Winter Wildlife and December 2nd with J-Pod

Overall, the weather has been windy and rainy, not conducive to much outdoor activity. It hasn't stopped us from getting out there completely, as a couple weekend ago we went off island to do some birding, and successfully saw two different owl species.

Snowy owl at Sandy Point near Ferndale, WA

Short-eared owl hunting on Fir Island in Skagit County

With some family visiting over the Thanksgiving holiday, we went down to check out the foxes at South Beach. This one provided a welcome splash of color in an otherwise very gray landscape on a very gray day!

We've also been able to do a lot of bird-watching from the comfort of our own home due to some very active bird feeders, which we have been keeping a closer eye on than usual with the start of Project FeederWatch. Thanks to the counts we've been doing, we realize we get visits from about a dozen species a day totaling about 60 birds! The vast majority of these are a huge flock of juncos, but we also regularly get visits from four different species of woodpeckers.

Pair of hairy woodpeckers

Anna's hummingbirds have been steadily expanding their year-round range northward over the last couple decades. Ten years ago it was rare to have one overwinter on San Juan Island; now, it's commonplace. For the first time I'm getting them as regular visitors to our feeders during the winter. How do they survive without blooming flowers? These adaptive little guys eat insects and sap - though they aren't above sugar water, either!

Anna's hummingbird - in December!

This afternoon (December 2nd) we got word of orcas in San Juan Channel. They were heading away from us, but a bit later a friend on shore saw them turn around, so we headed out to Reuben Tarte county park to take a look. A few others were already there looking, and surprisingly, the first whales they pointed out to us were a pair of humpbacks! Shortly thereafter we spotted three orcas in the distance heading down San Juan Channel. They were spread out and far away, but since we didn't see any others, we assumed they were transients. Later in the afternoon, however, we got a chance to hop aboard a boat out of Friday Harbor with Maya's Legacy Whale Watching. We thought we needed to go a ways to catch up with them when I spotted a whale right near Point Caution just north of Friday Harbor. I zoomed in on the first photo I took and spotted a large "finger" on the saddle patch - something you don't see on transients! It was J17 Princess Angeline and her youngest J53 Kiki.

Surprise! Residents! J17 Princess Angeline and J53 Kiki in San Juan Channel

The whales were very spread out both north-south and across the channel, but slowly more and more came into view. It's amazing the energy and mood boost that comes from seeing whales, especially apparent this time of year when the winter dolrums have set in. 

J35 Tahlequah

J40 Suttles

Some of the whales practically went right into Friday Harbor! I've seen whales right near Friday Harbor from shore, but I've never had the opportunity to photograph resident killer whales with Friday Harbor in the background before. Another item off the orca photographer bucket list! ;)

As the daylight was fading the last two whales we saw approaching were L87 Onyx and J45 Se-Yi'-Chn. The colors of the sunset were becoming more spectacular and we were all crossing our fingers for a perfect surfacing from them in the amazing lighting. Of course, right when the sky looked like this they took a long dive.

Beautiful winter sunset....but what happened to the whales?

After surprising us by doubling back, we did finally get a look at the big male Onyx in front of Friday Harbor. The light had changed by then, but I'm not complaining - at least it wasn't dark yet! It was pretty awesome to see him right off the Friday Harbor ferry terminal, complete with ferry at the dock!

L87 Onyx and a ferry at the dock in Friday Harbor

Unexpectedly seeing J-Pod and L87 was a thrill that helped make up for the long stretch of dreary days. Luckily it looks like there's a lot of sunshine in our near future, so hopefully I will have more photos to share again before long!

Spring Changes to Summer

In mid-June we got two brief visits from L-Pod, but they weren't too accommodating for shore-based viewing. The L12s made one trip up as far as Lime Kiln, first spending some time resting off of Land Bank:

The L12s in resting formation

The second visit, from a larger group of L-Pod whales, offered only the most distant of looks over their two-day stay, before they headed back out to the open ocean.

