Tweets,

Today 9 of us braved light rain and cool temperatures to walk Nisqually.
After all the hot, dry weather we've had I won't complain.

It really was a pretty good day with 5 swallows and all three wading birds
at the visitor center. Between the trees and the roof we had BARN. CLIFF,
TREE, VIOLET-GREEN, and NORTHERN ROUGH-WINGED SWALLOWS. A GREAT BLUE HERON
flew over the parking lot as we arrived and we had two flybys by a GREEN
HERON over the pond behind the visitor center. After the second flyby it
landed along the edge of the cattails and provided excellent views.

The second flyby interrupted our viewing of an AMERICAN BITTERN that moved
in and out of cover near the viewing platform. Funny how we can be
distracted.

The next best bird of the day was a male TOWNSEND'S WARBLER in the riparian
area near the Nisqually River overlook. It was in a mixed flock of
BLACK-CAPPED CHICKADEE, BROWN CREEPER, WILSON'S WARBLERS, and YELLOW WARBLERS.

Waterfowl and raptors were very scarce and shorebirds were non-existent.

The only mammals we saw were a doe and fawn BLACK-TAILED DEER near the
visitor center as we were leaving.

All told we saw 36 species for the day with the TOWNSEND'S WARBLER being
new for the year.

Until next week....

Phil Kelley
scrubjay323 at aol.com
Lacey, WA
360-459-1499