Soaking Up the California Sunshine

After heading north from San Diego it was nearly time to head back home where snow would await us, but first we had just enough time for a pit stop in sunny Laguna Beach, where we got married almost two years ago. The weather couldn't have been more perfect and with winter storm warnings forecast for our drive home, we had extra incentive to soak up our last couple days of California warmth. Even for California, it was amazing to me how many flowers were in full bloom in February!

 

I of course have extra special memories from here, but I think it would be one of my favorite places in California anyway. It's a smaller, funkier beach town with much more dynamic landscapes; I just love it there.

There wasn't as much variety of bird life on the beaches as in Mexico, but we still got some nice birding in.

Heermann's gull - a species we won't be seeing at home until late June

As we enjoyed our last sunset in Laguna Beach, we just had the feeling that would be the end of our warm weather, as indeed it was. The next morning there was a new chill in the air even in southern California.

For a few moments the golden light just looked magical on the waves!

The next day we stopped at a neat little preserve called Madrona Marsh in Torrance. The harsh lighting made birding a bit difficult, but we did get a quick look at what would be my last life bird for the trip - an ash-throated flycatcher.

We spent the night in Santa Maria and then made a stop at the butterfly grove in Pismo Beach early the next morning. The birding was great, as we added another handful of year birds in the hour we were there.

Nuttall's woodpecker - the only place I had ever seen one of these before was....also at the butterfly grove in Pismo Beach!

California scrub-jay

It was still too early in the day/cold for the monarch butterflies to be flying around, but after some careful searching of the trees we did find a cluster of them huddled together looking like a branch of dead leaves.

On our continued drive north we stopped at a little city park in Sacramento where a worm-eating warbler has been seen. (It was funny: as we passed by a couple of Frisbee golf players and they saw our cameras they knew we were probably looking for "that little bird".) We didn't have any luck finding it, but did get our best look of the trip at a red-shouldered hawk.

And just like Batiquitos Lagoon, I can't pass Sacramento National Wildlife Refuge without making a stop. It's 6-mile auto tour loop always provides some great birding and was not a disappointment!

Greater white-fronted geese

White-faced ibis

Western meadowlark

American coot

And I don't think I have ever seen so many black-necked stilt in one place! A conservative estimate was 250 of them. I'm not sure what was going on in the second photo - attempted mating?

We saw nearly 40 bird species in just over an hour there - pretty impressive! Oh, and one mammal species:

California ground squirrel

For our last two days of the drive up we hit the snow and it felt like our vacation was over! Thankfully we managed to dodge the worst of the weather and the biggest snow didn't hit home until the day after we got back. That actually made for a cozy return and some nice photo opportunities! The last birding of the road trip, however, occurred at the Anacortes ferry landing where the most impressive sight was the more than 30 great blue herons roosting on the old dock pilings:

It was a great trip that provided both the birding and some of the warm weather we had hoped for. In conclusion, here are a few statistics for our nearly two and a half week trip:

Miles traveled: More than 3800

Number of states traveled through: 7 (including Sonora, Mexico)

Number of bird species seen: 187

Number of photo year birds added: 120

Number of life birds for me: 19 

Number of life birds for Jason: 42

Number of mammal species seen: 15 - ranging from yellow-bellied marmot to bottlenose dolphin!

 

August Adventures: Outer Islands, Pond Sleuthing, Sunrises, and More

As much as we complain about our summer weather (or lack thereof) here in the San Juan Islands, we've really had a pretty summery August with lots of sunshine and warm days - at times even bordering on hot. In the last post I updated on a great extended weekend of orca sightings, but here are some of the other things I've been looking at this month...

On August 4th, my work sponsored a party aboard a local barge, complete with live music, catered food, and sand on the ground of the boat. We made a stop at Stuart Island, one of the outer islands I've long wanted to visit. While some people swam in the harbor, others of us took advantage of the short time at anchor to hike out to the Turn Point Light Station at the northwest end of the island. We had to hoof it to make it there and back, but it was worth it to visit a spot I've long seen from the water but never set foot on from the land side.

