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!

May 11-12 ~ Spring Shorebird Migration near Grays Harbor

For years I've been wanting to head to the outer coast of Washington to catch the spring shorebird migration in and around Grays Harbor. This year, we finally made it happen! While we missed the peak numbers by a week or two, we still saw an incredible variety of species - about 15 different types of shorebirds in two days!

On May 10th, the day we traveled there, the weather was both sunny and unseasonably warm. Of course, the next day saw a 30 degree drop in temperature and was very gray! It made photography a little more difficult, but still could have been much worse had it been windy or rainy instead of just gray and cool.

High tide is the best time to view shorebirds on the mudflats, and unfortunately the high tides while we were there were either very early or very late. Our first stop for the day was at Bottle Beach State Park, where we arrived as the tide was very quickly going out in the morning, but we still got to see a lot of shorebirds, even if mostly from a distance.

Dunlin

I also got what was a bit of a surprise life bird in the red knot, as I really thought I had seen them once before! But nope, they were a lifer! Cool!

Red knots in flight

Next we went to Grayland Beach State Park, a known snowy plover nesting colony complete with a blocked off nesting protection zone. We walked along the perimeter of the nesting zone and were lucky enough to see one snowy plover - the first time I've seen this species north of California!

Snowy plover! New Washington bird for me

We were looking at some gulls on the beach when a sudden a bald eagle came swooping by - in pursuit of a greater white-fronted goose!

Bald eagle in pursuit of a greater white-fronted goose

The goose ended up landing in the ocean and dove underwater three times as the eagle was dive bombing it.

An odd sight: a greater white-fronted goose in the ocean

It was one of those same gulls that then came to the "rescue", chasing the eagle away, and allowing the goose to survive.

At Westport Light State Park the best bird wasn't a shorebird at all, but a very cooperative male common yellowthroat, another new one for the photo year list:

In the late afternoon, we made our way back around Grays Harbor towards Ocean Shores, where we were staying. Near the jetty at Point Brown, it was interesting to see fishermen right in the breakers, successfully hauling in fish. I wonder what they were catching?

We were soon distracted, though, but the hundreds of sandpipers just down the beach! They were mostly sanderling, but there were also a fair number of semipalmated plovers mixed in.

This crab also made for a cool photo op. He/she was alive, though apparently missing an eye and probably not doing so well.

The next morning we came back to the jetty at Point Brown, spending most of our time scanning through the scopes. The bird highlight was a parasitic jaeger, unfortunately much too far away to photography, but rarely enough seen by any of us that it was pretty exciting. We did, however, see 4-5 gray whales fairly close to shore, including this one that spyhopped twice.

Next we headed north up Highway 109 towards Point Grenville, a stretch of coastline none of us had never seen before. Unfortunately the dramatic beaches at Point Grenville were closed to the public, but we were able to see part of the view from up on the bluff, though the birding was a bit disappointing.

View from Point Grenville

After a late lunch we headed to an exciting spot for birders in any town: the sewage ponds! The Hoquiam Sewage Treatment Plant was bustling with bird life, and we successfully located the single blue-winged teal that had been reported earlier:

As we continued to zig zag all over the place, the next walk we took was at the Oyhut Wildlife Recreation Area, which provided yet another different habitat with a marshy lagoon. The low-flying swallows (some of whom were perching on the sand) provided an opportunity for me to finally get a nice photo of a tree swallow for the year:

In the evening we made another high tide attempt just before sunset by visiting Bill's Spit in Ocean Shores. The light was fading and the water was coming in fast, nearly cutting off access to the beach, but the quick visit was worth it, not only for the tranquil scenery but for the shorebirds that were coming in to roost for the night.

Looking out over Grays Harbor

Dunlin in flight

I even snagged one last photo year bird, bringing the trip total to a whopping 18 new species added, nearly doubling my goal of adding 10 species.

The unmistakable silhouette (when viewed larger, at least) of marbled godwits

All in all it was a great trip and I was glad to have finally made it out there, but now of course I definitely want to go back again when both the weather and the tides are more cooperative!

July 30-31: Northern Vancouver Island

For many years I've dreamed of making the trip to northern Vancouver Island to explore as well as try to see the Northern Resident Killer Whales. It hasn't happened in part because, though their peak season is a bit later up there, the best time to see the Northern Residents overlaps with the best months of seeing the Southern Residents so I find it hard to leave San Juan Island. I've read about places like Alert Bay, Telegraph Cove, and Johnstone Strait since childhood, the home of some of my whale heroes (both humans and cetacean). In 2010 we traveled through those waters on the Alaska Marine Highway while taking a ferry from Ketchikan to Bellingham, and in 2011 I made it as far as Campbell River in August and up to Johnstone Strait by boat, but this was the first time I've been on land on the northern part of Vancouver Island.

On our way up we stopped at Little Huson Caves, a hidden gem several miles up a washboard logging road. (This would not be the last logging road we would drive this week - they're used as the main source of access to many places up there!) While the part that was open to the public wasn't really a cave, they were still impressive and beautiful rock formations.

Alongside the logging road, the fireweed was in full bloom in the clear cut areas. We stopped to take a picture, and the first plant I approached had this interesting insect on it - a new one to me! A yellow velvet long-horned beetle (Cosmosalia chrysocoma):

Next stop was Telegraph Cove - a hotspot for tourists, but very scenic!

There's a boardwalk around the marina with restaurants and historic buildings restored as lodgings, and the Johnstone Strait Whale Museum!

We spent the night, however, a little further up the road in Port McNeill, in a cottage on top of a hill overlooking the straits. When we woke up in the morning there was a lot of bustling bird activity just outside our front door, including maybe 10 rufous and Anna's hummingbirds!

Anna's hummingbird

I was surprised to see a couple of Townsend's warblers, too - probably the best views I've ever had of this often secretive species!

A little later in the morning we caught a ferry from Port McNeill over to Sointula on Malcolm Island, where we spent four nights camping. I love the BC Ferries, and this one was especially cute.

While waiting for our ferry we bird-watched the waterfront, where the most exciting sight was a couple of gulls harassing a bald eagle:

Eagles would be a highlight throughout the trip, as a pair of immature eagles were right at our campground to welcome us, too!

On the evening of July 31st we spent our first few hours at the beach where we hoped to see Northern Residents. We didn't have any luck that night, but stay tuned for the next post to see what we saw when they woke us up the next morning!

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!