Huddleston Pond

Our daily schedule operates something like this.  When the first person makes a suggestion for a birding location that everyone agrees with,  we pack up and head out.  Today it was Jeanette that suggested we go back to Huddleston Pond in Willamina. Serious readers of this blog will remember we were just there the Saturday before last on our way home from the Tillamook area. I was delighted with the suggestion to return to Huddleston because Jeanette and I both felt that we could do better than the 13 birds we found that day.  We hit the pond this morning just before 9:00 with the resolve to find more birds.  Although the temperature was rather cool, we had bright sunshine and a whole raft of waterfowl. We ended an hour later with a list of 21 species. Our observation list and photos can be seen here.  Interesting, we left Salem in sunshine, endured rain on the drive which stopped when we arrived in Willamina, and then started raining again just as we finished birding.  The rains seemed more like spring showers than real fall rain.