Hi Tweets,

While camping at Potholes State Park campground from May 26-28 we were
serenaded each day by a singing Brown Thrasher. As a native New
Englander, he is for me a familiar old friend. As I sought to track down
the singer, I kept thinking, "Sounds just like a Brown Thrasher. I
didn't know they were in eastern WA." What a delight to locate him
perched at the tip of the Lombardy Poplars: reddish-brown dorsal, brown
streaks on white front and sides, long tail, long curved bill, yellow
eye, singing away in his repeated phrases in threes (and occasionally
twos and fours)!

Hiking in Columbia NWR south of Soda Lake Dam we also watched a
Black-crowned Night Heron wade out into the water at lake side and swim
its way many yards along the shore! Other highlights of the region for
us Whidbey Islanders were Lark Sparrows, Lazuli Buntings, and Prairie
Falcons -- including three youngsters walking around at the edge of
their cliff-ledge nest looking ready to fledge.

Sarah Schmidt
Coupeville

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Sarah Schmidt
243 Rhodena Drive
Coupeville, WA 98239
(360) 678-8396
(360) 929-3592 cell
one4bats at comcast.net
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"The shadow of a pelican sailed over a pool
in which a yellowleg alighted with warbling
whistle; it occurred to me that whereas I
write a poem by dint of mighty cerebration,
the yellowleg walks a better one just by
lifting his foot."
?Aldo Leopold, A Sand County Almanac