HI Tweeters,

When my husband eagerly suggested a drive up the hood canal to search for the Orcas that had been sited, I responded by grabbing up Hal Opperman's A Birder's Guide to Washington.

So Saturday morning we set off to search for orcas, with great directions to all the birdy places along the way.

First stop was Mud Bay, more precisely the parking lot of Blue Heron Bakery ....hmmmmm....fudge bars! Then it was on to Kennedy Creek and the gravel pullouts. We headed up the Old Olympic Highway till it met up with 101 again. Taking off at the Purdy cutoff and making our way to Union, where we stopped at a small espresso stand and got coffee to go with those fudge bars. We then headed back towards 101 via 106. We stopped at Potlach state park for a while before continuing north, stopping at the various creeks and rivers feeding into the canal along with any public dock areas we came across. We went as far as seal rock campground on this trip before turning around and slowly making our way home.

We first spotted the Orcas a short ways before Dosewallips State Park. We watched them for a while, ooing and awwing along with many others, while the Orcas made a few short surfaces and then went back under. They were moving North at a fairly fast clip. We followed them, stopping at Dosewallips and watching again till they came to the surface, this time a little closer in. We watched till they were out of site again, hopped back in the car and drove on to Brinnon, pulling off the highway to stand and watch once more. At the entrance to Dabob Bay the Orcas slowed down a bit, did some half breeches, swam in circles, checked out a nearby boat, and probably rolled their eyes at the halo of gulls overhead. Finally we saw them start to head North into Dabob Bay, disappearing under the surface. We chose this point to turn around, having felt quite fortunate to have watched these amazing creatures for as long as we did.

And as for the birds, we had some nice views of those as well, highlights being an Osprey seen from the gravel pullouts near Kennedy Creek and the Eared Grebe at Potlatch S.P. Not exactly where I would expect to see an Eared Grebe. The grebe was a new life bird for me...having evaded me on my trips to Eastern Washington...but I am still hoping to see one of these in breeding feathers someday! Which was the fortune of another birder/orca watcher we spoke with. When I mentioned the grebe, he said he had seen one at Potlatch as well, in breeding feathers non-the-less.

Here is what we managed to ID:

House Sparrow
E. Starling
American Crow
Bufflehead
Mallard
Osprey
Chestnut-backed Chickadee
Barrow's Goldeneye
Kingfisher
DC Cormorant
Common Merganser
Common Goldeneye (males displaying)
Great Blue Heron
American Coot
Horned Grebe
Red-breasted Merganser
Bald Eagle (including two 3rd year birds that were starting to get their adult feathers)
White-winged Scoter
Surf Scoter
American Wigeon
Eared Grebe
Common Loon
Harlequin Duck
Rock Pigeon
Pelagic Cormorant
Mew Gull
Kill Deer
Red-winged Blackbird
Northern Pintail
Brandt Geese

I found it odd that I didn't see any shore birds except the killdeer and one small group of too-far-away-to-ID sandpiperish birds. With all those exposed tidelands, I would have thought there would be more. Maybe my husband managed to scare them all off...knowing it would take me all day to manage to ID them....and he wouldn't get to the Orcas...hmmmm, it's a conspiracy!

Happy Birding,

Maurie Kirschner
Olympia WA
outdoorchickerooatyahoo.com







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