Subject: North Idaho bird trip report
Date: Feb 18 13:57:38 1998
From: "Jane Westervelt" - Jwesterv at novell.uidaho.edu


As promised, the rest of the list from our weekend birding. After
birding at Turnbull, we tried to go look for the Mew Gull at
Riverfront Park in Spokane. Tried to follow the signs, but they
disappeared before leading us to any sort of parking space. Tried to
stop at the Visitor's Info place, but the sign led us down the wrong
street. The final conclusion was that it wasn't worth finding the
gull in Spokane, which says a lot since mews are one of my favorite
gulls. We left Washington headed for Sandpoint.

Sunday morning we started up from Sandpoint, heading for Hope, Clark
Fork, and Montana (although Montana was never in the original plan).
Most of the birds we saw were seen from Sunnyside Road, which we
followed all the way around instead of retracing our steps as
suggested in Kas Dumroese's book (no offense, we just don't like
retracing our steps). The last part of that road was quite
squirrelly, lots of snow and mud, so proceed at your own risk.
Here's what we saw along this road.

Canada Geese (lots)
Common Raven
American Crow 1
Mallard (lots)
Northern Pintail 15
Northern Flicker 1
Great Blue Heron 1
Pied-billed Grebe 3
Horned Grebe 3
Redhead (lots)
Bufflehead (less than 20)
Common Goldeneye
Gadwall ~20
American Wigeon 1 (I'm used to Gadwall/Wigeon numbers going the
other way--refreshing!)
Greater Scaup (lots)
Lesser Scaup (lots)
Common Merganser ~50
Hooded Merganser 1 male
Bald Eagle 6
Coot (lots)
Ring-billed Gull
Belted Kingfisher 1 male
Black-capped Chickadee
Golden-crowned Kinglet 1 (we argued over male vs. female, and the
bird left before we decided)
Pine Siskin (lots)
and a pink flamingo for good measure.

Steve, more interested in fuzzy mammals than feathered flitties,
pointed out a number of beavers sitting on the ice at the edge of a
hole. I thought they were rocks, but I guess rocks don't really jump
into the water, slap their tails and swim away. After recognizing
them for what they really were, we starting seeing them everywhere.
We probably saw a dozen more that day alone.

Farther down the road we found 1 American Dipper on Lightning Creek
in Clark Fork.

We also headed into B.C. to go to the Creston Wildlife Center, but
there was absolutely nothing there. Maybe later when the ice melts.

The only other part of the trip worth noting was a drive up the east
side of Priest Lake:
Black-capped Chickadees
Stellar's Jay 4
Pine Siskins
Chestnut-backed Chickadees
Winter Wren was heard
Red-breasted Nuthatch 1
Golden Eagle 1
Bald Eagle 2, but more likely the same bird seen twice (same spot,
about 20 minutes apart)
Pine Grosbeak 1
Pileated Woodpecker 1
and 1 Northern Shrike on the drive back to Sandpoint.

All in all, not a bad trip. Steve found three new life birds
(Trumpeter Swans, Pygmy Nuthatch, and Pine Grosbeak) and I got one,
the Pine Grosbeak. We also have every intention of returning to
these sites at the "right" time of the year.
jw
Jane Westervelt
Moscow, ID