Some pictures from the river estuary

These are some of the photos I digiscoped at the Santa Clara River Estuary last evening. Just some of the things you'd see if you decided to visit. Be mindful of the nesting areas if you do. There isn't a large Least Tern colony at the estuary, but it is suitable habitat for the terns, and the California subspecies is threatened, so they're protected by the state. The American Avocets are using a small area of dune marked by Least Tern signs, and they're very vocal about their territory. Avocet chicks should be present at the estuary soon.

American Avocets feeding on the shoreline

 

On the shore of the estuary

One of the avocet nests

Another nest being protected by an alert parent

Red-necked Phalarope

A Surf Scoter herding two female Mallards away from his preferred sitting spot

"Good, all to myself."

A Great Blue Heron thought avocet eggs would be a good dinner. However, the avocets had other intentions for the heron, and he was soon kicked out of the nesting site. No avocet eggs eaten today.

Mute Swan swimming slowly through the marsh

Orange County Reprise

The last time I went to the OC was still not enough. I needed more terns. I had gotten Deven Kammerichs-Berke and Zander Clarke stoked enough about it to go with me, so this time I had some buddies to talk to. We met up early in the morning. and headed down to get to Bolsa Chica before the sun rise. (The sun never came out because June gloom had come early) Getting out of the car, Zander and Deven were pretty amazed with the density of terns and skimmers in the sky. I was happy to see all of the birds as well. I gave them a little tour of the place, showing where I had seen birds previously. There was an Osprey hovering over the water past the nesting site. After a little walk around, Zander went to get out his camera from his car. Zander has a really nice camera, so he got some pretty good shots. He really wanted one of a Black Skimmer with its bill trailing through the water, but the skimmers disappeared to their little island pretty quickly.

Zander and Deven, Respectively

Black Skimmer (ZC)

The Forster's Terns, as always, were very outgoing and not shy of the people passing by on the walk bridge. They would land on the bridge and comb their feathers, unconcerned about everybody only a couple of feet from them. Since Zander and Deven are both so tall, they each had a Forster's that nearly crashed into their heads, only inches away! It was exciting to say the least. Forster's Terns are very common, but they have a lot of character and they're really fun to watch. I had seen the Forster's nesting in the vegetation two weeks ago, but today there was something extra in their nests...chicks! I spotted a mother sitting on two of her chicks; heads trying to stick out from under her breast. They were really cute, and I was lucky to have my scope to get a good look. We also watched the Least Tern nesting sites, where a Horned Lark evaded both Deven and Zander's camera. There was a brilliant display of gift giving (and possible copulation) between a male and female Least Tern. Zander got a good shot of the form, but another photographer nearby got an incredibly clear shot of the same instance. There was also another two chicks unattended in a nest, but occasionally the mother would come by and feed them what she had caught. 

Forster's with me in the back (DK)

Forster's Tern preening

Two Forster's chicks waiting for their mom

A blanket of Royal Terns

I wasn't expecting to see any new species for the year today, much more for my life. I just went to enjoy all of the terns. But, the Clapper Rails of Bolsa Chica were still on my mind, and I still wanted to find them. We had looked once we got there, and didn't had any luck. But I did see the sketchy bearded guy that I had seen three times the last time I was in the OC...weird. There were a couple of photographers waiting for the rails as well, having as much luck as we were. After spending a good amount of time by the Forster's Tern chicks, we decided to head over to Huntington Central Park. We saw a photographer taking pictures of something by the parking lot. Hey Zander, it may be that stilt you wanted pictures of. But it wasn't...

(ZC)

It was the Clapper Rails. I couldn't move. Eyes wide open, breath-taken, the only thing I could manage to whisper to Zander and Deven as they followed behind me was shhhh. The rail was right next to the bridge, oblivious to us. Picking through the marsh plants, it was the most silent bird I had ever seen. Then, one, two chicks popped out of the reeds, following their parent. It was amazing. I'm really glad that Zander got pictures. We watched the adult and two chicks for about ten minutes, and then they slipped into some small reeds and completely vanished. You knew they were there, but you had no way to prove that they were; the rails were that stealthy. After a minute, they reappeared, and then not too far, the other parent and another chick showed up. It was the whole family, and I was in shock. Of the most amazing sightings I have had, this made the top three, only behind the Great Gray Owl I had seen in Yosemite, and the two Bald Eagles I had seen in Oregon, holding each others talons while spinning down in a death dive. I think I watched the rails for thirty minutes, before they finally retreated into the larger reeds, not to make an another appearance for the rest of the day.

