Joel Brady-Power and I birded Skagit today. Five inches of snow were
already on the roads when I drove on to Fir Island and it snowed
nearly non-stop all day. On Samish Island there were 13 inches on the
deck of my cabin. Perhaps the weirdest sighting of the day was an
American Pipit that landed in the middle of the center lane of I-5
just south of Conway first thing in the morning.

We had several highlights including a Northern Waterthrush and three
White-throated Sparrows at the Skagit Game Range (aka Skagit WMA /
Wylie Slough), three Canvasback & twelve Thayer's Gulls at Samish
Island, the Prairie Falcon on the Samish Flats, and an amazing show of
at least 35 Short-eared Owls at dusk at the West 90. We managed to
find 80 species which seemed pretty good given the conditions. A full
list is below.

Good birding,
Ryan Merrill
Kirkland, WA


Snow Goose - 5000+ Fir Island
Brant - 500+ Samish Island
Canada Goose - 50 March Point
Trumpeter Swan - 20 Fir Island
Tundra Swan - 60 Fir Island
Gadwall - 5 March Point, 8 Samish Island
American Wigeon
Mallard
Northern Pintail
Green-winged Teal
Canvasback - 3 Samish Island (2m,1f)
Greater Scaup - 20 Samish Island
Harlequin Duck - 3 Samish Island (1m,2f)
Surf Scoter
White-winged Scoter
Bufflehead
Common Goldeneye
Barrow's Goldeneye - 1 Samish Island
Common Merganser - 1 flying over Rexville headed SE
Red-breasted Merganser - 50 Samish Island
Red-throated Loon - 20 Samish Island
Pacific Loon - 2 Samish Island
Common Loon - 4 March Point, 2 Samish Island
Horned Grebe - 20 Samish Island
Red-necked Grebe - 15 Samish Island
Double-crested Cormorant
Pelagic Cormorant
Great Blue Heron
Bald Eagle - 10
Northern Harrier - 20
Cooper's Hawk - 1 adult West 90
Red-tailed Hawk - 8
Rough-legged Hawk - 5 Samish Flats
Peregrine Falcon - 1 Samish Island
PRAIRIE FALCON - 1 Bayview-Edison Road perched on a fence post NW of
Sullivan Road
Black-bellied Plover - 15 Samish Island
Killdeer - 25 Samish Island
Black Turnstone - 35 Samish Island
Least Sandpiper - 15 March Point
Dunlin - 300 March Point, 2 Samish Island
Wilson's Snipe - 15 Game Range, 8 elsewhere on Fir Island, 1 Samish Island
Mew Gull - 300 Samish Island
Ring-billed Gull
Thayer's Gull - 12 Samish Island (11 ad, 1 third-cycle)
Glaucous-winged Gull
Pigeon Guillemot - 2 Samish Island
Rock Pigeon
Barn Owl - 2 Pulver Road after dark
Short-eared Owl - 35+ at dusk at West 90! Several times had 8-10 in
one field of view
Belted Kingfisher - 1 Game Range, 1 Samish Island
Downy Woodpecker - 2 Game Range
Northern Flicker - 1 Game Range, 2 Samish Island
American Crow - 50 Samish Island
Common Raven - 3
Black-capped Chickadee - 10 Game Range
Brown Creeper - 2 Game Range
Bewick's Wren - 1 Game Range
Winter Wren - 5 Game Range
Marsh Wren - 6 Game Range
Golden-crowned Kinglet - 10 Game Range
Ruby-crowned Kinglet - 15 Game Range
American Robin
Varied Thrush - 10 Game Range, 4 Samish Island
European Starling
American Pipit - 1 landed in the middle of I-5 near Conway, 5 Game
Range, 7 Samish Island
'Audubon's' Yellow-rumped Warbler - 2 Samish Island
NORTHERN WATERTHRUSH - 1 Game Range
Spotted Towhee - 15 Game Range
Fox Sparrow - 15 Game Range
Song Sparrow - 120 Game Range
Lincoln's Sparrow - 2 Game Range, 1 Jensen Access
White-throated Sparrow - 3 Game Range
Golden-crowned Sparrow - 40 Game Range
Dark-eyed Junco - 150 Game Range
Red-winged Blackbird
Western Meadowlark - 5 Game Range, 10 Fir Island, 15 Samish Flats
Brewer's Blackbird
Purple Finch - 8 Game Range
House Finch - 90 Samish Flats
Pine Siskin - 100 Game Range