Tweets - it was a good day today, despite the unnaturally cloudy skies. We
even had, horrors, a few feeble sprinkles of drizzle. I think I even saw
one person have to wipe their binoculars once! That damn precipitation...
With temps in the high 50's, and little wind, it wasn't all bad weatherwise.
And the birds were quite active.

Highlights:

Cackling Goose 2 flew by - our first March sighting
American Wigeon Around 10 - uncommon in park
Common Merganser Lots, flying in circles and at lake
Red-tailed Hawk Adult on eggs on odd-snag?
Wilson's Snipe 3 flushed from below weir
Band-tailed Pigeon 1 high flyover
Barn Owl Brian saw 1 w/prey at 6:25 a.m. near windmill
Rufous Hummingbird 3? males, all doing J-displays
Northern Shrike Adult in East Meadow SINGING!!!
Varied Thrush Female at Rowing Club
Y.-rumped Warbler 3+, including 1 breeding plumage male Audubon's
Violet-green Swallow At least 100 overhead - no Tree Swallows?
Wh.-throated Sparrow One w/GCSP near weir
Purple Finch 7+ at Rowing Club

Besides the excitement of the return of the Violet-green Swallows and the
Rufous Hummingbirds, the other excitement was the breeding behaviors. A
RED-TAILED HAWK was seen sitting on the odd-snag nest west of the main
entrance for an extended period of time. On eggs? We also found 2 BUSHTIT
nests, one near the east end of the boardwalk and the other in a weeping
willow at the Rowing Club. There were nests built at both of those exact
locations last year as well.

The singing NORTHERN SHRIKE in the East Meadow was a real thrill. It
allowed us to get quite close while still vocalizing. From the BNA account
[condensed]: "Highly individualistic, variable, and continually repeated for
many minutes, somewhat like thrasher (e.g., Toxostoma spp.), "a formless,
dis-jointed performance" (F. A. Allen in Bent 1950: 124). Consists of both
musical notes-various trills, warbles, whistles, and soft
gargles-interrupted at irregular in-tervals by harsh notes-chatters,
screeches, and even alarm calls." The one we heard was indeed doing a wide
variety of loud, somewhat harsh, whistles and hard-to-describe sounds.

Sunday, I heard the SONG of a STELLER'S JAY at the Rowing Club - I didn't
even know they *had* a song. From the BNA account [condensed]: "Consists of
low-amplitude series of whistled, gurgled, snapping, popping, or harsh
sounds; run together with frequent repetitions. Solitary individuals perched
in dense vegetation will sing with no apparent stimulus. Singing bird often
continues for several minutes with slight pauses; holds tail and body in
line and nearly vertical. Extends head forward slightly, and slowly turns it
from side to side." That pretty much matches what I saw/heard.

We didn't see Green Heron or Anna's Hummingbird, but Ollie saw herons on
Monday, and I saw an Anna's on Sunday.

Late-in-the-morning sightings of a Horned Grebe on the lake and a Cooper's
Hawk near the main entrance lifted our day's total to 60 species. The VGSW,
RUHU, and YRWA were new for 2005, giving us a year total of 87 species so
far.

== Michael Hobbs
== Kirkland, WA
== http://www.scn.org/fomp/birding.htm
== birdmarymoor at verizon.net