Photo: Bufflehead by Mick Thompson
Hello everyone,
Well, we achieved our goal of having more bird species than birders this week, but not by much. We didn’t have any extra-special species but the behavior of some of the species we did have was interesting.
Our Red-breasted Mergansers were back on the east lagoon, looking lovely, except for the young males who are still working on growing in their adult plumage. They looked pretty scruffy, but cute, with their multi-colored feathers. We had one female Common Merganser too. Last winter we had a regular flock of Red-breasted Mergansers along with one female Common. Could they be the same birds?
There was a bunch of Goldfinches at the top of a tree in the former rose garden, looking just like leaves until you looked closely with your binoculars. They had us fooled at first!
Robins were all over the place and they even had a flyabout with some of the Goldfinches. We saw a few large flocks of Starlings, and one very large murmuration was joined by a Cooper’s Hawk – that would explain why the murmuration broke up and went in different directions. The hawk didn’t catch any of the Starlings while we were watching, fortunately.
BIRDERS: Jen, JC, Cheryl, Jennie, Paul, Mark C., Eric, Lucy, Kristin, Bruce, Tracy, Marisa, Renate, Marian.
TIME: 8:00am to 10:45am
WEATHER: Low 40s, cloudy, light winds
Compiler: Cheryl
Photographer: Eric
Canada Goose Number observed: 193
Mallard Number observed: 8
Common Merganser Number observed: 1
Red-breasted Merganser Number observed: 25
Ring-billed Gull Number observed: 4
Great Blue Heron Number observed: 4
Cooper's Hawk Number observed: 1
Downy Woodpecker Number observed: 1
Northern Flicker Number observed: 2
American Crow Number observed: 7
Black-capped Chickadee Number observed: 4
European Starling Number observed: 38
American Robin Number observed: 31
House Finch Number observed: 2
American Goldfinch Number observed: 21
Dark-eyed Junco Number observed: 10
Northern Cardinal Number observed: 4
If you’d like more information about a bird, check out the All About Birds ID guide:
https://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/
Corrections, additions and comments are welcome.
Good birding everyone,
Jennie