Clapper Rail (ZC)

Clapper Rail chick (ZC)

(ZC)

Parent with chicks (ZC)

(ZC)

My favorite of the rail pictures (ZC)

We had agreed that the rails were the best part of the day as we headed to the park. There was a lot of spring action today. On top of the tern and rail chicks, we also saw a fledgling Western Bluebird and Nuttall's Woodpecker, both with their mothers. Egyptian Geese were roaming the dried up pond with their two goslings. The Western Tanager we were looking for made an appearance, but not one for Zander to get a really good picture of the bird. However, he did get a great photo of two Nutmeg Manikins, as well as an American Avocet. (a life bird for him) We had a lot of good sightings at the park, including three species of empidonax flycatchers. (Willow, Hammond's, and Pacific Slope)

Western Bluebird fledgling and mother (ZC)

Nuttall's Woodpecker fledgling (ZC)

Parent over the fledgling (ZC)

Egyptian Geese and their goslings (ZC)

American Avocet (ZC)

Nutmeg Manikins (ZC)

We were done in the OC, but we decided to check out the Sepulveda Basin Wildlife Reserve. It was in the afternoon, so there wasn't much action. We saw a Bullock's Oriole and some more flycatchers (Western-wood Peewee and Black Phoebe) The highlight of that area though was the Zebra Finch. I found it in the trees, and then Zander got a shot of it. It's a popular pet, and is native to Africa. It was obviously an escapee, but it was still a nice sight. We finished the day with a Greeh Heron striking at something in the water, neck totally outstretched.

Hidden Zebra Finch (ZC)

Green Heron hunting (ZC)

If you want to see the full checklist of what we saw that day, then check out Deven's blog. He also has some other photos up.

http://roamingfro.blogspot.com/2014/05/clapper-rail.html

And remember, If you want to find out more about any of the birds that I mentioned, check out the Cornell site. 

http://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/search

ZC denotes picture was taken by Zander Clarke, and DK respectively to Deven Kammerichs-Berke

Great Salt Lake Bird Festival, May 17

Second day at the bird festival. Unlike the day before, my grandma and I had a couple of field trips today. The first one was at glover ponds, which is at Farmington Bay. I had actually been there with my cousin on the 16th, and that's where I took the picture of the roosting herons. So I thought that it would be a bit boring to go again. We headed over to the Davis Legacy Center, which is where most of the field trips would meet and where all of the workshops and booths were. We got there, checked in, and then headed over to the ponds. The group of people consisted of mostly elderly, with a large, quirky family. I don't think anyone knew nearly as much about birds or identification as I did (I'm not saying that I'm an expert...yet) but that's perfectly alright. At the beginning of the trip, we checked out the end of the pond, where I spotted some Northern Shovelers, American White Pelicans and many Yellow-headed Blackbirds. There was a couple from North Carolina, and they really wanted to see American Avocets. Avocets are pretty cool, and they could find them just up the road, but that would be their surprise for the field trip. They hung around me since 1. I had a flippin' sweet scope 2. I could identify any bird they pointed to. For an unskilled birder, that was a pretty good deal, and that's why a lot of these people went on field trips. They wanted to see cool birds, but they didn't know where to look, and they didn't know what they were. At the side of the pond closer to the heron rookery, there were plenty of outgoing blackbirds hopping through the reeds.I'd like to think I got a pretty good shot of one through my scope.

A photogenic Yellow-headed Blackbird

The guide had set up his scope, and the woman from North Carolina had spotted something. "I think it's a sandpiper." I quickly located my sight on the bird, and enthusiastically stated, "It's a Solitary Sandpiper." I've been looking for these sandpipers around Ventura, but they're especially hard to find in California during spring migration. (They tend to migrate south through California more than they do north) I was pretty happy about the find, and it seemed that everyone else was, probably just because it was a new bird to them. We then left the pond to go look at a Great Horned Owl nest. The owls were there alright. Once we pulled up we could see the adult get harassed by some house finches. I spotted three fledglings up in the trees. Now don't get me wrong, seeing owls is great, but finding them on your own is even better. That's probably why I wasn't very excited on seeing them. I remember owling in the arroyo in South Pasadena for many nights searching for a Barn Owl. I don't remember how many times it took to finally find one, but I remember driving back home disappointed, and then seeing a Barn Owl flying right in front of the head lights of the car, giving me a fantastic look at this stunning creature. That's what owling was about, not this "I know a spot where they're always there" crap.

