Tweets - my wife and I spent Monday over in Kittitas county, scouting for
my Feb 25th Seattle Audubon field trip to Cle Elum and Ellensburg. For
some reason, birding was really slow yesterday, but we did have some
interesting birds.

In the Sun Ranch neighborhood, accessed from the Golf Course Rd exit off
I-90 west of Cle Elum, we had an OSPREY sitting in a snag.

In South Cle Elum we had a flock of about 30 EVENING GROSBEAK.

At the Swauk Cemetery and at the end of nearby Ley Rd. we had RED
CROSSBILLS. Also on Ley Rd. were at least 3 MOUNTAIN CHICKADEES and a
female CASSIN'S FINCH.

On Hayward Rd, which connects Bettas Rd. to SR 10, we had many
ROUGH-LEGGED HAWKs, perhaps 10, including a nice dark morph bird. Also
present was a flock of perhaps 20 HORNED LARK, and the highlight of the
trip, 2 male MOUNTAIN BLUEBIRDS.

South of Ellensburg, in the pond at the mobile home park at Canyon Rd x
Tjossem Rd, there was a male EURASIAN WIGEON in company of a single female
wigeon.

On our way home, just west of West Summit at Snoqualmie, there was a GREAT
HORNED OWL in the median 3/4ths of the way up a snag.

Today, on our way home from skiing at Alpental, we saw the ALBINO
RED-TAILED HAWK in the I-90 median on a short fir near Hwy 18.

Yesterday, we ended up with less than 50 species seven hours of birding.
Very slow. But it was nice to be birding with my wife, and the sun shone
most of the day.

== Michael Hobbs
== Kirkland, WA
== http//www.scn.org/fomp/birding.htm
== hummer at isomedia.com