A distant look at L91 Muncher from San Juan Island

Amazingly, but perhaps not surprisingly given the salmon numbers, the days continue to slip off the calendar and as we edge towards July J-Pod still has not visited us since the first of the month. They have been spotted a couple times - once in the Strait of Juan de Fuca and twice off of Tofino, and luckily off Tofino reports were they were finding a lot to eat. But the times have surely changed, and meanwhile we are left hoping that as the summer progesses, sightings of the Southern Residents in inland waters will increase as the summer goes on as happened later in the year of 2013 when sightings were also at record lows.

Meanwhile, there continue to be some transients around, though fewer than a few weeks ago. We did manage to have one nice shore-based encounter with the T36As and T65Bs where they spent more than half an hour "milling and killing" off of 4th of July Beach.

Other than that, sightings have been pretty slim, and we've taken some of our extra spare time to hand-tame some of the wild birds at our feeders. So far we've gotten red-breasted nuthatches, chestnut-backed chickadees, and even a downy woodpecker to eat from our hands!

Red-breasted nuthatch fledgling on my hand

Other than that, I've been left to enjoy and photograph all the other abundant wildlife (and wildflowers!) that lives in this special place I get to call home. I'll let the variety of the photos speak for themselves!

Curious raccoon

Female rufous hummingbird on nest

Deer fawn

Another deer fawn - this one in our yard!

Red fox in the rain

Lily pads at Three Meadows marsh

Oceanspray in bloom

A bizarre visitor to the intertidal zone - a turkey vulture

A female purple martin

On my last excursion, we headed down to Cattle Point, hoping for a first of the year Heermann's gull. They've been seen in Puget Sound, but not up here yet, though that should change any day. We didn't find out, but it's impossible not to take a photo of the eagles that regularly perch on the Cattle Point Lighthouse:

While looking up at this one, I happened to turn around just in time to see it's (presumed) mate fly by below the cliff behind us with a large fish in its talons:

Sure enough, the lighthouse eagle wasn't far behind, as it soon took flight after it's mate and/or dinner:

It's clear that there will be no shortage of things for me to photograph and report about on my blog, but I strongly hope that my next installment includes at least one visit from our Southern Resident Killer Whales!

Signs of Spring Everywhere

Earlier in the week, J-Pod departed the inland waters of the Salish Sea again, but not before making one more pass by Lime Kiln Point State Park. Many of them were way too far offshore to ID or even see, but a few of them, like J17 Princess Angeline with her youngest J53 Kiki, were fairly close to shore:

It absolutely doesn't feel right for the residents to still be scarce as June arrives, but there's nothing we can do about it but hope they're finding enough to eat wherever they are spending their time. In the meantime, there are plenty of other amazing natural sights to enjoy on San Juan Island, including just in our yard, where the birding has been quite amazing! This week one species after another has started to show up with their first brood of chicks, and none of have been more amusing that the trio of fledgling red-breasted nuthatches. When they first arrived in our yard, they could only perch on top of things, but as the days have progressed they've learned to perch upside down and sideways like their parents, and have apparently enjoyed doing so even when there's no food to be had as a result!

They look so much like their parents, but their colors are just a little fainter and something about them still gives them that baby cuteness:

The nuthatches were the first to arrive, but there have been others, some of which have taken a moment to identify like this fledgling spotted towhee!

There's also been one or a couple of young dark-eyed juncos:

And as of this morning, the first fledgling chestnut-backed chickadees have arrived, although it took a lot of patience to get a shot of one!

No house wrens yet, although it the pair is still active around the nest box after having gone into stealth mode, likely for the egg laying an incubation period. I think maybe their nestlings have hatched at this point as the trips have become more frequent, perhaps to feed the babies. I hope we get to spot the fledglings some point soon!

We also have a pair of both hairy and downy woodpeckers that visit every day, and while we don't know for sure, I hope that they too are nesting nearby and will bring their chicks to visit!