One of the Great Horned Owl fledglings

After watching the owl fledglings for about twenty minutes, the group headed down the dirt road towards Egg Island. I was anxious to get back to the big stay to help Shyloh out some more, but it took us about twenty more minutes to get there since the North Carolina couple kept stopping to look at the nesting American Avocets. I was kind of annoyed, since we couldn't pass them on the small road, but then again, why not enjoy the avocets? So I did enjoy the avocets, very much in fact. Their nests are just a small rise on the shallow shore of the marsh, made of sticks and reeds. They're pretty cute when they're sitting on their nests; I should have gotten a picture. Anyway, I finally made it back to Egg Island. Shyloh already seemed like a good buddy of mine. His big stay was at 86 species already!...no wait, 85. You wrote American White Pelican twice dude. "Oops! Ah that's okay, I'll just cross one of them off." I met another great Utah birder named Bryant Olsen, who was also helping Shyloh with the big stay.. Some background, Shyloh had so far seen the most species in Utah for the year (as of 9:00am 05/17/14 he was at 279) and Bryant was number two, only four or five species shy of Shyloh. Bryant had seen the most the previous year, and him and Shyloh were having a friendly competition for this year. (every birding competition is friendly, or should be) Bryant had been scouting out the distant birds that were too hard to identify from the island, and I headed out with him towards glover ponds. I told him about the Solitary Sandpipers that I saw, and he walkie-talkied Shyloh, who hadn't seen them yet from the island. (He got them later on) Bryant said that there was a group of trees that always had Eastern Kingbirds around this time, so naturally, we went to look for them, since neither of us had them on our year list. But alas, no easterns, just westerns. however, I got an even better sighting of the Common Tern than I did the day before, it was even siting next to a Forster's! That'd be a great photo for comparison!...Ah crud I left my scope down by that bench. It was only about 100 feet away, but by the time I ran for it and came back, the Common Tern was up from his spot. A great opportunity missed, we continued down the trail. With not much besides a Swainson's Hawk, and a missed Macgillivray's Warbler and Sora, we turned around and looked at the half visible face of a Barn Owl in a nest box. We were back on Egg Island, and Shyloh now had 92 species! He had tied the record that was from two years ago. American White Pelican Oh excuse me, I forgot. He was actually at 91 still. Bryant had to go to work, so he got a move on after a couple minutes of talking. After he left, there was a small buzzy, zipping sound. It was a Blue-gray Gnatcatcher, and Shyloh's 92nd bird. Awesome. I talked to Shyloh about birding and non-birding things for a while until my grandma came to pick me up again. There, I said farewell and told him that I would let him know if I was back in Utah before I left on my mission.

Scoping over Farmington Bay

Two Forster's Terns, formerly the spot where a Forster's and Common were side by side!