Here's a view of it from the water - taken today actually!

I imagine it would be a great spot to view the whales from shore; living up to its name, the whales often make a sharp turn there to go from Haro Strait to Boundary Pass, passing close to shore. There weren't any whales when we there, which was probably a good thing because I would have missed the boat back to watch them, but I'll definitely have to go back sometime to spend some more time there and try to see whales. It was still a pretty spectacular view that late afternoon, though.

I've been spending some early mornings on the west side of the island hoping to get one of those quiet, glassy water whale passbys. That hasn't happened yet, but I've seen some other cool stuff. One morning, this fledgling bald eagle chick flew up and landed - right in the top of a little madrone tree. It was kind of an awkward perch for an eagle, but he tested his wings a bit before taking flight again:

Yesterday morning when I was getting ready to head out, I paused to take in the sunrise from right here at our marina. It was pretty spectacular to see it coming up right over the side of Mt. Baker:

The activity at the bird feeders here on the houseboat seems to have really slowed down, though I did see my first chestnut-backed chickadees at the feeders in what seems like months. This wasn't a feeder visitor, but one afternoon a great blue heron perched right on the walkway railing just off our front porch:

On a warm Sunday afternoon I spent some time walking around a pond on a friend's property. Lots of insects were enjoying the sunny day, including these dragonflies:

Eight-spotted skimmer (Libellula forensis)

Cardinal meadowhawk (Sympetrum illotum)

There were also lots of damselflies, and this single butterfly was a beauty:

Hoary comma (Polygonia gracilis)

The the abundance of bullfrogs were interesting to look at, but unfortunately are having what I'm sure is a pretty negative effect on some of the other local wildlife. Native to the eastern US, they are an invasive species here in the west, where they eat anything smaller than themselves including the tadpoles of most native frog species.

Today, despite a lack of orca reports, we went out on the Western Prince, the boat I used to work on. We didn't see any cetaceans, but there were tons of bald eagles all over the place. We easily saw more than 20 throughout the course of the morning. 

The most interesting was an adult feeding on what looked like a dead harbor seal pup on the north side of Spieden Island. Right above it on the rocks were one of the several small herds of Mouflon sheep we saw right along the beach. I know the sheep like to lick the salt of the intertidal level, but several were actually trailing pieces of seaweed from their mouths while they were walking! The eagle's kidn of hard to see, but it's in the middle of the bottom of the picture - you can just make out the gray lump its sitting on:

We saw some of the other Spieden Island "native" wildlife, including these male European fallow deer:

We saw tons of harbor seals hauled out everywhere, too, since it was a pretty low tide. There wasn't a lot in the way of sea birds, though I did spot two kinds of gulls, a pair of marbled murrelets, black oystercatchers, pigeon guillemots, rhinoceros auklets, and pelagic cormorants. It was neat to see the cormorants had returned to a former nesting site of theirs right by Turn Point on Stuart Island. Those little ledges sure don't look like they offer much in the way of nesting space to me, but to each his own!

As you can see here, they don't form huge nesting colonies like some other sea birds, but do aggregate in small groups. They roam around from year to year, too, which perhaps explains why this site has been empty for several years prior to this one.

There - I think that catches me up a bit on sharing pictures from this month! There are more adventures in store, and I'm hoping more whales and nice weather too, so I'll try to get back to posting in a more timely manner.

Winthrop Trip: Part 1

Last weekend a bunch of co-workers and their families headed over to Winthrop in north-central Washington, and I was excited to go as well and get the chance to explore a new part of the state. It was my first time taking Highway 20 east of I5 and through the North Cascades, and it was well worth it just for the drive alone. The stunning scenery reminded me at times of Alaska, especially at this overlook near Diablo Lake where you're looking down on the water but surrounded by towering mountains.

In a nearby rockslide I also saw several pica, the first time in quite a while I've seen this small mammal.

