quickly disappeared before I got a glimpse of it, never to be seen again.
Red-Breasted Sapsucker
Golden-Crowned Kinglet (by Nicholas)
Male Dark-Eyed Junco (by Nicholas)
Female Dark-Eyed Junco
Ankeny NWR has also hosted a regular Rough-Legged Hawk that we couldn’t quite seem to get. We tried a couple of times to look for it with no luck. And another time we super scrutinized a distant raptor sitting in the grass for about 15 minutes hoping that it was a RLHA, but it turned out to be a Northern Harrier. Wah wah. So when a recent report for Finley NWR listed these two nemeses, we knew we had to give it a chance to get the most bang for our buck, so to speak.
Brown-Creeper - Not a nemesis bird, but a nemesis photography subject. Nailed it!
Male Spotted Towhee
False Turkey Tail fungus (by Nicholas)
We had our doubts about how the day would turn out when we drove through a thick blanket of fog that stretched from just south of our apartment for about 35+ miles down all the way down to Finley. We eased into our day with a few ducks here and there in some of the ponds created by the winter rains.
Fox Sparrow
Golden-Crowned Sparrow
Purple Finch… But not purple!
What perked us up was a group of 11 California Quail. Usually when we see any quail, they run for cover and vanish into the brush as soon as we see them. But this group seemed to feel they were at a comfortable distance, and they pecked for food as we watched them for a while munching and then running back and forth from one side of the road to the other.
A bevy of California Quail
These round little footballs are super adorable and a joy to watch. They look like balloons that could pop at any moment. And I love how they know how to quickly run across the street in contrast to their somewhat leisurely pace along the edge of the brush/grass. I giggled each time one of them would inch up to the edge of the road, assess the safety of their surroundings, and then quickly scoot across, lengthening their bodies.
We pushed on and drove to the nature center as we were on a mission to find those nemeses. The first attempt was in a pond just behind the main building. There we sought and succeeded in finding a new lifer: the Black Phoebe! Huzzah! I took one pass when we first got there, not sure if this was the right pond as there was another across the street. After we took some time to snap some photos of the well-behaved birds at the feeder, we went back over to the pond, and immediately found success as the Black Phoebe flew passed us and continued to flycatch amongst the reeds.
Black Phoebe
Lovely pair of Spotted Towhees by the feeder (by Nicholas)
Next we headed to the long stretch of road with large open fields sprinkled with ponds of ducks. We were first greeted with only our second sighting of a Golden Eagle. He was one amongst half a dozen Bald Eagles we had already seen that day. We watched him perched for a few minutes until he unsuccessfully hunted for a goose. And then, as if a heavenly door opened up in the sky, a Rough-Legged Hawk swooped across the sky. There was no mistaking this one with its black belly and black “wrists.” It landed in the treetops and we were still jumping for joy when a second one soared right above us. AAAA-mazing!
Digiscoped photo of a Rough-Legged Hawk
Immature Bald Eagle
This dreary day turned out to be quite rewarding, indeed. And just when we thought it couldn’t be any better, we were delighted by some bonus sightings. A group of Tundra Swans were feeding super close to the road that allowed for nice close shots. But the cherry on top of this awesome day was something I didn’t even know existed – a Storm Wigeon. What’s that you say?!? Check out Seagull Steve’s blog post about them. This is a rare form of an American Wigeon that has that butter color on most of its face, not just on the top of its head.
Tundra Swan
I shouted, “What’s wrong with that Wigeon?” And Nick knew just what it was after reading Seagull Steve’s post. It was really cool to see it side by side with a regular American Wigeon. I would have never expected to see one, especially since I didn’t know of its existence. Haha. But what a treat it was after conquering two nemeses and having great views of other great birds.
Storm Wigeon = An extra buttery American Wigeon
Compare a normal American Wigeon to a Storm Wigeon
Ebony and Ivory, live together in perfect harmony...