Back at the Legacy Center, I checked out some of the booths. They consisted of binocular/camera companies, local Audubon Society chapters, and a couple of other miscellaneous vendors. There was an art and photography gallery as well, consisting of pictures of birds from people of all ages. Some of the paintings were for purchase, and the prices were not reasonable. This lady had quite a few paintings of owls and illustrations of egrets, but the cheapest one was $500! I mean, she was a good artist and all, but her art wasn't nearly good enough to be asking for $750 for a medium sized painting of a Northern Saw-whet Owl. My grandma made some comment about them, saying one was better than the other, and the lady popped out and said, "These are mine." in a very proud and confined manner.Pssh, these aren't worth 500 bucks. I almost said that out loud. I don't know how she thought she could persuade anyone to buy one of her paintings for so much. I could do a painting just as good as hers, and charge 20 dollars for each one I did, and I'd probably make more money than her. Whatever, if she wants to never sell her paintings than go ahead. I headed over to the Mountain West Birding Co. booth, which was a company started by Tim Avery (the guy I met the day before who had the Utah big year record) where he sold birding equipment. Jerry Ligouri told me that he was the bully of the Utah Birders, but for a bully he was pretty chill. I told him (like everyone else) about my college plans, which made him super bummed, since he's a die hard Utes fan. But, he seemed excited about me joining them. Tim talked about how the young birding community in Utah has grown over the past five years, and that there are 20+ guys that are active birders under the age of 35. Sounds good to me. I bought Jerry Ligouri's books (Hawks from a Distance and Hawks at Every Angle) and noticed a picture of a Rufous-crested Coquette in the back of his booth. I asked him about it, and unfortunately he had never seen one before, but that got us talking about birding in South America. He told me about his trip to southern Peru and all of the birds he saw there. Honestly, Central/South America is bird heaven, and a serious birder such as Tim and I could spend our whole lives observing the neotropical species found anywhere south of the US border. Mexico may be our neighbor, but in the Ornithological realm, it is so different and much more diverse than the United States and Canada. He asked me if there was anywhere specific I wanted to go for my mission, and I told him somewhere in South America would be preferred. He just smiled and started laughing, knowing my obvious reasons. I had to head out for the Burrowing Owl field trip, but he gave me a free MWBirdCo water bottle before I left.

The Burrowing Owl field trip wasn't the most energetic field trip I've been on. It consisted of driving for about half an hour to and from Antelope Island, as well as dealing with a million little gnats biting your scalp when you got out of the car, so it was a bit draining. But, there was good compensation for it. The Burrowing Owls were more than present today, standing on their mounds, flying around, and catching bugs. The first area we stopped, there was a breeding pair, and you could differentiate between the male and female since the male has much lighter plumage. One young man on the field trip was from Belize, and like others on the trip, he enjoyed using my scope since I was always able to locate the owls. "You have a very good equipment. Can you bluetooth the photo from the phone?" I took a couple of photos with the scope and he was interested, so I told him that I'd email him. He was really happy about that. The guides were two ladies that worked with the Burrowing Owls on Antelope Island, so they were pretty knowledgeable about the subject. We were instructed to be very quiet when we got out of the cars and watched, but that would be common sense, wouldn't it. Apparently, the Antelope Island population of Burrowing Owls is threatened, so it was important not to spook any of the owls to abandon their burrows. I learned a couple of things that I didn't already know about the owls, such as the owls will lay eggs in multiple nests, and that the male owl will use a burrow for stashing things such as insects and other portions of food. The male is also the one that will stand on lookout as well, and much like human females, a female owl will keep a much more tidy home, defecating farther from the burrow than a male will. At Antelope Island, they create some artificial burrows for the owls, and we got to see how they made them. It might be interesting to work at Antelope Island while at BYU. We also headed over to a spot where there were nesting Great Horned Owls, something hard to turn down. I got a couple of cool pictures of two fledglings with one of their parents. And, living up to it's name, Pronghorn Antelope were present on the island. After we returned from the field trip, Javier (the young man from Belize) gave me his email and thanked me for letting him use the scope. He was a super nice guy, just a bit hard to understand.

Two Burrowing Owls watching over their burrows (I took the second at an angle, sorry)

An Adult Great Horned Owl with two fledglings. Quite an intimidating bird.

At the end of the day, Shyloh made his report of the big stay, with a whopping 105 species!!! Not only did he break the previous record, but he got over 100 as well. He thanked me in his recap for keeping him company and finding many birds, and also said that I would soon be a hotshot birder up in Utah once I began my studies at BYU. May 17 was indeed a good day for the birds.

