Today was a unexpectedly nice day in Seattle. Rather than the deluge of rain predicted, it was party sunny skies all morning.
So, of course, I went out and took pictures. I won’t repost most of them here, but I had two nice conversations with different people today, both of whom pointed me toward things I might not have otherwise noticed.
I skipped (most of) the work day today. I didn’t want to stare at a computer screen for hours, there was nothing urgent I couldn’t take care of later, and most importantly, it’s been beautiful and sunny all day here in Seattle. I ended up going to both Discovery Park and Magnuson Park.
Shortly after I arrived in Discovery Park I stopped to look at a rather loud song sparrow and noticed movement on the tree trunk. At first I thought (by the size) that it might be a downy woodpecker, but no; instead, I’d found a reclusive brown creeper, the first time I’ve ever seen one!
Brown Creeper
As usual, the weather forecast for Seattle wasn’t quite right. Today, though, it was much more pessimistic than needed: it’s been above 50°F all morning, and only partly cloudy since about 9:15 am this morning.
A perfect morning for some birding in Discovery Park! Very few people around, fewer than you’d expect for a morning like this, but I suppose a lot of people trusted the weather forecast a bit too much, because even the Ballard Farmers’ Market wasn’t nearly as crowded as it usually is on such beautiful days. I took 380 photos in about an hour and a half, mostly due to burst-fire. As you’ll see, most of the birds I found this morning were busy bathing and preening, so burst-fire mode is very useful for catching interesting (and sudden) behavior.
When I arrived it was still overcast, so the lighting wasn’t great. I quickly found an Anna’s hummingbird, though I couldn’t get close enough to get a shot, and saw a red-tailed hawk from a distance flying out of the park. But then, a fun bird to find (and rather shy): a red-breasted sapsucker. Quite a few robins, starlings, and even a Stellar’s jay were in the tree as well. Though I located it by the sounds of its tapping, it soon started to scratch its face on a branch and then begin preening:
Red-breasted Sapsucker
I’ve gone through my past year of shots in Lightroom, picked out my favorites, and present them here with brief descriptions of where and how I got them.
A bold downy woodpecker gets close. Washington Park Arboretum, February 3rd 2014. ISO 1600 (auto), 400mm, f/8.0, 1/500s
I’d just finished a rather unlucky birding session in the Arboretum when I noticed a small bird climbing around on a low-hanging branch. I carefully circled around the tree to be able to catch the bird in the morning sunlight and sure enough, it not only circled the branch, but climbed toward me a bit closer as well. I liked this shot so much I made it the first photo I had printed onto canvas, and it’s hanging in my kitchen. This is a downy woodpecker, the first of about 4 that I saw in 2014.
Today I did something I hadn’t done before; rather than go to a place I knew to be good for general birding, I chased down some rare bird sightings, to mixed success. Being fairly new to all this I had only just found out about a mailing list for regional bird sightings. A few days ago the Seattle Audubon Society had posted about a snowy owl who’d showed up in Edmonds, WA. Using the mailing list I was able to narrow my search to the marina park, to which I arrived about 30 minutes after sunrise on this cold (~25°F) morning.
Unfortunately, the owl was nowhere to be found. I knew it was a long shot, as it hadn’t been seen since Friday (two days ago), but a number of other birders had taken the same gamble. Nobody had seen the owl. Still, there were some interesting species to be found, including a large and hungry flock of pine siskin:
A male pine siskin forages for seeds