Yakkers,

A rainy day kept us close to home so we did a raptor route in the Lower
Yakima Valley. Starting from the Toppenish NWR gazebo, we headed west on
Pumphouse Road, then north on Old Goldendale. Then west on Marion Drain to
White Swan and Fort Simcoe. There we walked the standard "Lewis's Woodpecker
survey route" where we saw 20 or so woodies and returned towards Toppenish
via Fort Road east to Tecumseh Road. South on this to Pumphouse, thence east
into Toppenish.We owled in the rain at dusk was on Campbell Road near Marion
Drain and again on Marion Drain 1/2 mile west of Lateral C. We thought of
trying to roust a screech or saw-whet owl but the rain was pretty steady,
not great for owling! Besides, we were getting cold and Villasenors Mexican
Restaurant in Toppenish sounded mighty good!

The hot spot of the day was a large field 1/4 to 1/2 mile west of Lateral C
on Marion Drain. This place was amazing! From a single vantage for an hour
around Noon and again for 15 minutes at 5 pm we had:

Northern Harrier - 12
Bald Eagle - 1
Sharp-shinned Hawk - 1
Northern Goshawk - 1
Red-tailed Hawk - 25
Rough-legged Hawk - 2
American Kestrel - 2
Prairie Falcon - 1
Barn Owl - 1
Short-eared Owl - 1
Great Blue Heron - 5

In Toppenish at 4 pm we spotted the adult Peregrine on the sheltered (from
the west wind and rain) east side of the silver water tower. We poked around
Toppenish residential districts for an hour hoping for a Merlin with no
luck.

In all today, here was our raptor tally on this route:

Bald Eagle - 4
Northern Harrier - 28
Sharp-shinned Hawk - 3
Cooper's Hawk - 7
Northern Goshawk - 1
Red-tailed Hawk - 109
Rough-legged Hawk - 3
American Kestrel - 36
Prairie Falcon - 5
Peregrine Falcon - 1
Barn Owl - 1
Great Horned Owl - 1
Short-eared Owl - 3

The other "raptor" we noted in numbers was Northern Shrike, seven in all, a
high count for us in south-central Washington.

Waterfowl numbers are way up from the CBC nearly a month ago. Though there
are still many frozen ponds, enough open water is creating a magnet for
geese and ducks. We noted:

Canada Goose - 150
Cackling Goose - 75
Am. Green-winged Teal - 60
Mallard - 500
Northern Pintail - 700
Gadwall - 3
American Wigeon - 2

Near the south end of Campbell Road were many thousands of blackbirds. We
scoped these roving flocks for oddball blackbirds for nearly an hour and
noted:

Red-winged Blackbird - 8000
Yellow-headed Blackbird - 3
Brewer's Blackbird - 3000
Brown-headed Cowbird - 100
European Starling - a boatload

Another interesting bird was 30 Western Meadowlarks, some singing. This
species seems to have increased a bunch since the CBC.


Andy and Ellen Stepniewski
Wapato WA
steppie at nwinfo.net