The final checklist of the big stay:

http://ebird.org/ebird/view/checklist?subID=S18436869

http://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/search

Great Salt Lake Bird Festival, May 16

I had arrived in Salt Lake the night before,  and my cousin picked me up from the airport. I didn't actually do any birding until noon, when we headed down to Farmington Bay Waterfowl Management Area after we checked out a motorcycle shop. I knew that this was a good place to look, since I had been here before, but noon wasn't the best time to go. We headed down the road (which was apparently closed...oops) and would stop every now and then to check out the birds around us. Using the spotting scope for the first time was sweet, I could spot things a lot farther away than I could with my binoculars. With it I identified a Whimbrel and a Red Knot. (two birds common to the California coast, but rare to Utah) There were lots of waterfowl on the bay, with pelicans and cormorants sitting on the edge. Franklin's and California were the only gulls present. There were also a surplus amount of Yellow-headed and Red-winged Blackbirds, sitting in the reeds and ignoring my cousin and me. Blackbirds have the tendency to be very loud, but I enjoy their metallic calls. There was a stream intersecting into the bay, where Barn Swallows were zooming around like crazy. There were also some massive fish in the stream, at least five feet long. We watched the fish for a little while since they were so giant. Heading back, we also witnessed some not as large fish battling in the reeds. (possibly carp) They were just going at it in the shallow water, pretty crazy.

On the other side of the man made Goose Egg Island (a small lookout point in the bay) is the Salt Lake Nature Center, which had a heron rookery. I decided to try to digiscope the herons. Digiscoping is taking pictures with your phone or whatever by attaching it to a spotting  scope. It doesn't produce professional pictures, but they're good enough to post.

Two fledgling Great Blue Herons with their parents perched above.

On the look out deck of the nature center, I spotted a Northern Harrier flying low to the ground, and then a Merlin sitting on a telephone wire. After that, there wasn't much to look for around that area, so I packed up the scope and we headed towards our grandma's house.

With nothing to do at her house, my cousin decided to head back to his house. My grandma had done some errands earlier in the day, so she wasn't feeling up for some birding, but she said she'd drive me somewhere. I wanted to head back to Farmington Bay, since I didn't see any Swainson's Hawks yet. That's where my grandma dropped me off. She told me that they were having a big stay there, which is where you stand in one spot for 24 hours and see how many species you can see. The stationary spot was Egg Island, which was perfect, since it gave you a good view over the flat land. One guy was up there, already scoping out species. His name was Shyloh Robinson (still is) and he's been doing the big stay for a couple of years at the festival. I introduced myself and told him that I'd be up in Utah for a couple of years after a mission. He bashed me a tiny bit for going to BYU, but I didn't care, since I bash myself for going to BYU. He told me he had seen a Common Tern flying around the bay, which immediately got my attention. I hadn't found one at Bolsa Chica, but he had just seen it right before I got there so there was a good chance. I started watching every Forster's Tern that flew around the bay, trying to see if it wasn't a Forster's. A mom and her daughter joined the sit for an hour or two, and right around thirty minutes of searching, I found the guy. Yeaaaaaa, Common Tern! Shyloh was stoked that I found it too. He started talking about finding an Arctic Tern at the Great Salt Lake. "I'm gonna will it into coming here, and then I'm gonna be the first to find it." I thought it was kind of silly, but I don't blame him for wanting one to come; terns are awesome.

Another had joined the stay, his name was Jerry Ligouri. Jerry has been studying Raptors in North America since the 80s, and is one of the best hawk experts in the nation. Now, I didn't know that until the day after, but he didn't fall short of this claim. He spotted a Swainson's Hawk flapping high above the bay, and I thought it was pretty impressive, since it took me about 15 seconds to spot it with my binoculars and see the marks. The daughter had spotted a large bird and said it was another heron, but it looked too long and stiff to be a heron. Well it was, since it was actually a Sandhill Crane. I was pretty happy to see it, since I had never seen any species of crane in the wild. But I think the best sight I saw all day was the Northern Harriers. A female was flying kind of low to the floor, just like harriers do, but there was a male following her. He was doing an aerial display, where he flips over and basically does corkscrews in the air while in casual pursuit of the female. It was an incredible sight. After that the mother and daughter left, and Shyloh, Jerry and I decided to scope the other side of the island. We had seen quite a few American Kestrels so far, and that had reminded me to look for the Merlin I had seen not far from here. I didn't have any luck finding the Merlin again.

