Winter Birding on Lopez Island

With so many microclimates and microhabitats in the San Juan Islands, there are very different places to explore and even different birds to see depending on which island you are on. Because of the convenience of the ferry schedule, when we decide to explore another island, we usually go to Orcas, but yesterday we decided to go for the extra early and extra long ferry rides in order to explore Lopez Island. Good decision!

Locally known as "Slowpez", Lopez is definitely the quietest of the larger ferry-served island with about half the population of Orcas and a third of the population of San Juan. It's also been nicknamed "the friendly isle", in part because every car waves to every other car as they pass each other anywhere on the island. I've only been to Lopez a handful of times myself, which means there are still parks I have yet to explore over there. After our visit yesterday, I think I actually prefer the Lopez over Orcas, because there are more coastal access points with dramatic landscapes and fewer in the way of hilly wooded hikes.

One of the main reasons for our trip was to go birding and try and add some species to our year and photo year lists. Our first stop in the morning was to Fisherman Bay, where both the species and photographic opportunities added up quickly!

Belted kingfisher in the early morning light at Fisherman Bay

Great blue heron at Fisherman Bay

Heading out the spit at Fisherman Bay

Abstract rock and tree reflection at Fisherman Bay

Our next stop was Shark Reef, which is on the opposite side of San Juan Channel of our regular stomping grounds at Cattle Point. Unlike Cattle Point, which is all open prairie, you hike through the woods to get to the rocky Shark Reef.

Boardwalk at Shark Reef

Shark Reef, on the east side of Cattle Pass

Next we searched for one of the main target species for our trip: the wild turkey! While they used to be found on other island including San Juan, currently the only flock of wild turkeys on the island makes their home on Lopez. We were just about to give up when we came upon a group of more than 20 of them! I'm not sure why they are so much more fun to watch than many other birds, but they are - I suppose it's because they're very expressive, comical, and have lots of social interactions.

Wild turkeys on Lopez

It's surprising to see such a large bird fly - not only over this fence, but even up into the trees above!

Our next stop was Iceberg Point, a place I amazingly had never visited before. There are miles of hiking trails there and we only got to go out to the point in one direction, so we will definitely have to go back. While the birding was decent, the scenery is absolutely stunning.

Iceberg Point

It also offered a different perspective on Cattle Point:

The geology is complex and amazing throughout the San Juans as well, and Iceberg Point was no exception.

Hummel Lake was pretty quiet, but seems to be one of the first locations swallows show up in the islands each year. With reports of some already in nearby Skagit County, the early arrivals might not be far off! We settled for this picturesque common merganser though:

Our last stop before heading back to the ferry was out to Spencer Spit, but we got waylaid on the way there at first by a northern shrike (which would only perch on fence posts, so sadly will not quality for the photo year list which has the theme of photos "without the hand of man"), and then by these sheep. Have you ever seen sheep run before? I don't think I have!

Unlike the ferry ride there, the ferry ride back was in the daylight, so we continued birding from the boat (as we again stopped at every island on our way home). 

An up-close view of double-crested and pelagic cormorants at the Shaw Island ferry terminal

No luck on the shrike, but I did get a rock pigeon picture "without the hand of man"! I like this theme because it makes me attempt different and more challenging photos, such as in-flight shots. The different challenge means the first rock pigeons I saw this year perched on a man-made structure didn't "count", but I like this result much better!

In the end we tallied 52 species on the day, the highest single-day total yet this year! Not at all a bad showing, and after a several year gap in visits, we will definitely we going back to Lopez sooner rather than later.

Portrait of a glaucous-winged gull at the Orcas Island ferry landing

October 30th ~ The Sheep Rock Unit

On October 30th (my 30th birthday!) we were greeted as we departed Mitchell by the seemingly resident group of wild turkeys.

Our first stop was at an overlook near Dayville looking at the Picture Gorge basalts:

The peak in the above photo is Sheep Rock, namesake of the third of the John Day Fossil Bed units. This single feature showcases about 10 different geologic formations. Here are the ones I could pick out:

Right across from Sheep Rock is the Thomas Condon Paleontology Center, which features a lot of the fossils found in the region. It's really impressive stuff!

Next we were off to hike the Blue Basin, where we didn't get too far along the rim trail before flushing a flock of chukars (195)!

Chukar!!

Again, it was pretty quiet bird-wise, but I did manage to find a single mountain chickadee (196), too.

As is the case throughout the region, the landscapes stole the show:

These incredible formations are the result of volcanic ash turned into claystone, and the color is from mineralization over time (so it wasn't this color originally).

