Weather: Partly Sunny/overcast
Temperature: 72-80 Degrees
Location: Nisqually National Wildlife Refuge
Time: 10am-7pm (roughly)
Note: these pictures are from various websites. I deemed my pictures as unusable since my camera is garbage and all you could see in the pictures were grass, blurs, and sky (pretty much everything except the birds themselves). I hope my descriptions will accurately describe the birds I saw as of course the pictures will not do them complete justice. Thanks!
I drove separately to Nisqually because I had a commitment after the trip which meant I would have to leave early. I thought everything was going to go smoothly but it was quite the opposite. My morning started by locking my keys in my car just seconds before I was planning on meeting the class at Wallace hall, because of this I was left to rely on my navigation for directions to Nisqually (that is assuming the class was there instead of Rainier). My phone navigation is fairly reliable but I quickly learned that depending solely on modern technology was a mistake. Once I passed Tacoma my GPS fell through, the only thing I remembered was the exit I was supposed to take. After getting off the exit, I thought there would be signs that would lead me to the refuge but I was wrong. I stopped 3 times before getting the correct directions to the refuge. After arriving, I was pleased to see that the UW vans were present and even more pleased to know I had made it to the right location. Anyways, the whole point of this story was to say that I was about 20 minutes late to the trip but after a few failed attempts on various trails at the refuge, it put me about a little over an hour late. During this hour, I actually joined a random birding group. It was a group of older individuals that were from a birding organization near Vancouver, Washington. Very nice people. While I was with them I was able to join in on some of their bird sightings. Below are a few of the birds that I saw while I was with them! (Again, these are not my pictures)
Here is the first bird I saw with them! It is a Red-Tailed Hawk (Buteo jamaicensis). This hawk was pretty amazing. We spotted it perched on one of the snags that was present at the refuge. While it was perched, it did not do much other than look around. After 10 minutes of perch action, it flew away. I believe the birding group I was with said that this hawk we saw was an adult hawk because the tail was cinnamon colored. The Hawk was pretty big and I believe they said it was also a male, I have no idea how they knew but I don't think I had any room to question it, they were very serious birders.
The second bird I saw with the birding organization was called a Purple Finch (Haemorhous purpureus). Honestly it took me like five minutes to even spot this bird because I was literally looking for purple. In this bird's case, purple and red must be interchangeable because I'm pretty sure this bird is red. It is hard to distinguish the Purple Finch from the House Finch in my opinion. Regardless, this purple finch was very pretty and also restless. We spotted it in a small tree and it kept moving from various branches until it finally flew away. This bird was also very noisy but had a pretty call. It was a very "all over the place" type of sound, hard to explain. We saw a male because the females do not have any red on them whatsoever. Also, unlike the one in this picture, the one we saw was a tad bit puffier.
The last bird I took note of that I saw with the birding group before I figured I should probably find the class was a Pine Siskin (Spinus pinus). This was a very pretty bird. The one we saw (according to the birders) was a very subtle Pine Siskin. For some reason everyone seemed really excited to see this bird, it made me think that it was a rare spotting but I swear this bird is rather common. It had brown streaks throughout with yellow on the outer fringes of its tail and wings. It seemed to be foraging through the trees at the time we spotted it. It was making calls as well which were very high-pitched and rapid. A fact that I learned was that unlike most finches whom have a larger/thicker beak, the Punk Siskin's tend to have slimmer beak.
Now, below are some of the many birds I saw with the class.
This is the Savannah Sparrow (Passerculus sandwichensis). Personally, I think the Savannah Sparrows all look different. Maybe they just have a wide-range of variance or something but the one I saw with the class looked like this one but at the same time looked a bit different. My previous encounters with Savannah Sparrows have all been different, either they are puffy or are on the slimmer side. This bird is fairly easy to identify because of its yellow strip before its eye. It has a short notched tail and sometime they appear to have a peak on their head because of their feathers. When we observed this bird we were on the long bridge. The sparrow was flying between small tree's and did not really sit still. Their call was rather distinctive. It is very high-pitched and sounded like a "tssss" sound followed by a somber flat note.
My favorite bird that we saw was the dowitcher below..
I probably would have been able to get a real picture of the Dowitcher (Limnodromus griseus) but I just wanted to look at them through the binoculars instead of trying to get a good picture for the sake of this journal. This was amazing to see. The short-billed Dowitcher (ironic name since its bill is huge!) was in a large group foraging in the muddy swamp area. Unfortunately, we were not able to hear this shorebirds call sound because it was too busy foraging.
Here is a list of other birds that I saw with the class that I took note of:
Bald Eagle
Cinnamon Teal
Yellow Throat
Mallard
American Coot
Green-Wingedteal
Northern Pintail
Northern Shoveler
Red-Winged Black Bird
Barn Swallow
Yellow Goldfinch
(Scientific names to come)
I did not get a chance to go to my wildlife spot until this morning, 5/14. I woke up at 5am in order to get to Ravenna park by 6am. I was extremely tired but Ravenna was beautiful. I planned on going to Ravenna to take note of changes that have occurred since the beginning of the quarter but instead I ended up birding! Early morning is the time to go, I was able to see a lot of birds and listen to their calls more closely. Here are some pictures below!
This is just a photo I liked of the trail. It seems that everything is in their full foliage and in bloom!
Here is the Thimbleberry (Rubus parviflorus). It is in full bloom.
It is kind of hard to see this picture clearly but here is a Common Robin (Turdus migrators). There was actually A LOT of robins out this morning and they were all very loud. The Robin was mainly perching and making calls.
This was just a Western Pine (Pinus monticola) I believe. I took a picture of it because of the strange spider web-like branches or vines that were climbing up the tree. So cool!
If you look closely in this picture you can see a dark bird. This was a Song Sparrow (Melospiza melody). These Song Sparrows were also very talkative this morning.
In this picture, we have the Salmonberry (Rubus spectabilis). The berry's aren't exactly ripe BUT I did eat one of them and although they were sour they were pretty good! When I visited my site a few weeks ago you could not even see the berry's present. They are almost ready, I would give it at least another two weeks! Unlike in the Cascades, these Salmon berry's will probably stay abundant because there are no black bears around to eat them!
This picture above is a picture of a Bushtit (Psaltriparus minims) nest! This was the coolest thing I saw this morning. There was actually two bushtits that were going in and out of this nest. It was made out of moss and little sticks and was hanging down from the Western Pine (Pinus monticola).
I liked this picture of this tree. I have no idea what it is though. I want to say it is a Big Leaf Maple. Regardless of this species I just wanted to take a picture of it!
Other details and a few pictures of my site will be posted once I find my camera! Hopefully it will be by tomorrow. :)
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