WINTER BIRDS OF THE PACIFIC NORTHWEST

UPDATE: SIGN-UPS FOR THIS TRIP CLOSE ON NOVEMBER 15, 2011.  This coming January PIB and Minneapolis Audubon are teaming up on a trip to the Pacific Northwest.  For Minnesotans the weather will seem mild despite the rain.  The wintering birds will agree.  Most have come down  from the Arctic to enjoy the temperate weather of coastal Oregon and Washington State.  The trip will begin and end in Portland.  For a complete itinerary, dates and list of target birds click here.

Here are soe pictures taken by birder Bob Shade on one previous trip:

Male Barrow’s Goldeneye on Hood Canal.

Black Turnstone on the rocks at Seaside, Oregon.

Pair of Harlequin Ducks just off the ferry dock at Keystone Harbor on Whidbey Island, WA.  This photo by tour leader, Harry Fuller.

A Pacific Wren in brush at Fort Lewis, OR, near the mouth of the Columbia River.  And a Surfbird with its gray back on the same stretch of beach as the turnstones.

A bunch of Brant watching a bunch of birders near Hama Hama, WA.

Other birds we see on this trip include: Red-throated and Pacific Loons, Black Oystercatcher, Long-tailed Duck, Pigeon Guillemot and Rhino Auklet, Glaucous-winged and Western Gulls, Chestnut-backed Chickadee, Anna’s Hummingbird.  We will also visit Ft. Clatsop where Lewis & Clark spent the winter 1804-5 and a Native American cultural center for the S’Kallam Tribe.

Here’s a link to blogs done during last year’s trip.

NORTHWEST WINTER BIRDS: A GALLERY

Our Colorado birders got 114 species on the Oregon/Washington State trip last week.  As we headed south from the Olympic Peninsula we got our final two species at the Wild Birds Unlimited Store along Hwy 101 southeast of Sequim.  Pine Siskin and Cassin’s Finch were among the crowd in the garden full of feeders there at WBU.

Look at the beak on this fella.  It would make a House or Purple Finch jealous.  It’s a serious seed-crunching implement.

Amonmg our 114 species: five alcids including a few fly-by Cassin’s Auklets and good look at Rhino Auklets. There were twenty-nine species of waterfowl from Trumpeter Swans to Eurasian Wigeon, three mergansers, two goldeneyes, Harlequin, Long-tailed Duck and both scaup in large numbers.

You got your Wood Duck, your Mandarin Duck, your Cinnamon Teal or even your Red-breasted Goose.  But this guy in full breeding regalia…Parisian courtiers could not conceive of such glamor.  Neither could I until I finally saw this duck up close a few years back.  This male and his mate paddled around the Keystone Ferry harbor, Whidbey Island, within thirty feet of us for half an hour.  An ecstatic half-hour for our birding group.

We did OK on raptors, with over sixty different Bald Eagle sightings. 

And we enjoyed some pretty good land-birding as well, from Pileated down to Pacific (nee Winter) Wren and both kinglets at close range.  And then there is the Northwest’s scenery where snow, fog, steep mountains, volcanoes and blue seas combine for a panorama not found in most of the world.

Not the overcast skies but no rain.  While the Coloradans’ friends and family struggled with blizzard and sub-freezing, we breezed around the Northwest under mild temps of 45-55 degrees and only a half day of rain in seven days afield. 

Finally there were several satisfying looks at Varied Thrush, including one in the garden at Wild Birds our last day.

The park is named for the Dr. Tolmie who gave his name to the Latin binomial for MacGillivray’s Warbler.

This group of VATH was in the shade beneath the Sitka spruce at Tolmie State Park near Olympia, WA.

NORTHWEST WINTER BIRDING, GALLERY PART 3

Here are yet more pictures captured by birders on the PIB trips to the Pacific Northwest last winter.  Here’s you chance to get your own pictures this winter.

View across Sauvie’s Island taken by Steve Murray.  That’s another one of those Cascades volcanoes.

Black Turnstones on the ferryboat dock at Port Townsend, Washington.  There were Surfbirds present, along with Pigeon Guillemot and Pelagic Cormorant.  Steve Murray took this photo.

Adult Pigeon Guillemot in Puget Sound.  This bird will not show up in your local reservoir if you live east of Sacramento.  Photo by Mr.Murray.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Barrow’s Goldeneye by Tom Shade.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In addition to all the birds we saw Orca, river otter, California sealions, harbor seals, elk and mule deer.  Among the land birds we saw: Varied Thrush, Wrentit, Pacific Wren, Pileated Woodpecker, Merlin, Cooper’s Hawk.

 

 

 

 

Some Northwest Trip Pictures From Bob Shade

Top to bottom:  Sunrise that first dawn just outside Astoria.

Barrow’s Goldeneye on Hood Canal.

Black Turnstone on the bouldery beach at Seaside, Oregon.  Just after taking this picture, Bob Shade took a tumble among the jumble of rocks.  He and his camera survived, shaken but unstirred.

Winter Wren in the woods.

Birders on the rainy sand at Cannon Beach, scoping Haystack Rock.  We later found Harlequins here but never located the Black Oystercatcher.

Birders all in a row.

Pictures From Puget Sound

Here are some fine pictures by Tom Bush, one of the PIB expedition members on the Northwest birding trip.  We expect to do another trip in 2011.  The next group to go will gather in Portland next week.

There could not be a more emblematic bird for our trip than the Harlequin.  This delicately marked duck goes from breeding on crashing streams to wintering on cold, open water.  Here’s a pair of males cruising off Whidbey Island.