A truck rolled up onto the island, with a giant Utah Utes "U" on the back. The guy driving the truck was Tim Avery, who had the Utah big year record. (355 species) With his stature, you'd think he was there to hunt birds, not to watch them. He actually just stopped by to say hi to his buddies, since he was going to scout out a spot for a field trip he was leading for the festival. I introduced myself and congratulated him on recently setting the Utah big day record. (205 species) after he left, Jerry came up to the spot where I was searching and I had a lengthy conversation with him. I let him know that I would be at BYU after a mission, just as I had told Shyloh, and that I was excited to be birding up here regularly. He told me that there was a pretty good birding community up here, and that contrary to my thoughts, I would have a good time going to BYU. He had fair enough arguments why, and I gave in. He was gonna head back home soon, and my time had ran out as well, being that my grandma had come to pick me up around 9:00pm. I told Shyloh that I would come back to help him in the morning since I thought he was a cool guy, and then headed off.

http://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/search

A Nice Local Spot

With post AP testing there's that feeling that, once you're done, school is utterly pointless. With that being said, I am definitely subject to this feeling, and I didn't go to school today. Why would I? Is it crucial for me to attend when all I'm going to do is sit in an a room with about eight other kids while the teacher go runs errands? No, it's not. Instead, I headed down to the Santa Clara river estuary after seminary. besides Red-necked Phalaropes, I wasn't looking for any specific species. I got there around 7am, and I saw another birder heading out. A bird had flown up into a palm tree, and I hadn't gotten a very good look, so I asked him if he saw it. A Green Heron in the most German accent ever. It was awesome, I think I like Green Herons more just because of the way he said it.

I trailed down the shore of the beach, my shoes already full of sand. When I go birding I always wear old shoes, and those old shoes always have multiple holes. My shoes were emptied multiple times today. The first bird I saw was an Osprey; its wings glowing gold in the sunrise. He was heading towards the harbor or the settling ponds, so I guess I wouldn't see any Osprey action today. Drat. The surf was really small, and the tide was low, but it was already pretty warm and the thermals were doing a good deed by elevating all of the lazy pelicans to their preferred diving height. There was a small breeze too, so it wasn't a bad time to bird. Turns out that the phalaropes were just waiting for me at the near end of the estuary. They were bathing and feeding with a couple of Bonaparte's Gulls, and then two Wilson's Phalaropes joined the group. When I neared in, the gulls flew away like wimps, but the phalaropes were totally chill about me just sitting on the little dune, sketching them. They were too occupied with whatever they were eating. Some Killdeer and Spotted Sandpipers were running around on the shore of the estuary, eating little bugs and whatever else there is to eat. I spent about 45 minutes taking notes and just watching the phalaropes, and a cool fuzzy caterpillar climbed on my leg. Since there was no apparent vegetation on my pants, he slowly moved on, and so did I.

I saw birds that I've seen here normally around this time. Dunlins and peeps (peeps is a term for the smallest of sandpipers) running up and down the estuary, terns diving into the ocean, and gulls trying to steal whatever the terns had caught. American Avocets were accompanied by a juvenile Black-necked Stilt, and cormorants and ducks were swimming around. I found a Greater Yellowlegs in the crowd of all of the other birds. I've seen them multiple times before, but always from a distance. I was a lot closer today. It was near one of the avocets, and was only a couple of inches shorter. (American Avocets are about a foot and a half tall) You could take a wild guess on why this bird is called a yellowlegs. And you could probably guess that a Greater Yellowlegs is larger than a Lesser Yellowlegs. The hard thing is differentiating between them when they aren't so near. But, there were no Lesser Yellowlegs today, and actually, the greater has a bill that is ever so slightly upturned. (not as much as an avocet's of course)


I reached the end of the estuary, and saw a beached sea lion. It's a good thing that McGrath State Beach isn't one of those heavily populated beaches, because there would probably be kids and stupid moms around it if it were. He wasn't injured, and he was just sleeping, but I called the marine animal hotline just to let them know about the little guy. If he's okay, then no harm done. It started to get really windy, which wasn't a problem for all of the airborne pelicans. They were more than fine with the stronger drafts coming up from the waves. Brown Pelicans are just natural surfers, carelessly gliding over the carved waves. There were about 200 Clark's and Western Grebes sitting behind the surf. (the two are very similar species, almost identical) They didn't seem to mind the wind either, since they could just dive down to get away from it. However, it was getting a bit too much for me. I enjoy the wind, but it's not very easy birding when the wind is blowing into your eyes. I headed back to my car, but not without watching the phalaropes for a couple more minutes, still bobbing up and down on the wind-generated waves in their small corner of the estuary.

