And the World Keeps Turning

While it's been hard to find the motivation to blog in the last month, it hasn't been hard to find the motivation to go out into nature. Not only is April one of my favorite months on San Juan Island regardless, but it's been especially comforting to find some peace and sense of normalcy in these crazy times.

Before things really shut down and the stay at home order was put into place, we got out for one more on the water encounter with J-Pod in San Juan Channel back in mid-March. As we're quickly heading towards an unprecedented April with NO orca encounters, those two encounters from March are extra special and moments I replay often in my mind!

J-Pod in San Juan Channel on March 21st

Without whale encounters, the spring bird migration has received my extra attention, especially because I've been participating in two unique challenges over the last few weeks. One is an extension of our year-long challenge to photograph as many vertebrates as we can in 2020; since many of us are restricted to much closer to home for the time being, we're doing a mini 6-week photo blitz to see how many bird species we can photograph within 1 mile of our home. I had hoped to get 30 species, but am surprised to already have more than 50, with a week to go!

Hanging out with a red-breasted nuthatch in our yard

The other challenge is an extension of the year-long Fantasy Birding effort I'm participating in for the second year. What is Fantasy Birding, you ask? It's along the lines of fantasy sports, where you pick real-life players to be on your fantasy sports team and gain points based on the actions they take in real-life games. Here, you pick a region to virtually bird-watch in, and you score points based on lists real birders submit in that area to eBird. Again, due to everyone staying at home much more, we've started a sub-game called the Yard Squad Challenge. Captains chose birders from around the country (plus one international player per team) to bird their yards for four consecutive two week periods, and the race is to see which team can see the most species collectively. Both of these games, on top of the stay at home order, have meant daily bird walks from home and lots of time spent observing the changes in my neighborhood, whereas in previous years I might have watched the migration from further afield (like last year when we went to Westport!).

Watching migration from close to home means many more "first of the year" birds in our yard - like this yellow-rumped warlber

One highlight of this very local birding was a couple of weeks ago when, for every morning of the week, you could reliably see/hear all 5 of our local woodpecker species within a quarter-mile of our house: downy woodpecker, hairy woodpecker, northern flicker, pileated woodpecker, and red-breasted sapsucker.

The red-breasted sapsuckers have, in my opinion, the best drumming ditty of any woodpecker, made even better when executed on a man-made metal surface

A northern flicker briefly visits our suet - actually the hardest of our 5 local species to get a photograph of this year!

There's also moments like this quick visit from a sharp-shinned hawk to our feeder tree, which are likely to be missed when we're not at home as much. This juvenile was not successful in picking off any of our other visitors....this time!

And nothing says spring to me like the return of the swallows. Every year a pair of violet-green swallows checks out our nest boxes, but they have yet to use one. Will this be the year?

Thankfully, while some public lands are closed, other local natural areas have been open, so we have been able to go out and bird elsewhere on the island as well. This has turned up some other great finds that we definitely wouldn't have been able to see in our yard!

A bald eagle landing on a rocky shoreline with the Olympic Mountains in the background

A singing savannah sparrow

False Bay has been especially successful in turning up shorebirds this spring.

A flock of dunlin

Thanks to a tip from a friend and fellow birder, we also got to see a whimbrel there, a new species for my county life list! 

A few of our winter seabirds are still lingering, and some of them like this horned grebe are giving us a rare glimpse (for here) of their summer plumage before departing.

In late April/early May of each year, English Camp and the Mt. Young trail can always be counted on for many "first of the year" species, but this year was a personal record where in a single morning I added my first house wren, Cassin's vireo, chipping sparrow, Pacific-slope flycatcher, Townsend's warbler, and black-throated gray warbler all in one visit!

First singing house wren of the year at Mt. Young

I returned a day later to try for some audio recordings, and was surprised to find another species: a Townsend's solitaire! I only see one of these on the island every few years, and this time it wasn't a single one, but at least five of them.

Regardless of what's going on in our crazy human world, there's some comfort to be found in the fact that the cycle of life is continuing on in the natural world. I am very thankful all this is happening in the spring, as I can't imagine going through this without the ability to spend a lot of time outside in the sunshine! 

I will cut this post off here so it's focus remains on the birds, but there's another species that's an icon of spring on San Juan Island, and they deserve their own post!

April 14 ~ Birding Trip with Maya's Legacy

Sunday, April 14th dawned a somewhat blustery and gray day, but that didn't stop a group of intrepid bird-watchers for heading out on a excursion with Maya's Legacy Whale Watching out of Snug Harbor. The birding started before we even left the docks with singing white-crowned sparrows, a pair of black oystercatchers on the rock in the harbor, and mew gulls foraging along the shoreline. As we slowly made our way out of the bay, we also spotted a great blue heron along the shoreline.

