I uploaded 3 ptarmigan pictures on my blog at http://birdmeister.wordpress.com.

Stefan Schlick
Hillsboro, OR




From: greenfant at hotmail.com
To: tweeters at u.washington.edu
Date: Sun, 7 Aug 2011 22:37:41 -0400
Subject: [Tweeters] Mt. Rainier White-tailed Ptarmigan, White-winged Scoter, ...





Hiked up the Golden Gate trail this morning out of Paradise at Mt. Rainier National Park. The trail was pretty much entirely on 2+ ft of snow. A pair of White-tailed Ptarmigan (without young ones) was maybe about 1/4mi up from where the Golden Gate trail meets the Skyline Trail. Right off the trail. I'm going to upload some pictures later. There was plenty of habitat for the ptarmigan above the Golden Gate trail. The snowfree patches increased dramatically once you merge back onto Skyline. The trail was very slippery overall, so I can't really recommend this hike unless you are comfortable on snow and in good shape.

Also of interest were 3 Gray-crowned Rosy-Finches (the first couple only 0.3mi past Myrtle Falls), several American Pipits and a swallow flock at around 5900ft. Hoary Marmots were out in full force, pretty much every snowfree knoll had one. No sign of ANY ground squirrel or chipmunk.

On the way back, just 0.4mi west of downtown Elbe along 7, I was surprised to find 10 female-type Harlequin Ducks (3 were there yesterday) at the east end of Alder Lake. I was even more surprised to find a male WHITER-WINGED SCOTER there both yesterday and today. This bird was near the Lewis/Pierce Co line which runs right through Alder Lake. This is a very unusual time frame of White-winged Scoter suggesting that the bird may be summering at Alder Lake.

Stefan Schlick
Hillsboro, OR

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