Hi Tweets!

Today, I had another successful and fun birding trip with Sir Tom Mansfield. We focused on some elusive target county birds for Skamania County.

Before dawn, we had great looks at a very cooperative BARRED OWL along FR23 (shortly after the road forks to the right leading to Takhlakh Lake) Above the East Fork Adams Creek area, we flushed a SOOTY GROUSE and a probable SPRUCE GROUSE along the roadside.

Horseshoe Lake was very quiet except for a vocal HAIRY WOODPECKER, BELTED KINGFISHER, and a sunbathing RED TAILED HAWK.

While having lunch with the Gray Jay's at Takhlakh Lake, I saw three PINE GROSBEAKS flyby and had a very vocal one that just teased us without it's presence. We also had a flock of WHITE FRONTED GEESE fly over Mt. Adams right above the scenic, Takhlakh Lake. A pair of GADWALL and a female COMMON MERGANSER were in the lake.

Near Takh Takh Meadows, we also spotted a PRAIRIE FALCON up high. Several VARIED THRUSHES and one HERMIT THRUSH were in this area,too.

Not only is finding Sprucies a tough task, but Tom had to specifically request for an adult male. I had to work but just as we were about to give up, I spotted a beautiful male SPRUCE GROUSE along Horseshoe Lake Rd. Tom snapped, snapped away and was in awe of how elegant this fancy forest chicken was.

As we headed down to Randle, I found Tom the third grouse species for the day, a RUFFED GROUSE, adding another county bird for his list. Yipee!!

Today, Mt. Adams looked magnificent. It was a fun day:)

Good birding,

Khanh Tran (Portland, Oregon)


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