We didn't have to go far for our first "stop" in Mosquito Pass, where as usual in the fall, winter, and spring, there was a lot of bird activity, including bufflehead, red-breasted mergansers, red-necked grebes, and pigeon guillemots. We got a nice side-by-side comparison of double-crested and pelagic cormorants and also spotted what we may often think of as more freshwater species, Canada geese and mallards. Before continuing on into Spieden Channel we spotted a group of 7 of one of the most hoped-for species of the trip: long-tailed ducks!

Long-tailed ducks in Mosquito Pass

While our main focus was on birds, when you're cruising slowly through the islands you're of course going to see all kinds of things, and no trip along Spieden Island is complete without some of the exotic mammals that live there. I have made a lot of on-the-water trips to Spieden over the years, but I don't think I have ever seen as many sheep on it as I did on this day! Hundreds of them.

Mouflon sheep on Spieden Island

We counted more than a dozen bald eagles on or above Spieden, and they weren't just idly hanging around, either. This immature was nonchalantly dive-bombing lambs, making for some very distraught mothers. The eagle didn't seem very serious about the pursuit - perhaps just looking for any sick or injured, or just playing around - but the sheep were taking the threat seriously!

Bald eagle spooks some Mouflon sheep

A little further down the shoreline, four more eagles were huddled around a carcass of some sort (perhaps seal?), along with some northwestern crows.

Eagles and crows scavenging a carcass

When one of the immature eagles took flight, it was amazing to see how much white was on it!

Next we headed over to White Rock, where as hoped for we turned up our first shorebirds: a couple of black turnstones and about a dozen dunlin. There was also another eagle perched on top of the rock, making for a striking image with the harbor seals hauled out below.

Bald eagle and harbor seals at White Rock

Let's take a closer look at one of those seals....awwwwww:

Young harbor seal at White Rock

Next we continued north towards Monarch Head. The way there was a bit choppy, but we started seeing some new species for the day, including rhinoceros auklets and our only western grebes for the trip. At Monarch Head itself the only addition oddly enough was a pair of turkey vultures, but the stunning geology still made the trip worth it:

Cool rock formations at Monarch Head

Next it was over to East Point on Saturna Island where the first sight (and smell) we noticed was all the Steller sea lions:

Steller sea lions at East Point

A closer look at the birds on and near the same rocks, however, turned up four gull species (glaucous-winged, mew, California, and Bonaparte's), harlequin ducks, a couple of black oystercatchers, and another male long-tailed duck. A little south of us we spotted an active bait ball, so we started to head over that way. They mostly settled down by the time we got there, but there were still several dozen common murres, rhinoceros auklets, red-breasted mergansers, and, best of all, Bonaparte's gulls. The few sitting on the rocks at East Point were cool, but the reason they're one of my favorite marine birds is because of how awesome they look in flight. It's late enough in the season now that they also all have black heads, our only black-headed gull in the region.

Bonaparte's gulls in flight near Patos Island

As we cruises from Patos to Sucia, another small rocky reef had an unlikely pair sitting together: a harbor seal and a bald eagle.

It's rare enough that I get over to this part of the San Juan Islands that I didn't even know there was an impressive sea lion haul out on Ewing Island near Sucia. It was incredible to see how high up on the rocks these guys go!

Sea lions on Ewing Island

 Even the harbor seals seemed to want to show off their (admittedly less impressive) climbing skills:

Harbor seals at Ewing Island

Bird-wise there were many more pigeon guillemots, some harlequin ducks, a few surf scoters, and surprisingly our only loon of the day (a Pacific loon), but the best look was of a pair of black oystercatchers that came by to scold us for being in the area:

Black oystercatcher in flight near Ewing Island, with Steller sea lions in the background

We continued cruising south towards Peapod Rocks, where we found more black turnstones but none of the hoped-for surfbirds or plovers. There was plenty of bird activity though with a nice variety of the usual suspects all in one place, including glaucous-winged gulls, pelagic cormorants, harlequin ducks, and several more pairs of oystercatchers.

Peapod rocks

It was time to start making our way back to the home port so we picked up speed for really the first time of the day and wound our way west through the San Juans. We were still just short of 30 sepcies on the day, however, so instead of cutting back through Mosquito Pass, with the seas a little calmer we went on the outside of Henry Island in hopes of finding a peregrine falcon. Success!

Below the peregrine (who was high up but on such a photogenic perch) was a red-flowering currant clinging to the rocks, and amusingly there was a female rufous hummingbird feeding at it! While this is not my first time seeing hummingbirds from a boat, they're certainly not one of the species that comes to mind when you're thinking about marine birds. We were only a few minutes from the dock at this point, but the day list wasn't done yet: as we pulled back into Snug Harbor we also added hooded mergansers and rock pigeons.

Despite the less than ideal conditions it was still a beautiful day on the water. It was a nice change of pace, too, to slowly meander through the islands and enjoy many of the smaller sights that make this place so special. There is definitely so much to see here beyond just all the whales!

