Hey tweets, I've been thinking lately about the subject of luck and have
come to the conclusion that a good birder must have it in abundant supply in
order to be a good birder.

I'm sure all of us so-so types have been on the receiving end of a truly
great birder who can identify every wisp of a bird's tail, classify every
whit of a bird's slightest utterance, call birds in like an electromagnet
attracting paper clips, poomp, poomp, poomp. All that takes skill, and we
can scarcely begrudge the tgb his skill, seeing as how he has probably been
honing it since he was in diapers. What's galling, however, is the tgb's
phenomenal luck. He sees things that just a-r-e n-o-t t-h-e-r-e when we go
out by ourselves.

I have spoken before of walking around the Fill with the Tahoma Audubon
Society members, for example, who seem to be simply shot with luck. I have
seen a pileated woodpecker only twice at the Fill, and both times it was
with Tahoma Audubon. How do they do it?

It's not like I have never had any luck in my life. I did place out of all
math classes when I took the freshman placement exams, this despite the fact
that I know practically no math at all. I can still remember this feeling of
power coursing through me as I answered one question after another on the
test. If I'd had any sense, I would have hopped a plane to Vegas and made a
killing that day. Instead I trotted myself over to the swimming pool, where
I placed out of all required swimming classes, despite the fact that I
possess no recognizable swimming strokes. Well, okay, I was gladder not to
have to take swimming lessons than I would have been winning a big pot in
Vegas. But you know what I mean.

I have even had a fair amount of luck finding birds at the Fill, though
beating the bushes in all weathers is also a factor. But whatever luck I do
have comes to me sporadically and not too often. What I would really like is
to be able to call my luck (such as it is) to me at will.

Take yesterday, for example. I was walking past Shoveler Pond and glassed
the far side, where the grass comes down to the shore. Lo and behold, there
was a Western Meadowlark walking along moving his head back and forth just
like a starling. I gazed at his bright yellow and black chest, his face that
always reminds me faintly of my mother-in-law, and his stripey back. I
brought my binocs down to wipe them off for a better view, and he was gone,
never to return. No one else was there. After that three-second look, not
even the bird was there. If I hadn't glassed the right spot at exactly the
right moment, I would not have seen that bird. Pure, dumb luck. Where does
it come from? On the same pond that day was a gorgeous Cinnamon Teal, and an
equally gorgeous Wilson's Snipe. As I was about to leave, a herd of tree
swallows chased a northern harrier into a low tree. Altogether, it was a
most fortuitous day, a lucky day to call to mind when I get the next parking
ticket or flat tire.

Here's everything I saw:
pied-billed grebe
double-crested cormorant (12 perching in the dead beaver snag)
great blue heron
Canada goose
mallard
gadwall
green-winged teal
American wigeon
northern pintail
northern shoveler
cinnamon teal
ring-necked duck
greater scaup
lesser scaup
bufflehead
common merganser
hooded merganser
American coot
killdeer
Wilson's snipe
glaucous-winged gull
bald eagle
northern harrier
ring-necked pheasant
rock pigeon
northern flicker
tree swallow
barn swallow (back at last)
Steller's jay
American crow
black-capped chickadee
bushtit
Bewick's wren
marsh wren
American robin
European starling
yellow-rumped warbler (both Audubon's and myrtle)
common yellowthroat (heard, not seen)
savannah sparrow
song sparrow
white-crowned sparrow
golden-crowned sparrow
western meadowlark
red-winged blackbird
brown-headed cowbird (heard, not seen)
house sparrow
American goldfinch
house finch - Connie, Seattle

csidles at isomedia.com