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Category Archives: birds

Common Loons of Lost Lake

Common Loons are a favorite bird of mine and around here they are not so ‘common’. One of the charms of Lost Lake is the fact that the loons not only spend the summer there but there is a nesting pair. This year they hatched two, or maybe three, depending on who you ask, chicks. One was killed by a Bald Eagle who has also made meals out of the Canada Goose goslings. The remaining loon chick is maybe half grown now and too big for an eagle to catch. The parents and the young bird spend their days moving around the surface of the lake, fishing, preening and resting. Occasionally they make the unique loon sounds that echo off nearby mountain sides. It’s truly a haunting and beautiful sound. I have read that loons make four distinct calls and they all are used to communicate among themselves and declare territory. My favorite is the long drawn-out wail, similar to a wolf howl.

 

The young bird. It lacks the distinctive plumage of the adults.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Parent searching for fish

 

The young bird is learning from the parents.

 

 

 

Everyone needs a good stretch once in a while.

 

 

Just a Few Bird Photos

Last week we identified 114 bird species. It seems like a lot but we missed an awful lot of so-called ‘common’ birds – all the owls, all the grouse, Downy and Hairy Woodpeckers and the list goes on. And we saw no real rarities. It was pretty fun birding with lots of birds singing and we worked on learning and re-learning the bird songs and calls. It’s a challenge from year to year to keep them in my head. Some stick with me; for instance Rock Wren and Willow Flycatcher. Others – well let’s just say, it’s going to take many years for me to learn the few warblers we have in our region and remember them.

I managed to get a few photographs of birds. I didn’t really try too much bird photography. It is time consuming and we were really focusing on seeing and hearing a good variety of birds.

 

Hooded Merganser female at Lost Lake

 

 

 American Coot adult and chick

 

 

 

 

 

Spotted Sandpiper chick along Maryanne Creek Road

 

 

Spotted Sandpiper adult

 

 

 

Early Morning Birdwalk

I was up early and out on the wet hillside this morning, hoping to hear birds and try to figure out which ones were singing. It was a glorious morning after all the rain we’ve had this week. Rubber boots were the fashion statement of the morning. I meant to take the big camera but, somehow managed to leave it behind so once again, Instagram to the rescue. Really, I mean to get serious about photography again. Soon. Really.

 

That’s our nicest pine tree

 

The ground is starting to heal nicely after the April 17th brush fire

 

Sunrise!

 

I think these are Douglas sunflowers

 

I don’t think the pines down in the draw are going to survive

 

Here’s something new

 

Lots of chokecherry blossoms this year

 

Target practice?

 And birds. Here is the list of birds I was able to identify by sight or sound:

California Quail

Dusky Grouse

Red-tailed Hawk

Mourning Dove

Rufous Hummingbird

Calliope Hummingbird

Northern Flicker

Western Wood-Pewee

Willow Flycatcher

Say’s Phoebe

Warbling Vireo

Red-eyed Vireo

Common Raven

Tree Swallow

Violet-green Swallow

Black-capped Chickadee

Mountain Chickadee

House Wren

Western Bluebird

Mountain Bluebird

American Robin

Gray Catbird

Orange-crowned Warbler

Yellow-rumped Warbler

Spotted Towhee

Western Tanager

Black-headed Grosbeak

Brewer’s Blackbird

Brown-headed Cowbird

Cassin’s Finch

Pine Siskin

Black-headed Grosbeak

My desk is in a loft office on the second floor of our house. There is a window directly over the garden and when I am sitting here I have views of the hillside and a ponderosa pine. The other day, while diligently working on wedding photos from last weekend, I heard the fluttering sound of wings against the glass. I looked over my shoulder and didn’t see anything and the sound was gone. It repeated a few seconds later. Curious, I walked over to the window and looking down, I saw a Black-headed Grosbeak perched on top of the garden fence.

I backed away from the window while keeping my eyes on it and soon the bird returned and clinging to the siding it looked in the window and then over at a round decorative piece covered with lavender beads.


The bird flew/hopped to the other side of the window and again fluttered at it as if to beat it senseless with its wings?

 

This behaviour happened several times over the next half hour or so. There’s no ledge so the bird could only hold on to the position for a few seconds at a time.

 

 

 

And then the bird left. The grosbeak must have felt that it had subdued the lavender beads and they were no longer a threat to him. I have seen territorial birds attack windows and mirrors when they see their reflections and perceive them as another bird in their territory but for some reason, this bird was obsessing on the purple beads. What’s up with that?

 

White Bird Pond

After two and a half weeks on the road, we are back at home in the Methow Valley. Here, a warm day is sixty degrees and wildflowers are beginning to bloom and the snow is gone. The trip to the southeast was quite an adventure taking us, mostly me, to new places and climates; seeing new birds and other wildlife.

All of these images came from one small pond at the Six Mile Cypress Preserve near Fort Meyers. It has been a dry winter and spring in Florida so birds are concentrated in some locations. This pond was maybe fifty yards across and when we arrived there were at least 70 white birds and one Great Blue Heron. The white birds were White Ibis, Snowy Egrets, Great Egrets and Wood Storks.

 

Lots of end of the day grooming

 

 

 

Spanish moss makes for an especially pretty stick. It might even attract a mate.

 

 

I wonder if she will like me if I bring her a stick?

 

Yup, still gorgeous.

 

Every feather in its place

 

 

This one took grooming lessons from a dog I think.

 

 

 

These Wood Storks in the trees above us were very restless, constantly moving about. The two are engaged in active noisy bill clacking at each other. I don’t know if that means they like each other or they don’t like each other.