Hi Tweeters and friends:
On Sunday, Feb 12 a group from Rainier Audubon (S King County) saw 4 SNOWY
OWLS at the Skagit Headquarters Wylie Rd dike on Fir Island. [All
directions in the following msg are from the excellent maps in A BIRDER'S
GUIDE TO WASHINGTON, edited by Hal Opperman.] We walked the loop at Hdqtrs,
and headed in a clockwise direction passing by the boat launch. A PEREGRINE
FALCON flew past the hdqtrs. parking lot. It was quiet along the river
trail, except for a flock of about 15 YELLOW-RUMPED WARBLERS, both Audubon's
and Myrtle. We looked for sparrows down the boardwalk bridges, but were
unsuccessful finding them except for Song and Fox Sparrow. Later we saw a
number of GOLDEN-CROWNED SPARROWS on the other dike. We did see a GREATER
YELLOWLEGS in a flooded field. Out at the far end of the loop at the salt
marsh, we reached a point where there is a jct. of trails, and there are
some picnic benches. We turned left (south) and walked out on what Rob Cash
calls the "spur dike". I had never been there before. Rob says it
eventually stops at the river mouth. We only walked about 3 or 4 blocks on
the spur dike road, and looked out to driftwood near the water on the bay.
We saw a nice white adult SNOWY OWL on a log near the water. Two adult BALD
EAGLES were perched high on some driftwood. Eventually we saw 3 more SNOWY
OWLS perched in that area. We saw 3 adult and 1 juv SNOWY OWL from there
and were glad we had our scopes. The birds were perched at least 1/2 mile
away.
Back at headqtrs parking lot we saw 3 BARN SWALLOWS flying overhead.
Members of our group and a Seattle group saw 7 swallows w/ white underparts.
The Seattle group said they were TREE SWALLOWS, and VIOLET-GREEN SWALLOWS.
Bugs were flying in the air.
Earlier that same morning about 8:45am, we saw a MERLIN perched in the tall
fir tree in Conway on Fir Island Rd. A little beyond that was an AMERICAN
KESTREL perched on a phone wire. On Fir Island Road, just before the
turnoff to Wylie Rd, we pulled well off the road! and had nice comparison
views of TRUMPETER AND TUNDRA SWANS in the field to the north. SNOW GEESE
were flying to the south.
After we left headqtrs, we stopped at Hayton Snow Goose Reserve where there
were several thousand SNOW GEESE foraging in the field. From there we
headed north, and there was a second AMERICAN KESTREL perched on a line by
the Fir Island produce market (ice cream store). We traveled through the
Skagit Flats which were pretty quiet, and saw a third AMERICAN KESTREL on
Farm to Market Rd up on the hill, before dropping down to the Samish Flats.
On Bayview-Edison Rd, south of the T, we saw a beautiful adult female
PEREGRINE FALCON on a telephone pole. Scott Morrison stopped by, and said
he had seen a HARLAN'S HAWK over on Farm to Market Rd, about 1/2 mile south
of Edison. Our group did not see it.
At the Samish West 90 it was sunny, warm, and there was no wind! We watched
several SHORT-EARED OWLS, several N HARRIERS, and a ROUGH-LEGGED HAWK. Then
we got to observe something wonderful. In the field just to the north of
the West 90 parking lot, a SHORT-EARED OWL, a light-morph ROUGH-LEGGED
HAWK, and a DARK-MORPH ROUGH-LEGGED HAWK! were flying around and flying at
each other. Wow! At first I didn't know what the dark-morph Rough-legged
Hawk was (I briefly called it a Vulture), as I had never seen one flying
before. But the Seattle group, led by an expert raptor leader ID'd it as a
Dark-morph ROUGH-LEGGED HAWK! Eventually it landed on a bush in front of
the left-most metal barn and we got to study it w/ scopes. Then it flew low
to the north. Wow!
After that we headed north to Samish Island Park, and viewed Samish Bay from
the beach below the bluff. We saw 7 LONG-TAILED DUCKS in the middle of the
bay as we looked over toward a bridge on Chuckanut Drive. We saw lots of
BALD EAGLES of various ages everywhere we went. It was a great day.
Yours, Carol Schulz
DesMoines