Bird Year List: End of 2018, Beginning of 2019

This was my ninth year keeping track of a bird species year list. My goals for 2018 were to reach 220 birds for my year list, and photograph 95% of them, for a target of 209 species photographed. I exceeded the number goals, tallying 261 (my highest ever) on the year list and photographing 243 of them, a 93.1% capture rate. Thanks to our road trip to Nevada, Arizona, and Mexico, I also tallied 21 life birds this year, second only to my 23 life birds on the Alaska trip in 2010.

Because it's fun to play with numbers, here's the break down over the years for bird species added by month:

Dave (from England) and my dad Rainer and I have also had a friendly competition over the years. For 2018 my dad tallied 266, winning for the second year in a row and the sixth time in eight years, and Dave came in at 195.

There were a lot of birding highlights in 2018 but here are a few of my favorites.

Madera Canyon in Arizona was one of the most incredible birding spots I have ever seen. Not only was it full of life birds for me, but the action at the feeders at Santa Rita lodge was captivating and ever-changing; one full day of sitting there doing nothing else was not nearly enough of watching! One of the most unexpected moments was, thanks to a tip from a couple fellow birders, locating a pair of elusive Montezuma quail:

Later on that same trip, we rented a boat in San Diego Bay to track down the "mega-rarity" - a Nazca booby. While it was a bit of splurge expense-wise, we knew it was a memory we would never forget, and it was definitely one of the major highlights of our two week trip:

While it's exciting to see exotic birds far away from home, some of the best sightings can also happen literally right in your yard. Another highlight this year was this barred owl who spent at least half an hour eying our domestic quail in their aviary in broad daylight.

For 2019, we are trying out a new twist on our photo year list, trying to take photos without the "hand of man" in them. So, no birds at feeders, sitting on wires, etc. Last year my photo year list had about 15% of the pictures with the hand of man, so I wasn't anticipating it would be too much of a challenge. Turns out there's a lot more things to think about than expected! For instance, I decided this lovely shot from Day 1 of 2019 shouldn't count, since this song sparrow is perched on pressure treated lumber.

On January 1st I tallied 44 species on my year list and got decent photos of 17 of them. This was my favorite shot of the day:

Greater yellowlegs at Jackson Beach on January 1

Given the more difficult photo challenge this year and the fact that I won't be traveling as far afield, I'm lowering my goals a bit for 2019. My goal is to reach 200 species on the year list and photograph 90% of them, or 180. Here's to another great year of birding!

Weekend Wildlife

With my parents up visiting, it was the perfect time to get out and about with the cameras to see what could be seen last weekend. While we didn't see any whales, we did see lots of other wildlife, starting with the 50 or so Steller sea lions that have been hanging out at Green Point on Spieden Island. Unlike my last visit, this time most of them were in the water, and some of them were very curious!

Spieden's terrestrial wildlife was also out in abundance, with one group of Mouflon sheep taking advantage of the low tide to be down on the rocks at water level. We thought they were probably licking salt off the rocks, but a closer inspection of my photos showed that some of them were actually eating seaweed!

Sometimes you don't appreciate the photos you take until you see them on the computer at home - that was the case with this snap, which gave me a laugh when I saw the surprised-looking expression on this mama Mouflon as her baby nursed (click to see a larger version).

There were so many deer and sheep out enjoying all the green grass, but we also spotted one bald eagle surveying the scene.

This is a great time of year for watching sea birds, too, because they've transitioned into their summer colors, like this common loon:

Same goes for these pigeon guillemots, though they've been sporting their "summer" plumage since February:

Back on the home front, more signs of spring seem to be appearing on a daily basis. While looking for year birds across the island didn't turn up any, at the end of the day I added two right in my own front yard! A yellow-rumped warbler drew me outside, but this singing orange-crowned warbler stole the show.

Orange-crowned warbler, photo year bird #135

On Sunday, we headed down to Cattle Pass, one of our favorite places to scope out birds - literally. Here's my dad scanning Goose Island, shortly before we found a flock of nearby shorebirds.

At first it appeared the shorebirds were all black turnstones, a species I've seen a couple times this year, though it feels like more occasionally than usual. Without more turnstone encounters, I hadn't turned up their sometimes companion, the surfbird. Until now! Three surfbirds were in and among the turnstones, adding another year bird to the tally.

Black turnstone

Surfbird, photo year bird #136

Surfbirds and turnstones can be difficult to tell apart. Turnstones are darker with reddish legs, while surfbirds are grayer with yellow legs. In flight, their wing patterns are also distinct, with the turnstones (top and bottom) having the additional white striping compared to the surfbird (middle):

As much as it felt like spring this weekend, it's back to feeling like winter this week with chillier temperatures, lots of rain, and heavy winds. I thought it was March that was supposed to be in like a lion, out like a lamb? In any case, the taste of warmer, sunnier weather has me more than ready for more days outside with the camera again!