Tweets - it was a beautiful, frozen day, though with a bit of overcast.
There was a ring around the sun for most of the morning. Twelve of us
enjoyed the day, not complaining too much about the cold hands, though it
did manage to make us forget to write down several species on our lists - it
wasn't worth pulling off the gloves to write them down at the time.

It was pretty birdy. Highlights:

Gr. White-fronted Goose 2 adults
Cackling Goose 350-400
Horned Grebe 1-2 at the lake
Wilson's Snipe 2 at weir, 1 at Rowing Club
Barn Owl Many sightings, 2+ birds, early
Pileated Woodpecker One flying west north of weir
Northern Shrike East edge of East Meadow
Winter Wren Heard one well by the windmill
Western Meadowlark Three at the East Meadow

The Barn Owl apparently gave quite a show at the windmill at 6:30. I was
still at home then. I managed to get down to the East Meadow at 7:00, and a
few minutes later, a mob of crows rousted a Barn Owl from the Compost Piles,
and we saw it fly around in a game of keep away, before the owl finally made
its way to cover to the southeast.

It took us forever to get out of the parking lot, since we were awed by the
large flocks of (mostly) Cackling Geese that were flying in to the grass
soccer fields. Amazing scene. We managed to pick out the two GREATER
WHITE-FRONTED GEESE among them; the white-fronts were not together. The
geese were all still there at noon when we passed through again.

For the day, 58 species. For the year, 70 species (PIWO and WIWR new this
week).

== Michael Hobbs
== Kirkland, WA
== http://www.marymoor.org/birding.htm
== birdmarymoor at verizon.net