On a sunny afternoon a few days ago, I was walking down a paved road in the forest of Fort Worden State Park in Port Townsend, when I spotted two small birds hopping around on the sunlit road ahead.

The sun was in my eyes, so it wasn't till I got a bit closer that I discovered these birds to be Kinglets; one a Ruby- crowned , and the other a Golden-crowned. They were leap-frogging down the road ahead of me, when the Ruby-crown flew off to be replaced by another Golden-crowned.

If I recall correctly, somebody on tweeters posted about seeing Golden-crowned Kinglets on the ground this fall or winter. Anyway, this was my first on the ground view of these little birds. As I watched, I went into the flow of the moment and assumed the naturalist yoga pose Standing Stump. Meaning, I just stood still and waited.

And that worked real good, because the little Kinglets got closer and closer. In fact the male perched on my shoe for a moment, and the other bird , a female, was about as close. My best view of this species ever - binoculars not required.

Perfectly lit in the winter sunshine, these tiny mites glowed like condiment trays of color. Piled atop a base of bright guacamole, or maybe salsa verde, were lines of salt and pepper, a dab of yellow mustard, and on the male, a dash of ketchup. Of course it would've all just tasted like feathers. Visually, pretty darn tasty!

The Ruby-crown was a green olive, sans the pimiento - a female.


Jeff Gibson
posting from
the Port Townsend Public Library