One thing. Obviously, if you aren't a birder, a lot of these names and descriptions fly right over your head.(just like a bird would) I'm not going to post other people's photos, since that's rude, but I'll include a link to the bird guide on the Cornell website. It's very good, and has nice pictures and recordings of every bird that I've talked about. It's right below.

http://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/search

Birding Origins

A lot of people have asked me how I got into birding, and why birds are so interesting to me. Sometimes I give them a condensed version of the story, sometimes I just tell them "I dunno." Here's the full story.

Let's see, it was around Thanksgiving in 2006. Around that time, my grandparents had a winter home in Tuscon since they were serving a couple mission. This is similar to the mission that a young man goes on (such as I will) only it's with a spouse, and it's usually focused on service. My grandparents did a lot with the LDS Institute at the University of Arizona, which is also where one of my uncles works. Alright, moving along. Being that they weren't going to live in that house for long, (They had it for two, maybe three years?) they didn't have much stuff in their house. So, for a ten year old boy, it was a pretty boring place. All of the adults would just talk and hang out in the living room and watch golf of the TV, and I would just roll around on the carpet, dying of boredom. I don't remember if my mom told me to go read a book or find something to do, or if I just did it myself. The small bookcase that my Grandma had was actually in the room I was staying in, convenient enough. Most of the books were "Literary Classics". "Pfft, what's so classic about anything literary" I thought to myself. Ah, but there was something more interesting to look at: National Geographic's "Field Guide to Birds of North America: 2nd Edition." It was a pretty used book, so it immediately opened to the middle of the guide, where owls could be found, specifically the screech owls. (My 4th edition of this guide is worn down as well, and it opens to the page where the Burrowing Owl and Northern Hawk Owl can be found.) I didn't know that there were so many species of owls, and according to the maps, some of them lived around Tuscon. I showed my mom this, and she told me to go ask my Grandma about them. So I did, my grandma is freaking cool. She probably said something around "Oh are you interested in all of those owls? I saw a Great Horned Owl a couple of days ago. Why don't you go on a walk with Charlie (my grandpa) tomorrow morning?" That sounded pretty interesting, beats being cooped up in this dumb house.

The next morning, I got up off of the air mattress, threw the blanket on my brother and got dressed. Charlie was already up, waiting for me. It was kind of cold outside, but luckily I wasn't no turkey and had a sweatshirt on. We walked along this trail that was right next to a small, dried up ravine. The image of the bird I first actively saw is still clear in my head. It was a Killdeer, a species of plover that isn't typically found at a beach, but rather in fields and open spaces. My grandpa told me that it was called a Killdeer, because its call was a harsh, shrill kill-deer. "It's a pretty neat looking bird" I thought to myself. We watched it for a couple of minutes until it ran off. there's the chance that Charlie took me to a spot where he had seen some Burrowing Owls, which is probably what I wanted to see in the first place. I don't remember if we did see any owls, but that one Killdeer is engraved into my memory, and I've been a birder since.

An Orange County Day

Cool, I made a blog, just like I said I would. First of all, This blog will go dormant in about two months when I leave for my mission. Secondly, I don't own a nice camera (my phone is basically all I've got) so don't expect any nice pictures of the birds I'm seeing (hopefully I can get one once I return from my two year mission.)

Today, I woke up at 4:30am just so that I could drive all the way to Orange County to go bird watching for the day. It probably sounds pretty stupid to just about anyone, they're just birds right? Yes and no, but I'll have to rant about my passion for birds some other time. Anyway, I woke up, got my stuff ready, ate some banana bread and drank about 213456 glasses of milk, and I was off before 5:00am. Driving there was a sinch; it only took me an hour to reach the parking lot of the Bolsa Chica Ecological Reserve. That's expected, due to the lack of traffic early in the morning.

Getting out of my car, I was immediately reminded of the last time I had visited the reserve: May 26, 2007. This was 12 days after I got my Nikon binoculars for my birthday (the ones I still use to this day) and Bolsa Chica was probably the best place to try them out. I distinctly remember my first sighting of a Pacific Loon here (in May? yea that's right, in May) as well as the Black Skimmers that dominated the shallow waters. Walking onto the walk bridge, my memory of this place definitely held its position as a wonderful place for the birds. Forster's Terns and Black Skimmer's were flying low over the walk bridge. Least Terns were nearby diving into the salt marsh.