And of course, there were more of these guys around:

As our last full day in the John Day Fossil Beds area came to a close, we were preparing to head up to Portland to visit with family for a couple days. The birding wasn't done, though, as along the Crown-Zellerbach Trail in Scappoose I reached my birding year list goal for the year with the following species: sandhill crane (197), cackling goose (198), Lincoln's sparrow (199), and cinnamon teal (200)!

Often November is a pretty quiet time wildlife and photography wise back at home, but not this year! There's plenty of excitement to share in my next few posts.

October 29 ~ The Painted Hills

Mitchell, Oregon would be our home base for a couple of days as we explored the other regions of the John Day Fossil Beds National Monument. I couldn't believe it when we woke up on the morning of the 29th to sunshine! The forecast before our trip was for lots of rain, and even a chance of a frozen mix - so this was a very pleasant surprise! It was a perfect day for exploring the Painted Hills unit, because the sunshine made the colors that much more impressive.

 

The incredible geology of the region results from an amazingly complex history. From former ocean floor to former tropical forests, with volcanic ash falls and lava flows, and millions of years of erosion, I honestly couldn't keep all the rock layers straight. I know the amazing reds and yellows of the painted hills are from an era where the climate was much warmer, about 35 million years ago, when exotic creatures like camels, rhinoceroses, and small prehistoric horses roamed the area.

It wasn't a very birdy area, with the exception of lots of robins and a few Townsend's solitaires (193) feeding on the abundance of juniper berries. Bordering the Painted Hills unit is a large proposed wilderness area, too, and we explored a few miles of those dirt roads, and found a single immature golden eagle (194).

There were also lots of Columbia black-tailed deer around. These deer, a sub-species of the mule deer, are supposedly the same species we have in the San Juan Islands, but there must be multiple sub-species, because these guys were much larger than our deer on the island! Their ears were also much larger, more characteristic of what I think of as mule deer.

October 28th ~ From Goldendale, WA to Mitchell, OR

The Yakima River side trip was such a success the day before, that I wanted to do another one. After leaving Goldendale, we again went off the highway and followed the 10+ miles of gravel Dalles Mountain Road towards the Columbia River Gorge. Again, it was an awesome side trip! Before we got to the gravel road, we passed through the small town of Centerville. It's amazing how many small towns there are like this all over the region, many of them almost ghost towns.

As we left Centerville, the birding really picked up for the first time on the trip. Lots of western meadowlarks and American pipits joined all the blackbirds in the farm fields. I also spotted the first of two prairie falcons (188)!

American pipit

One of the reasons we wanted to take this road is because as it goes over the ridge, you get amazing views of the Columbia River as you wind your way down towards Highway 14.

The Columbia River

The sun even came out a little bit!

Even on this side of the Cascades, the orcas aren't far from my mind. The Southern Residents feed on Columbia River Chinook salmon a lot, particularly during the winter months. While a good fall run of Chinook salmon is expected this year, in general Columbia runs are just a fraction of their former selves, in large part due to dams.

The John Day Dam

One reason dams are/were hugely important is as a source of hydroelectric power. On the ridgeline in the above photo, however, you can just make out what might be a good replacement for hydroelectric power: wind.

Wind turbines near Centerville, WA

 

[Side note: to learn a lot more about how dams impact salmon runs, and why we should start to seriously consider removing some dams, I highly recommend the movie DamNation. You can watch the trailer here, and the movie is available on both Netflix and iTunes or you can purchase the DVD from the movie's site.]

We also stopped at the replica Stonehenge before crossing into Oregon, because, why not? But to see what I'm thinking in the photo below, watch this video.

I actually don't think this one looks too much like the real thing, and we do know why they built this one: as a war memorial.

We wound our way down into Central Oregon away from the Columbia River, going through all kinds of very small towns and lots of wide open fields. In addition to spotting a small herd of pronghorn antelope, I saw a single mountain bluebird (189). I thought I might see more, but that ended up being my only bluebird on the trip! On our way to Mitchell, which would be our home base for the next couple days, we stopped at the Clarno Unit of the John Day Fossil Beds National Monument. The John Day Fossil Beds were the main attraction that drew me to this region, and the Clarno Unit is the smallest of the three units in the monument.

While we did the hike along this cliff face, we actually got a little rained on, but that didn't stop me from spotting some birds!

Rock wren (year bird 190)

Canyon wren (year bird 191)

In fact, this would also be the only place I would see rock and canyon wrens! We also saw rock pigeons in more or less their natural habitat, rather than on the city streets.

I would add one more year bird just outside of Fossil, Oregon as it was getting dark on our way to Mitchell: wild turkeys (192)! Next up: more hiking, more birding, and more amazing geology! The Painted Hills of Oregon.