Tweeters,

Yesterday (19 April) I took a University of Puget Sound class to Nisqually
NWR, arriving about 1:30 and leaving about 4:30. We walked to the big open
ponds, then the barn, then north along the river for another mile, then
back. It was wonderfully birdy, enough so that even jaded college seniors
couldn't repress their "wows" at seeing beautiful Tree Swallows and other
birds in a scope (they hadn't imagined you could see little birds that
well).

High points of the day for most were non-avian, including Northwestern
Salamander egg masses and a Red-legged Frog in the shallow wetland on the
way to the barn; a Northwestern Garter Snake near the river; a River Otter
in the pond behind the visitor's center and 5 together at the river,
cavorting right below us to the absolute thrill of the students, most of
whom had never seen otters (I often see them at this place, where you first
come out on the river, and I think they den in the rock riprap there); and a
very dark brown myotis bat that flew right around us on the trail, then back
and forth over the slough next to the trail, drinking numerous times. It
was in sight for a couple of minutes, unlike the brief look I've
occasionally had at day-flying bats. This was a cosmic sighting, as far as
I was concerned, and I told the students how lucky they were to see such a
thing. This was after the sun had come out and the ambience was just
sublime, a series of magical moments one after another.

Birds were exciting, too, although as I've said before, I think one of the
things that makes it hard for young people to get into birding is the
distance between them and the birds. They really like things in the hand or
at close range! Thus only when I got a little bird in the scope did I hear
exclamations about it, e.g., a male Rufous Hummingbird that looked like a
blob until you saw it at 45x.

At the ponds west of the visitor center there were lots and lots of dabbling
ducks, also 6 Greater White-fronted Geese, 20 (Cackling) Canada Geese, a
full-plumaged male Black-bellied Plover, lots of Greater Yellowlegs, and an
American Pipit. Those ponds are really primo birding habitat and should be
checked daily during migration. There were a pair of Wood Ducks and a
female Greater Scaup (surely unusual for that spot) in the pond along the
boardwalk north of the visitor center.

Yellow-rumped Warblers were common in the leafing-out willows and
cottonwoods, distinctly more Myrtle than Audubon's. Sparrows were
everywhere, including singing Savannah and Song and migrating Golden-crowned
and Lincoln's.

Swallows were especially overt, the cool temps and winds when we arrived
prompting them to forage over the ponds, and the five common western WA
swallows flew back and forth in front of us for great looks. Several times
when I looked up I saw Purple Martins sailing about high in the sky, once
just above an eagle we were watching. Someone else saw an eagle catch a
duck just west of the barn right before we got there.

You'd be hard-pressed to have a much better birding experience in this area.

Dennis Paulson

--
Netta Smith and Dennis Paulson
1724 NE 98 St.
Seattle, WA 98115