I encountered a flock of 18 (or so) swallows today (Friday, 15 February
2008) at the River S Unit of Ridgefield NWR. Of the ones I was able to
identify individually, 13 were TREE SWALLOWS and 2 were BARN SWALLOWS. All
of the swallows were in a loose flock on the road between the check-in kiosk
and the hunter's gate.

Around 4:40 pm, a lone SHORT-EARED OWL appeared along the SW corner of the
auto-tour route. It flew east and disappeared. About 30 minutes after
that, 2 SHORT-EARED OWLS were harassing a RED-TAILED HAWK near the SE corner
of the auto-tour route. One of the owls disappeared, but the other landed
on a sign for a while, and then it took off to harass an adult male NORTHERN
HARRIER that was on the ground. A ROUGH-LEGGED HAWK quickly joined in and
took over as chief harasser of the harrier, although the owl remained
involved.

There was also a dark-morph HARLAN'S HAWK in the SE corner of the auto-tour
route, presumably the same one that has been in the area all winter.

A coyote was active throughout the day; I last saw it with a freshly-killed
nutria just feet from the road.

Scott Carpenter
Portland, Oregon