Here’s a pair on the rugged shore at Hama Hama on the Hood Canal.

Here’s that same pair, now alerted to our staring gaze.

Top to bottom:

Barrow’s Goldeneye male on Hood Canal at Potlatch State Park.

Common Goldeneye male practices for the spring displaying competition.

Truly a golden eye.

Black Oystercatcher feeding on the beach at Sequim yacht harbor.

Young Bald Eagle at Nisqually NWR.  We probably saw four dozen different Bald Eagles on this trip.  Sightings included a copulating pair at Railroad Bridge Park in Sequim.  Tow different eagles with ducks at Whidbey Island.  Most amazing was a young eagle catching, then losing, a Cackling Goose on a lake on Sauvie Island.  That action attracted three other Bald Eagles and not even the mature individual could re-capture the goose which actually dove to escape capture.

Trumpeters at Sequim.

Song Sparrow, Nisqually.

Hood Canal Beauties

ONe of the Barrow’s Goldeneyes we saw today.  One on the right is making his courtship moves.  “How smooth am I?” he mutters in Barrowese.

Harlequin pair we found near the Hama Hama Estuary.  There we also found some great smoked oysters.

Long-tailed Duck female at the Sequim marina.

Monday Checklists

Here are some of the sightings from specific locations today as we moved from Lacey to Sequim, Washington:

Location:     Kennedy Creek estuary
Observation date:     1/25/10
Number of species:     13

American Wigeon     40
Northern Pintail     60
Green-winged Teal     10
Double-crested Cormorant     1
Black-bellied Plover     15
Dunlin (Pacific)     300
Glaucous-winged Gull     6
Northern Flicker (Red-shafted)     1
American/Northwestern Crow     12
Black-capped Chickadee     1
Chestnut-backed Chickadee     4
Golden-crowned Kinglet     6
Ruby-crowned Kinglet     1
Golden-crowned Sparrow     4

Location:     Potlatch State Park
Observation date:     1/25/10
Number of species:     17

American Wigeon     60
Mallard     10
Greater Scaup     25
Bufflehead     15
Common Goldeneye     15
Barrow’s Goldeneye     6
Red-breasted Merganser     12,   Harlequin  1
Common Loon     4
Horned Grebe     4
Red-necked Grebe     1
Double-crested Cormorant     16
Great Blue Heron     1
Bald Eagle     1
California Gull     2
Herring Gull     2
Glaucous-winged Gull     8
American/Northwestern Crow     30

Location:     Hama Hama River Delta
Observation date:     1/25/10
Number of species:     17

American Wigeon     50
Mallard     10
Northern Pintail     35
Greater Scaup     15
Surf Scoter     85
White-winged Scoter (North American)     15
Bufflehead     12
Common Goldeneye     40, Harlequin 2

Barrow’s Goldeneye     8,  Red-breasted Merganser   16,  Common Loon     1
Horned Grebe     5
Double-crested Cormorant     20
Great Blue Heron     1
Bald Eagle     2
Western x Glaucous-winged Gull (hybrid)     35
Glaucous-winged Gull     3
American/Northwestern Crow     40

Location:     Dosewallips State Park
Observation date:     1/25/10
Number of species:     18

Brant     75
American Wigeon     40
Northern Pintail     60
Green-winged Teal (American)     12
Surf Scoter     4
Bufflehead     15
Common Goldeneye     10
Common Loon     1
Horned Grebe     2
Great Blue Heron     1
Bald Eagle     1
Dunlin     25
Mew Gull     15
California Gull     12
Herring Gull     5
Glaucous-winged Gull     30
Spotted Towhee     2
Dark-eyed Junco (Oregon)     8

Location:     John Wayne Marina
Observation date:     1/25/10
Number of species:     20

American Wigeon     30
Greater Scaup     4
Surf Scoter     8
Long-tailed Duck     1
Bufflehead     25
Common Goldeneye     25
Barrow’s Goldeneye     4
Hooded Merganser     3
Red-breasted Merganser     16
Common Loon     1
Horned Grebe     4
Double-crested Cormorant     15
Pelagic Cormorant     3
Great Blue Heron     1
Black Oystercatcher     1
Western x Glaucous-winged Gull (hybrid)     25
California Gull     2
Pigeon Guillemot     2
Belted Kingfisher     1
Bushtit (Pacific)     25
Ruby-crowned Kinglet     1

Location:     Seqium and Dungeness
Observation date:     1/25/10
Number of species:     23

Trumpeter Swan     62
American Wigeon     50
Mallard     40
Northern Pintail     30
Green-winged Teal     12
Surf Scoter     16
Common Goldeneye     10
Red-breasted Merganser     4
Pelagic Cormorant     6
Great Blue Heron     1
Bald Eagle     2
Northern Harrier     1
Cooper’s Hawk     1
Red-tailed Hawk     1
Black-bellied Plover     18
Marbled Godwit     1
Sanderling     15
Western Sandpiper     20
Dunlin     130
Mew Gull     10
Western x Glaucous-winged Gull (hybrid)     30
California Gull     6
Pigeon Guillemot     2
Mourning Dove     2

Some pictures from the Northwest trip

Dunlin, Fort Stevens Park, Oregon.

Young Red-tailed Hawk eating small rodent on Sauvie Island, Oregon.

Sandhill Cranes in flight over Sauvie Island.

Below: Barrow’s Goldeneye male in Hood Canal, Washington State.

All photos by Tom Bush.