Thursday's Bird Watch!

 We have not had any hummingbirds at our feeder here at Dallas Retirement Village for the past couple of weeks. Several residents have reported the same.  The hummingbirds seemed to have mysteriously disappeared.  We did not have an answer.  To our great surprise, this magnificently colored Rufous Hummingbird male, showed up at our feeder late afternoon last Wednesday.  And then at dusk, a male Annas's Hummingbird appeared also at our feeder.  We are breathing a sigh of relief with these reappearing hummingbirds. 

Nesting Cooper's Hawks

If you look very closely in this pile of sticks, you can see the red eye of the female Cooper's Hawk. Last Wednesday local birder Joan Baker while birding in the Dallas City Park photographed a pair of Cooper's Hawks building a nest. We went looking for the nest on Monday the 27th and thanks to the sharp eyes of my brother-in-law Korell Blair, we found a Cooper's Hawk but did not find the nest site.  This morning March 29 I made another attempt aided with the knowledge of the general area. First, I found the male who was doing a lot of calling, and then he flew off and the female joined him.  After a little bit of courtship display, (possibly more than courtship happened, as I was preoccupied in replacing my camera battery) she flew back to the nest. There is now no doubt to the location of the nest. The photo below shows the tree that the nest is in. We will be checking back to keep an eye on the nest. Cooper's Hawks have been successful in raising young here at the Dallas City Park in 2020 and 2022.

female

male

Future Thursday Additions

 For a number of years, I have written a column about birds for the weekly newsletter of the Dallas Retirement Village where my wife Jeanette and I live. I have always considered that the audience of the publication is the residents of Dallas Retirement Village. Today I met the adult children of a resident couple, and they remarked about reading my article "Bird Watch!"  As it turns out, they receive an electronic copy of the newsletter.  I had actually known of other family members having the same experience.  Today I got to thinking about the wider geographic audience of Cascade Ramblings, and that you all would possibly also enjoy these articles as well, so, I have decided to share these weekly "Bird Watch!" articles on this blog.  Starting next week, they will be posted here every Thursday. The article below is from this past week.

Bird Watch!

 

Purple Finch male

I was very excited to be able to photograph this male Purple Finch here at Dallas Retirement Village last Friday, March 17th. It is very unusual for this location. In fact, this is the first one I have seen here. They prefer conifer forested areas.  The other red finch that is common here and can be seen virtually all year long is the House Finch.  The first clue that this is a Purple Finch male is the lack of stripes on the chest.  Famous bird artist and publisher Roger Peterson says that Purple Finches look like they have been "dipped in raspberry juice".

Return of the Osprey!

March 19, 2023

 Osprey are seasonal visitors to Oregon, arriving here mid-March to breed and nest and raise their young.  Come September they head back to Southern California, Mexico, and Central America. I got hooked on paying attention to their comings and goings 10 years ago while volunteering at Salem Audubon Nature Reserve in West Salem. Another volunteer, and personal friend of mine, John West, noticed that an Osprey nest on Murlark Ave had Osprey before the Reserve. I started paying closer attention and documenting with photographs, and the Murlark site always has the first birds. I've added more nests to track through the years, and now monitor over 10 nest sites in Polk County, 6 of which are located in West Salem. My wife and I start making the rounds of the nesting sites mid-March checking for Osprey.  On Sunday March 19th, we checked the Murlark site, normally the first nest to be occupied, but no Osprey.  Next we checked the nest on Bartell Dr., we had our first Osprey of the year the female in the above photo. Checking the records in eBird, I found that the first bird there last year was the female in the photo below. I believe because of the markings, that it is the same bird, which unfortunately was unable to attract a male last year.  We will be keeping close watch this year hoping for many successful nests.

March 20, 2022

Visit to Fort Yamhill

 We took advantage of the spring like weather this morning to visit Ft Yamhill.  We brought along friend Debby Kliever and her dog Max. It was 35 degrees when we started walking, but the sun made it feel much warmer. New interpretive signs have been put up along the trail. Bird activity was kind of quiet, but we did get our "first of the year" swallows, both Tree Swallows, and Violet-green Swallows.

Because we happened to just walk down the hill to this point, it was kind of a case of "you don't know what you don't know". Here is our eBird observation list

 

Three Days - Two Nights at The Coast

Dinner at Three Rivers Casino

We have sort of perfected a package that works out well for us to escape for a few days from Dallas Retirement Village where we live and get in some exploring and birding in a very economical way.  That is to say, a way to not spend any money on over-night accommodations or food. Our food is prepaid in our monthly fee, so the day before we leave, Jeanette orders and picks up the meals we will need for our trip.  These are loaded into the van along with the clothing we will need and our birding gear. Our night-time parking spots are places we know that we can park for free.

 We left late afternoon Friday the 10th on this trip, taking the Kings Valley Highway south. Our first stop was at Ritner Bridge for a quick bird walk and lunch.  

We continued on down Kings Valley Highway, joining up with Highway 20 to our next stop at Toledo to bird on the Depot Slough Path, one of our favorite birding locations.  You can see our bird list here. From there we returned to Highway 20 into Newport, and then down Highway 101 to the town of Yachats to check out the Yachats Commons Park and walk the Wetland Park Trail. You can see our bird list here.  Back on Highway 101 we drove over the scenic Heceta Headlands to Florence and to our overnight parking spot at Three Rivers Casino where we enjoyed our dinner as shown in the top photo. RVers are allowed one night of parking for free.

Saturday morning after breakfast we drove on south to Tahkenitch Landing Campground to pick-up our friend Glenn Reubon who volunteers there as Host.  Together we traveled on to our first bird stop for the day at the Stables Rd. eBird Hotspot. Here is that list.  Next was on to Winchester Bay to bird at the Salmon Harbor Marina and an exciting find of a Yellow-billed Loon.

Yellow-billed Loon

Glenn made our whole trip an outstanding event by putting us onto this rare, Yellow-billed Loon.  This is an artic species that is only occasionally seen along the Oregon Coast.  This was a first for us, so another Life Bird to add to our Life List. Here is our list for this stop. 

Glenn bought us lunch in Reedsport, and after dropping him of at his trailer we continued back north over Heceta Head to our quiet parking spot for the night at Yachats Commons.

On our route home on Sunday, we made stops to bird in Waldport at Eckman Lake, Campbell Park and Mill Creek Park along the Alsea River, and Jackson-Frazier Wetland in Corvallis.

 

 

Best Bird Walk

Townsend's Warbler

Jeanette and I have a moto we often repeat to ourselves, "the best bird walks are the ones we go on". Meaning, in order to have a great bird walk, you have to actually go on one. This was the case yesterday.  When I went outside early in the morning to check on the van (I run the furnace at night to keep the water system from freezing) I was surprised to discover bright warm sunshine without the bitter cold wind we have been experiencing daily.  Back inside our apartment I announced to Jeanette great weather conditions and suggested that we get out and go for a bird walk! I would cancel my plans to attend my 9:00 Tai Chi class. It turned out to be the right decision and we enjoyed the warm sunshine and busy bird activity despite the 30 some degree temperature. You can see our bird list here.  

One of the highlights of our morning was getting this photo of a female Townsends Warbler. The bright contrasting yellow and black coloring of this winter migrant always brings a smile to our faces. We only get to see this warble about one a year here and Dallas Retirement Village, and this was actually the first time for a photo.