After watching all of the terns and skimmers from the bridge, I moved on past the fenced off nesting site (not yet in full gear) and headed up the little service road. Snowy Egrets were plentiful along the edge of the marsh. Something else caught my eye though; it was a Reddish Egret. This species of Egret is very uncommon in California (although it seems that they are common to Bolsa Chica) so I was excited to see it. He/She foraged for fish differently than the common white egrets seen. He would hop around a couple of times and then use his wings to shadow over his head. His method was to scare the fish out of their hiding spots, rather than wait stealthily for them to come out. It was quite amusing, and after watching it I spotted a Peregrine Falcon perched in one of the small trees behind the egret. Sweet! I Haven't seen one since January! I pointed it out to a bearded photographer, but he wasn't very interested.

I had done a large loop and was now back at the walk bridge taking notes and sketching some of the nearby Forster's Terns diving. I had one lady ask me about the terns carrying fish to give to other terns. I explained that it's a courtship offer, part of the male showing the female that he is a skilled fisherman and that their offspring would be very fit as well. She then asked me about hummingbirds, so I just talked about the Anna's Hummingbird for a couple of minutes until she was satisfied with what I had informed her. Still sketching, another lady (this time a birder, not a photographer) asked me if I had seen any Common Terns. Unfortunately I hadn't, but at least someone else was looking for them! I guess I had missed the news that there was a Gull-billed Tern at the reserve the day before as well. She was with her husband (their names were Joyce and Doug) and they were going up to a pond to search for the two species of terns. I asked if I could join them, and she said "Of course, we're just birding." They were probably in their fifties, a cute couple, and pretty good birders. Joyce asked me about differentiating the Forster's, Common, and Gull-billed apart, so I informed them about all of the little features that were different in the three species as we headed up to the pond. We spent quite a bit of time watching all of the Forster's Terns, just to make sure they weren't another species. Once we reached the pond, we were greeted with...no terns. Oh well, it was nice to talk to some fellow birders. We went our separate ways; they went up a trail, and I headed back to the parking lot. I'll probably never see them again, which is kind of sad; They were really nice.

It was 10:00am, and I wasn't ready to go home yet. Not. At. All. I decided to head up to Huntington Central Park. According to eBird, it's the best spot in Orange County. I went into the library first to use the restroom, but I stayed in the library for a while since there was a used book sale. After spending $1.25 on three small books, I went out into the park. I started at Huntington Lake, where I saw nesting Double Crested Cormorants and quite a few Yellow Warblers. I also checked out the designated wildlife area, where there were little trails, and a Hammond's Flycatcher! Hahaha you silly tyrant flycatcher, can't hide from me! I also found the photographer to which I had pointed out the Peregrine. Back at the ponds near the library, I saw another birding couple (I forgot their names) looking at something in the trees. Casually I slid over and asked If there was anything interesting. Of course it was interesting; they were watching Townsend's and Hermit Warblers. It took me about two minutes to spot a Hermit, which was a little embarrassing, but no big deal. There were some Western Tanagers present as well, which are arguably the most beautiful birds of western (ornithological) North America. There was also a Swainson's Thrush, which looked exactly like a Hermit Thrush in the light, but it was a Swainson's, as dictated by its call. Another birding couple joined the warbler party. A walker came up to us and asked, "What are you looking at? An Owl or a Bird?"  to which one of the couple replied, "Either way it's a bird. We are watching warblers." It was obvious the walker wasn't interested when she said "Oh. Cool." and walked along.

Once I was satisfied with my sightings at the park, I wanted to go back to Bolsa Chica for a little bit longer, just to see the Black Skimmers again. I was back on the walk bridge watching skimmers and terns again, and I saw the photographer that I had seen twice before. It's kind of weird that we both went to Bolsa Chica, then to the park, and the back to the reserve around the same time. I also met a very elderly woman who told me how she used to be a bird photographer and that she got her pictures published. She was really sweet and complimented me on my sketches.

A long day in Orange County was followed by a long time in LA traffic, but all of the birds were definitely worth the two and a half hour drive back home.