Tweeters,

On Sunday, my wife and I hiked to the top of Mt. Townsend in Jefferson
County following Forest Service Trail 839, which lies just south of the
border with Clallam County). We had a relatively small bird list for the
day, but did see a couple of species of interest. First, we saw 3-4
Horned Larks in the low alpine vegetation on the south side of the summit
(6,280 feet elevation). The birds were all singing and at least one did
so while performing an aerial display flight, thus nesting seems likely to
be occurring there. Horned Larks are listed as a No. 4 species on the
Knittle checklist for Jefferson County, plus the new "Birds of Washington"
book indicates that breeding is restricted to just the northeast corner of
the Olympics, which our observation seems to fit. Secondly, we heard good
numbers of singing Hermit Thrushes (at least 10 birds) in the conifer
forest between about 4,000 and 5,500 feet. Two American Pipits were also
seen near the summit.

Gary Wiles
Olympia, WA
wilesharkey at yahoo.com


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