One of my birding goals for this year was to improve my "birding by
ear" abilities, so I have been listening to Walton and Lawson's
Birding by Ear DVD regularly. One of the nicest side-effects of this is
that I hear individual bird songs now instead of just 'birds' (so to
speak). Right this minute, I am getting a bonus lesson, listening to a
male American Goldfinch on the finch feeder outside my open (hurray for
a warm, sunny day!)window, singing his songs over and over.

But I digress. This email is meant to be about my hike yesterday on the
Chehalis River Discovery Trail just off Goodrich Road near Centralia,
and I called it "birding by ear" because I heard far more birds than I
saw--and knew what birds I was hearing! The first birds I saw were the
dozens of Cliff Swallows and Rough-Winged Swallows swooping ominously
across the trail in front of me and over the fields--making trips back
and forth to their nests under the Barn eaves. (Formerly, I have seen
Cliff Swallows only in flight, but as I was returning to my car later,
one perched on the power lines long enough for me to examine it in
detail and in awe.)

After the swallows, I saw 6 Scrub Jays: four of them were in the plowed
field near the barn and two were on the fence posts near where the trail
divides. These two may have been two of those from the field because I
disturbed them walking by, and they flew in that direction.

Later, I saw an American Robin, a Red-winged Blackbird, a Red-tailed
Hawk, a Yellow Warbler, and a female Black-headed Grosbeak. In
addition, I heard many Common Yellowthroat and Yellow-Rumped Warbler,
but in spite of waiting quietly for 15-20 minutes, I could not get them
to come out of the bushes and grasses. Also, I heard two species I
could not identify precisely. One of those sounded like the Common
Poorwill on Walton's DVD. It was close to dusk, but still I was unsure
if that species comes over to this side of the Cascades???

The other bird song I could not identify was four or five short, clear
whistles in succession--like a Kite or a Varied Thrush (although not a
long as the Thrush's whistle). I heard this one in several places
along the trail. Any guesses what that bird might have been?

Darlene
Cinebar