It was White, not Black Friday along Thomle Rd (Stanwood) and at
Hayton Preserve on Fir Island - Snowy Owls (one man, "Greg" said he'd
seen 4), Snow Geese, Trumpeter Swans and icy white mountain peaks,
stood out. More subdued in color, but equally exciting to see, were
the Western Meadowlarks (about 15 in a flock at Hayton Preserve and
perhaps a hundred or so in one tree off Thomle Rd.), 2 falcons, a
Merlin and a Peregrine, both at Hayton Preserve, Northern Harriers
and, my favorite, Short-eared Owls., at both the Stanwood and Fir
island sites we visited.

At Hayton Preserve in mid-afternoon, the fields and sky were full of
geese. Upon our (friend Ron and his daughter Carmel's) arrival, the
geese were mostly close to or directly on the ground. When a Bald
Eagle appeared in the collective goose peripheral vision, they all
lifted off at once, swirling around a bit and heading west to land in
another field. Using this opportunity to get closer to its own prey,
a Merlin flew right in from the trees to the west of the Hayton
parking area and perched on the ground, and got its bearings as to
where the shorebirds were (Dunlin, Black-bellied Plover, Long-billed
Dowitcher and ???)- a few minutes later it flew off. Looked like a
Taiga female to me, but who am I to say?! It was brown and streaked,
with a noticeably whitish neck... Carmel spotted our first Short-
eared Owl of the afternoon. It flew in, initially landing nearby,
next to a group of geese - then it flapped off to do some hunting and
we continued to see it and at least 2 others, hunting in the area.
There was interplay between the Shortears, until one of them caught a
vole and a couple of Northern Harriers came in to attempt to steal it
from the owl - the owl held on well and did something that surprised
all of us watching - it started flying up higher and higher, circling
as it went, until it left the harriers behind, evading them
successfully and flying still higher and to the west, until we lost
sight of it - when last seen, it still had the rodent in its grasp.
Yay!

Around 4 p.m., with the clouds filling the sky with charcoal gray and
the temps feeling well below the 53 it read on my car's gauge, Ron,
Carmel and I decided to revisit the Snowy Owl site on Thomle Rd.
After warming up at Starbuck's (hot drinks and warmed brownies with
caramel drizzle on top - yummy!), we went back to the area near the
metal barn, where earlier in the afternoon we'd seen 2 Snowys from our
position up on the dike to the east of the road. We also saw a Horned
Grebe, a male Bufflehead and another duck I'm not sure we adequately
identified (a goldeneye?), thanks to the persistent viewing of some
other people there.

As we slowly pulled up toward the barn on Thomle, Ron and Carmel saw a
Snowy in flight, in the field on the left side of the road! I missed
it, but Ron's animated description of the sighting left no doubt that
he had, indeed, seen a flying Snowy. Next we all tried to ID a very
large raptor flying near where the Snowy had been - it was now 4:30
and very dark, so we really couldn't see if this large raptor was a
juvenile Bald Eagle or perhaps, a .....Gyrfalcon? Wasn't a Gyr seen
in that area sometime last week?

As if this wasn't exciting enough, Ron exclaimed that a tree off to
the west was FULL of at least 100 Western Meadowlarks - he'd never
seen such a gathering. Attention was soon again diverted to Ron's
sighting of another Snowy, this time on a dead log/post over near to
the place on the dike across from Eide Rd., where we'd seen a Snowy's
head poking up from the top of the dike at around 2 p.m. We got the
scope on this one and watched it swivel it's head a bit. As the last
traces of daylight slipped off over the horizon, I managed to get a
few non-prize-winning photos through my scope, of the luminous white
bird.

What an afternoon!

An aside: when a half dozen or so birders and other bystanders were
milling about the area at Hayton Preserve near the gate beyond which
one dares not tread, the one mentioned by Gary Bletsch in his post
that included a description of a spot where he and Ryan Merrill had
both seen a Snowy Owl (last week), we all noticed black clouds of
small birds and were trying to ID them. Naturally Starling was the
first type mentioned, with the term "murmuration" soon to follow!
However, they finally came in close enough for us to see that they
were "just" shorebirds of various kinds, rarely flashing light color
as they curved up, over, around and through. As "murmuration" is a
term reserved for starlings and refers not to the sweeping motion of
them, but to the name of a group of them probably when they 'murmur'
loudly when they are roosting in trees (I heard that in my yard last
week), we had to drop usage of it and call what we were seeing
"evasion clouds", although nary a peregrine nor any other bird of prey
was visible to any of us. It was cool to see, however.

To view some good, bad and so-so photos of that afternoon, by myself,
Ron Benshalom and Leah Serna, visit my Flickr acct. at the following
link, and check out the set called "Snowy Day in Sun & Gray":

http://flic.kr/s/aHsjwZPTYr

I will later post a link for a better set of Snowy Owl (and sunset)
photos I took on Saturday, Nov. 19, on Eide Rd. on and near the dike
near which last week's Snowy Owl was seen, and much closer in than
that same owl was in subsequent days. Most of us will have to get
luckier to get closer Snowy shots, but we will have all winter, it
seems.

Cheerio.


Barb Deihl

North Matthews Beach - NE Seattle

barbdeihl at comcast.net