Hey tweets!

I made my way down to five of the counties in the southeast corner of the state this weekend, and had a nice mix of birds- some surprises both good and bad!

Saturday morning: Garfield county: snow kept me from hitting everywhere I wanted, but I got some good birds, nonetheless. At Central Ferry, I had a Bald Eagle, Eurasian Collared Doves, and a few Greater Scaup mixed in with the more common birds in the Snake River. Lower Granite Dam added some more ducks, but the highlights were Canyon Wren, Chukar, Cooper's Hawk and a large flock of Cedar Waxwings. The drive back to Pomeroy gave me a Rough-legged Hawk.

The afternoon in Columbia was a little frustrating! I've always found it tough to get birds in that county, and by the end of the day, a county list of fifty only grew to sixty. I saw only one gull the entire afternoon, no rough-legged hawks despite extensive driving through farmland, a lot of empty water on the snake, and a trip to the base of the Blue Mountains where I walked in conifers for thirty minutes with not a single bird sound! At sunset, the highlight was a Great Horned Owl at Lewis and Clark State part.

The next morning, I set out with Kevin Black to look for Snowy Owls near Kennewick. We had no success, but did find a couple Rough-legged hawks, before heading back down to the Tri Cities. Between Two Rivers and Columbia Park, we had really good numbers and diversity of waterfowl, although there was nothing too unusual to report.

We made only one stop in Franklin County at Chiawana Park, and we got a lot of good birds. On the water, we had horned and pied billed grebe, common loon, American white pelican, common and hooded merganser. On Wye Island we were able to see a great mix of gulls including herring, ring-billed, California and a rare Mew Gull! A handful of Dunlin were also visible. In the trees in the park, we found golden-crowned kinglet, Brown Creeper and a Varied Thrush (my favorite bird was my100th bird in the county)

Walla Walla was a little slower due to frozen waters and snowy roads. The highlight was a Barrows Goldeneye at Ice harbor dam. Our last stop was a failed search for Long-eared owls in the northeast corner of the county. We came across a Golden Eagle, which was not a bad consolation prize!

Happy birding!

Tim Brennan
Renton