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

Lopez Island Visit

I know I've mentioned it before, but it's amazing how rarely we get over to visit some of the other islands. Today, on a last-minute whim, we decided to visit Lopez Island, a place I haven't been in several years even though it's just a hop, skip, and a ferry ride away.

It was a drizzly day, but that didn't deter us from walking around a couple of different parks. Our first stop was Spencer Spit State Park, where I spotted my first barn swallow (145) of the season. Here is the view from the spit, as seen through the covered picnic shelter window:

Walking back along the spit, a drab bird larger than a sparrow caught my eye as it perched on top of a piece of driftwood. Much to my surprise, it was a female mountain bluebird (146), a bird I have never seen in San Juan County before. Too cool! It is listed in one of my field guides as being a rare migrant visitor to the islands between late March and mid-May, a time frame we are right in the middle of now. I have read of some other reports west of the Cascades as well, so maybe they are migrating a little further to the west this year.

After a stop for a bite to eat, we went to Shark Reef Sanctuary, my favorite place on the island. The first part of the trail meanders through the woods, where I found a couple of beautiful snails, like this one:

Then the trail comes out to the coastline, where you can look one mile across Cattle Pass to the Cattle Point Lighthouse on San Juan Island. I don't see the view from this side all that often! There were lots of harbor seals on the nearby rocks, and some beautiful yellow, blue, and white wildflowers in bloom which brightened the otherwise gray afternoon. Here was the view across the channel as a sail boat made its way up the pass:

There was one other surprising find here which I'll save for a separate post, but before long it was time to head back towards the ferry landing to catch a ride home. On the way we stopped to drive out along Fisherman's Bay, and while I had hoped to turn up another shorebird species, it was something completely different that had me pulling the car over....

Wild turkeys (147)!! Granted, these turkeys are relatively tame compared to their more skittish counterparts on the mainland, but the fact that they were out in the open isn't going to keep me from counting them. They were of course introduced to the islands, but as far as I know the population on San Juan Island has disappeared in recent years.