The next time I had to pull over to take in the landscapes and snap some photos was at Washington Pass, the 5000+ foot high point on this stretch of the highway. I was very impressed while talking to a young French-Canadian biker who had just climbed a 30 kilometer (18 mile) hill to reach the pass and had gone 90 kilometers (nearly 60 miles) on the day. He wanted his picture taken in front of the elevation sign and I was glad to oblige. Here's some of the craggy mountain peaks that were nearby, and though the road was dry there was still a couple feet of snow on the ground:

We camped at Pearrygin Lake State Park just a little bit north of Winthrop. While the campground was a little bigger and busier than I would have liked, the scenery here was absolutely beautiful as well. The lake was surrounded by rolling green hills that had an almost high-desert feel to them, and then the still snow-capped mountain peaks could be seen here and there in the distance.

A group of female mallards and their ducklings occasionally visited us at our campsite, showing little to no fear of all the people around:

 

 Seeing a spotted sandpiper (198) at Jackson Beach on San Juan Island had me poised to break through 200 bird species on the year list during this trip, and it didn't take long on Saturday to start adding to the list. While walking around the campground in the morning I saw a pair of vesper sparrows (199). Then, while driving with a friend towards a trailhead for a hike, I spotted a pair of mountain bluebirds (200) as well as a couple of western bluebirds. What a nice species to be #200!

Male mountain bluebird

The hike I had scoped up was a bit more remote than I had anticipated, being several miles up bumpy, rocky roads with no signs, but we found it: Pipestone Canyon.

Pipestone Canyon trailhead

All I had time to do was step out of the car before the birding started in earnest. Right away I heard some sooty grouse (201) calling from up in the hills. A moment later, I heard my first canyon wren (202) of the day. Way up in the interesting rock formations above us was a (presumably) nesting colony of white-throated swifts.

A prairie falcon (203) flew by, causing quite a stir among the swifts. Later, at the end of the hike, I spoke to another birder who had located the prairie falcon aerie (nest) high up in the cliffs. I was able to spot it, too, by the white wash on the rocks below the little ledge, and sure enough the falcon was perched there, not far from the swift colony.

The Pipestone Canyon trail gently descended through a wooded forest habitat, where I heard a mountain chickadee (204). Eventually the landscape opened up into a meadow valley between the canyon walls.

Here, the calls of western meadowlarks echoed across the open space at amazing volumes. Black-billed magpies also chattered away in the trees at the edge of the meadow. Lazuli buntings could be heard here and there, too. Another highlight was seeing three golden eagles - two adults in one spot and an immature further down the canyon.

Lazuli bunting

Slowly, the day started heating up, and the bird life quieted down. After having a snack we turned around and started heading back, and this part of the hike was dominated instead by butterfly sightings - we saw at least six different species. They seemed particularly interested in the dried horse droppings.

Dotted blue (Euphilote enoptes)

Northern checkerspot (Chlosyne palla)

Lorquin's admiral (Limenitis lorquini)

Once back in the woods, there was one more notable bird sighting: a red-naped sapsucker (year bird 205, NA life bird 348). I was pretty sure I had a glimpse of one on the drive in, but this time I got a good enough view to be sure. It's a very pretty bird, with especially striking facial markings.

The birding continued to be good on the drive back to the campground, including a western tanager and a western kingbird. The whole drive was just beautiful, too.

Saturday evening, while at the company picnic, a couple of common nighthawks (206) flew way overhead. With all my talk about birds, several people wanted to go on another bird walk the next morning, and it didn't take much convincing on my part! We went to the Beaver Pond trails near Sun Mountain, a place some birders I had talked to at Pipestone Canyon had recommended.

One of the first things I saw at Beaver Pond was an osprey nest:

We saw and heard lots of cool birds, including western wood-pewees, yellow warblers, house wrens, and a Bullock's oriole. I saw several more red-naped sapsuckers, and was especially thrilled to find one Williamson's sapsucker (207), another life bird (NA #349).

It was a bit of whirlwind weekend trip, and after this hike it was time to start heading back west to catch the ferry from Anacortes home. This post covered all the bird sightings, but there were also lots of amazing wildflowers to be seen...stay tuned for the next post!