Down at American Camp yesterday, we paused to watch all the fox activity in the rabbit field. There are several dens of foxes down there and the kits, who have gotten pretty big, all seemed to be active. They were keeping a wide berth from the bald eagle that had landed in the prairie, however, but when one of the parents returned, it bolted and then jumped at the eagle to chase it off! Only a sequence of photos really captures what happened; after the eagle flew off, the kits came in to feed on a kill the eagle had been on. I wonder if the foxes stole the eagle's kill, or if the eagle was trying to mooch off the foxes? Something tells me it was the latter.

While the major bloom of spring wildflowers like camas and lily have passed, there are still other flowers and interesting plants to see on the prairie, like this chocolate lily seed pod:

There are several small species of lupine in bloom; I think this one is two-colored lupine:

Lupinus bicolor

And also both yellow and purple salsify:

Tragopogon porrifolius

Then today, a walk on Mitchell Hill turned up my first deer fawn of the season:

And also a close-up photo op of this blue-eyed darner:

Aeshna multicolor

The weather has been just perfect - the only thing missing is more whales!

A Whale and Bird Filled Weekend

Although the weather still won't quite commit to summer, the wildlife-watching has been fantastic on San Juan Island and is very much starting to reflect the changing seasons. The excitement for me this weekend started on Friday afternoon when the T101 group of transient orcas passed by Lime Kiln. While it's becoming more common to see transients from shore from San Juan, it's still not too common to see them this close off the west side!

Male transient orca T102 - born the same year as me!

The T101s are an impressive group because it's a female and her three adult sons. Often you'll only see one or maybe two males that stick together in one family unit. I hadn't personally seen these guys in 8 years, so it was neat to see them again!

T101A and T101B

J-Pod had been up north since they came through on Sunday May 7th, and it was very nice of them to wait until Saturday morning to come back south. It was also nice to get a break in the rainy morning weather to see them! They were very spread out both east-west and north-south across Haro Strait, so we only got good looks at about half of them from Lime Kiln, but we weren't complaining!

J16 Slick

The whales were "all mixed up" too, meaning they weren't in their family groups, so IDs were a little more challenging! The J16 family group was split up near the lead, in the middle, and at the end!

J36 Alki and her son J52 Sonic

We've had so much bird activity in the yard it's been possible to just hang out outside and turn up 20 species over the course of half an hour. One of the dramas that's been unfolding this spring is use of our nest boxes, including following a male house wren has he started building a nest alone, attracted a mate, and then defended his home from some violet-green swallows who were interested in taking over!

A male house wren begins to build a nest, persisting to place these seemingly too large twigs into the hole

The singing pays off! The male keeps close watch on a female as she adds softer materials to the nest he's started

Fight! The male wren defends the nest box against a pair of violet-green swallows that are interested in moving in

One reason I went outside Saturday evening was to check up on the wrens, as the nest box has seemed very quiet since the swallow incident, although we did see the wrens continuing to build up the nest later that day after the swallows had left. I'm hoping they've just gone more into stealth mode, perhaps as the female is incubating eggs, because we haven't noticed them entering or exiting the nest box in a few days, although we did hear the male signing yesterday.

While there wasn't much happening near the nest box (though I did observe a quiet chickadee enter to feed some begging chicks in the neighboring box), there were plenty of other birds to observe in the yard last night! Here are just a few of the things I saw:

Warbling vireo - new yard species and photo year bird #158

Bewick's wren singing his little heart out

Hairy woodpecker on the suet feeder

Rufous hummingbird on the lookout to defend "his" feeder

Yesterday afternoon J-Pod seemed indecisive about heading west, as we could still see them milling out near Discovery Island from Lime Kiln, but head west they finally did, so without any whales in the area this morning we again turned our attention to birds, and we found more than 35 species on a walk at Three Meadows Marsh. Included in the list were 4 more photo year birds, three of which I had been hearing in the last week or two but hadn't seen or had an opportunity to photograph.

Common yellowthroat - photo year bird #159

Yellow warbler - photo year bird #160

The other odd sight was this barn swallow that was trailing something behind it. At first I thought it was a plastic bag, but it seemed rather to be something fabric-like, with a string tied around the bird's tail or body. It seemed to be flying pretty well, though was laboring a bit more than the other birds. Hopefully it finds a way to free itself!