Tweets - What a difference a week makes. Instead of me solo, there were ten of us today. And the weather was remarkably, notably, delightful with temps 43-50 degrees, no fog, little wind, and no precipitation after dawn; fabulous compared with the dismal weather on the 18th. It was birdy for a while too, though after the first 1.5 hours, it got notably quiet.
Highlights: Scaup sp. - Pair WAY out on the lake, too far for ID. Our first scaup of the year, but leaving it as a slash Anna's Hummingbird - Several males perched up and singing today after 2 months of absence or near absence
Four woodpecker day - Though both Hairy and Pileated were heard-only (PIWO *may* have been DISTANTLY seen)
Black-capped Chickadee - Several singing
Bewick's Wren - Several singing
Varied Thrush - Heard one or two singing just after 8:00
Song Sparrow - Also singing
House Finch - A few heard and a very few flying overhead were our only finches of any kind
In contrast to last week's dozens of FOX SPARROWS, today there were probably less than 10.
I did a late scan of the lake, hoping to get a better look at the scaup. No dice there, but I did find at least two RUDDY DUCKS, First of Year (FOY). We did not have a Ruddy last year.
Misses today included Ring-necked Duck, Virginia Rail, Ring-billed Gull (at least, none positively ID'd), Cooper's Hawk, Bushtit, and Marsh Wren.
For the day, 51 species counting the scaup sp.
= Michael Hobbs=
BirdMarymoor at gmail.com= www.marymoor.org.birding.htm