I spent Sunday up in the icy north - Samish/Skagit area. (After stopping
to see a friend's beagle puppy in her first dog show, that is ... You
should see the wacky looking dogs they have these days!)

At the Big Ditch Access, I met Wes and Ruby Jansen, John Nunn and his
wife, and a couple other birders whose names I've already forgotten, dang
it. We managed to find *8* Snowy Owls! It took a lot of time, and even
with a scope some of them were hard to see.

Spotted a flock of over 500 swans (I stopped counting at 500...) at the
intersection of Cedardale and Johnson roads. Cedardale is one block east
off of the SR534 exit from I5. Turn left at the Texaco, and the swans
were about half a mile north. The swans were near the long, low sheds of
the first farm on Johnson.

Also on Cedardale road, south of Johnson, was one very wet, bedraggled,
roughed-up looking immature peregrine. A chip truck roaring by knocked it
off the telephone wires with the blast of air. It had feathers sticking
out all over - two sticking straight up from its back, one sticking out of
its wings, and a couple from its breast. It shifted its weight
continually from one foot to another. After about half an hour it took
off over the field with the swans, and I lost it behind some trees.

At the North Access (end of Rawlins Road), there was a Great Horned Owl
sighted by some Mountaineers. I got some very close encounters with some
Short-eared Owls, as they hunted the path I was standing on. I'm not
sure, but one reacted like he hadn't even known I was there, until he was
about 4 feet from me! I'm curious about the percentage of successful
versus unsuccessful stoops. John Nunn (sp?) said "1 out of 10 tries"
resulted in a catch, but I watched one owl stoop 20 times in about 40
minutes, without a catch. And these were full stoops - down into the
grass, completely out of sight. Too much competition? (There were, at one
time, 9 short-eareds out there in the field) Young owl? Interesting.

Lots of Bald Eagles, and thousands of waterfowl out in the bay (along with
a couple hunters in boats, and about 10 hunters on land). The eagles
created quite a fuss once, all taking off at once. They stirred up the
waterfowl and I caught a quick glance of 5 or 6 Snow Geese. Beautiful in
flight! Lots of Great Blue Herons chasing each other, a couple of
Kingfishers, unidentified sparrows (not good at sparrows yet!), Marsh
Wrens, and a very loud Black-capped Chickadee in the tree by the gate.

Cheers,

Susan Collicott
camel at serv.net
Seattle, WA