Subject: [Tweeters] Memorial Day at Deception Pass
Date: May 30 22:52:03 2006
From: Josh Hayes - josh at blarg.net
My family and I spent the long weekend camping at Deception Pass; we had
some highlights and lowlights.
The weather was pretty crappy the first couple of days, but we discovered
that a cleft in a tree in our campsite held a nest of brown creepers, and it
was great fun to watch them work and work and work to keep their kids fed. I
roped my nine-year-old son into doing some measurements and recording his
observations, and after sighing and complaining for the first few minutes,
he really got into it, and several periods resulted in his estimate that one
parent or the other returned, on average, about every two minutes, and this
rate seemed pretty much constant over the 14-hour period we observed, over
two days.
That's a lot of bugs!
He was amazed. I also noted that the returning parent has an "announce" note
they make, and the kids start making a racket when they hear that. Wonderful
to be able to spend several hours lounging around, drinking beer and
watching birds (of course, the ADULTS were drinking the beer).
Other neato sightings: a western tanager seen by my wife and son, but not by
me, dammit. Juncos flirting their tails and singing (I thought they were
supposed to be up in the mountains?). Band-tailed pigeons (seen and heard)
and at least one, but probably more, mourning doves heard. Rufous hummers
viciously defending anything they thought was theirs. Yellow warblers by the
dozen, mostly heard but not seen. An alder flycatcher, seen, and then
definitely ID'ed by song, and I swear he was looking right at me when he
sang, as if to make sure I got it right.
Eagles galore. Pigeon guillemots. A small flock of what my wife and I
independently id'ed as rhinoceros auklets, but far enough out that we, with
only binocs and no scope, couldn't be sure. One oystercatcher, and a number
of western/clark's grebes (looked to me like western).
Sea lions, of course, but also a small group of harbor seals, and some
otters -- is it possible that there are sea otters at Deception Pass? These
otters were clearly otters, yet lounged around on their backs in the kelp,
with their feet showing, and seemed awfully large to be river otters, but
I'm not going to be the first to yell.
A lovely kestrel hunting near the freeway just south of Mount Vernon sealed
the deal.
All in all, as usual, a great trip, but it's nice to be home.
-Josh Hayes, josh at blarg.net