Subject: [Tweeters] Montlake Fill birding (and mammaling)
Date: Mar 10 16:39:09 2006
From: Dennis Paulson - dennispaulson at comcast.net
Hello, tweets.
Netta Smith and I are just back (3/10/06) from a few hours
digiscoping at Montlake Fill in Seattle. It was sunny when we
arrived, but we just beat a rain storm back to the car.
There were a few highlights, in addition to the perennial fun of
taking photos.
One adult Greater White-fronted Goose at southwest corner, feeding
with Canadas. Ridiculously tame.
About 90 Cackling Geese, probably all minima although a few had
somewhat lighter breasts, at the north end. A few big moffitti Canada
Geese were grazing with them, and I finally got photos of the two
together, something I had been hoping for.
One male Eurasian Wigeon with hordes of American. It's WHEEE-you
whistle really stands out against the lower-pitched whew-WHEW-whew of
the Americans. There was no female with the Eurasian.
One (Audubon's) Yellow-rumped Warbler getting breeding plumage.
At least a half-dozen Nutrias were the big surprise to me. I hadn't
been to the fill in a long time, and had never seen them there
before. Does anyone know of the earliest sightings? I wonder if
they've reached Lake Washington on their own from the south, or if
this was another introduction. They are surprisingly tame, and we
walked up to within a few feet of one of them grazing in the tall
grass. It didn't seem at all afraid, just kept grazing as it moved
slowly away.
-----
Dennis Paulson
1724 NE 98 St.
Seattle, WA 98115
206-528-1382
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://mailman1.u.washington.edu/pipermail/tweeters/attachments/20060310/edf47eaf/attachment.htm