Hey tweets, I just got back from five days in San Diego, where I watched my
oldest son graduate from Marine boot camp (sir, yessir). He looked great and
loved boot camp, and I loved seeing him looking so proud.

It was a magical time for me and my husband. Not only did we see our son
turn into a man, but I also nailed a bird I have been trying to find for ten
years: the California gnatcatcher.

I never thought that this would be the time I'd see one (actually, three!)
because of all the horrendous fires in San Diego County over the past
several weeks. California gnatcatchers, so I've been told, tend not to
travel from one habitat island to another. This may be their greatest risk
factor when it comes to survival because when one habitat is destroyed, they
don't fly far to seek another.

I have no idea how the fires impacted this fragile species, but I went to a
couple of places where they were known to be and there was nothing there. By
"nothing" I mean literally nothing. At one site near a slough/wetlands, the
only plants left at all were a few reeds near the water. Everything more
than 8 inches away from the water was burned to the ground. A couple of
trees were still standing, but I think they were probably dead and just
hadn't fallen over yet. The rest of the landscape was ash and blackened
earth.

We stopped at another site that looked a little better, a skydiving airport
where the buildings were still standing and so were a few trees. The place
was packed with birds (lesser goldfinches, hermit thrushes, Nuttall's
woodpeckers, Bewick's wrens, and at higher elevation, titmice, nuthatches,
chickadees, flickers, woodpeckers and red-naped sapsuckers). I suppose the
birds had all crowded in together because there was no habitat anywhere
else. The airport had survived, it turned out, not because the firefighters
had come to save the buildings but because the airport staff had kept the
brush and grass closely trimmed. According to the owner, the fire passed
right over, singing the trees and leaves pretty badly but not really
burning. No gnatcatchers here, however.

Where we did finally see landscape that had completely escaped burning was
mostly in the city of San Diego itself. We found the gnatcatchers at San
Elijo Lagoon, where a bunch of birders had gathered to watch a Harris's
sparrow. Nice, but not our main concern. We wanted those gnatcatchers. Local
birders had mentioned that this is a "can't miss" site, which of course
means that our chances of missing the bird were extremely high, not to
mention all but certain. We asked the locals if they had seen gnatcatchers
recently, and they all said no. Our hearts sank, but, having just come from
the Marine graduation, we were not about to give up. Semper Fi, you know. So
we trudged off and began beating the bushes. Sure enough, John turned up a
female gnatcatcher on his own, which frustratingly did not reappear for me
for at least two hours. When she did finally show herself, though, she was
truly spectacular. Well worth the wait. On the way back to the car, two more
gnatcatchers popped up, one male and one female. Isn't that always the way?
You look for a bird for ten years without ever seeing one, and then once you
see your first glimpse, you have to be careful where you put your feet for
fear of stepping on all of the others that show up.

Here's a complete list of everything we saw:
western grebe
pied-billed grebe
brown pelican (in spectacular breeding plumage with incandescent red gular
pouches)
double-crested cormorant
Brandt's cormorant
pelagic cormorant
black-crowned night-heron
green heron
great egret
great blue heron
Canada goose
mallard
gadwall
green-winged teal
American wigeon
northern pintail
northern shoveler
blue-winged teal
ruddy duck
redhead
bufflehead
American coot
American avocet
black-necked stilt
killdeer
willet
least sandpiper
x. dowitcher
Heerman's gull
ring-billed gull
California gull
western gull
Forster's tern
white-tailed kite
northern harrier
sharp-shinned hawk
Cooper's hawk
red-tailed hawk
red-shouldered hawk
American kestrel
California quail
rock pigeon
mourning dove
greater roadrunner
Anna's hummingbird
belted kingfisher
northern flicker
acorn woodpecker
red-naped sapsucker
ladder-backed woodpecker
Nuttall's woodpecker
black phoebe
Say's phoebe
western scrub-jay
Steller's jay
American crow
common raven
oak titmouse
bridled chickadee
verdin
bushtit
white-breasted nuthatch
Bewick's wren
ruby-crowned kinglet
California gnatcatcher
hermit thrush
varied thrush
American robin
northern mockingbird
California thrasher
cedar waxwing
phainopepla
European starling
orange-crowned warbler
yellow-rumped warbler
common yellowthroat
spotted towhee
California towhee
savannah sparrow
song sparrow
dark-eyed junco (Oregon and gray-headed!)
Harris's sparrow
white-crowned sparrow
golden-crowned sparrow
fox sparrow
Brewer's blackbird
house sparrow
American goldfinch
lesser goldfinch
house finch
purple finch

-Connie, Seattle
csidles at isomedia.com