Subject: [Tweeters] FOY (for me) - Snow Geese on Fir Island
Date: Sat Oct 15 15:24:09 PDT 2022
From: jimbetz at jimbetz.com - jimbetz at jimbetz.com

Hi all,

I know I'm late to the party - we were in Veracruz - but I saw
one flock of about 3000+ Snow Geese off of Maupin Rd and another
group of about 500 (+?) at Hayton. It was nice to hear them
honking their way across the sky and clucking their way across
the fields.
Very few ducks of any kind - yet. And I did not see any Swans -
today.

There were -many- hunters on Fir Island and even some "checking
out stuff" at the West 90 (no guns, just walking in, but in camo gear).
Just about every possible place a hunter could park was occupied,
often to capacity. And I could hear the guns going off all over
Fir and even down towards Stanwood.

Saw a fair number of RTHs, zero Balds, a couple of Harriers and the
requisite number of blackbirds on the wires (every where). I saw a
few Ravens but no crows. A few passerines (too far or on the wrong
side of the bushes). And about 4 GBHs. Did not see a Flicker nor
any Kestrels. I saw several boats in the river at Mt. Vernon - so
there must be something 'running' but there weren't any eagles or
ospreys here today (that I saw).

All of the above was "late" ... as in I left the house about 11:30.
The tide was high. The fresh water ditches and sloughs were pretty
empty unless they were within reach of the tide. I drove out to
Edison/Samish Island first and then went South to Fir Island.
Snow Goose Produce is closed for the season - so no ice cream
cone today (which I don't need after 2 weeks in Mexico!). The Rex
was open and -very- busy ... mostly bikes.

Wiley is "not nice" ... with more "work" scheduled after the first
of the year. But I did catch Bob (of Bob and his dog River who is
no longer with us) and we had a nice chat at Wiley. The parking lot
near the boat launch had about a half dozen 'duck boats' and/or trucks
with trailers (sans boat). All of the boats were "camo-ed" so these
were not fishermen. Even the motors had camo on them. One boat had a
fringe of cattails along the gunwale.

Go Birding!
- Jim in Burlington