Wednesday, December 5, 2018

New Birding Spots and A New Life Bird

Jeanette at Hall Lake

Yesterday morning we continued on our way from our over-night spot at Three Rivers Casino in Florence.  Temperature was a cool 39 degrees, but that was 10 degrees warmer than the morning before in Salem.  Our first birding stop of the day was at Hall Lake, a small overlooked lake in the Siuslaw National Forest just across Hwy 101 from William Tugman State Park.  I had visited this lake some ten years ago while living in Elkton and searching for fishing destinations, but I had never stopped here to bird.  I had the hunch that it might be good for birds, and it turned out to be as our short stop here in the cold netted 14 species.  The bird list can be seen here. We next went over to the William Tugman State Park and enjoyed a sunny spot in the Day Use Area where did some more birding, had lunch, and relaxed and got caught up on bird photos and lists.  In mid afternoon we moved on South to the Coos Bay area.  Another new birding spot that I wanted to check out was the North Bend Boardwalk. Here we had the great good fortune of Jeanette discovering some busy little busy birds, which later I identified as Palm Warblers, classified as a "Rare" bird.  Perhaps even more important to us is it a new Life Bird for us.  For any non birders, that means a bird you identify for yourself for the very first time. Life Birds get harder to find the longer you bird , so they also get to be a bigger deal.

Palm Warbler 

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