Snowy Egret

I watched from the cliff edge as two Snowy Egrets stalked prey in the tide pools off of West Cliff Drive in Santa Cruz. It was a bright but cold December Day, so there was a whitish glare reflecting off the ocean into my eyes and the Egrets slipped in and out of view as their forms blended into the swabs of light, becoming visible again against the dark wavelets. Snowy Egrets feed on mudflats, in rivers, on pond banks and tidal flats as well as irrigated fields. Their profile whether standing erect or stretched out in flight is distinctive. They are long- legged with long necks and a long and sharp, pointed beak. I suppose they appear thin, even for a bird. Though their legs are fragile looking, the Egrets seemed comfortable contending with the waves washing swiftly over the rocks. Snowy Egrets are more active fishers and do more scrambling and sprinting than White Egrets who use a stealthy stillness. The Snowy does more chasing of shrimp, aquatic insects, small fish, frogs, etc. They have a habit of stirring up shallow waters with their bright yellow feet ("golden slippers") as they wade and forage for prey, much as we might stir our soup with a spoon to lift the carrots or the beans. In flight they stick their long black legs rigidly straight out behind them and tuck their 's'-shaped necks in. They have a very wide wing span and slow graceful wing beats. Their breeding plumage is lace-like and becoming almost like a bridal veil or lightweight intricate shawl. The herons were my first favorite birds, and so they remain.

Northern Flicker

 The Northern Flicker is suited up with a black crescent at the throat and spots disbursed all along the breast, flanks and undertail coverts. Their black-barred backs seen against crisply spotted chests are an uncommon but successful fashion pairing of spots with stripes.
This species is very noticeable in the field with their red moustache (male), underwing and tail undersides. Out west we have Red-shafted Flickers; the other, eastern, subspecies is Yellow-shafted. They have been recorded as interbreeding, so they are not counted as separate species anymore. They nest in tree cavities which they chip out themselves. I've always spotted these members of the woodpecker clan alone or in small groups. About two weeks ago there were three who cruised through my backyard together. This group paused in the black walnut tree.They have the soft grey toned feathers which feather also the mourning doves on their heads. Flickers are a type of woodpecker and their flap-flap-flap-glide-flap-flap-glide flight movements (undulating) reveal this kinship as well as their stature (about 12" long), their stout and strong beak with potrusible tongue and their zygodactyl feet. Their toes are arranged differently from other birds, two facing forward and two backwards for scaling trees. This is how they shimmy up and down, plus side to side so smoothly. Woodpeckers' potrusible tongues wrap up around the eye socket when they are pulled in, so as to refit the whole tongue's length within the bill. They can stick out their tongues past the tips of their beaks by a couple of beak-lengths using special muscles as a part of their unique skull and tongue anatomical adaptation. Flickers eat a lot of ants, so they feed often on the ground using their pointed, extensive and sticky tongues. Most other woodpeckers feed up in and under the barks of trees and not the ground, though I've seen Pileated Woodpeckers, also eaters of ants, on fallen tree limbs (in Montana). The Flicker call is a clear and far-carrying Kyeer.With its patterning and flashes of red in flight, the Red-shafted Flicker is eye-catching in the wintertime when many other birds display toned down plumage. Look for the white rump patch as Flickers fly off.

Red-winged Blackbirds

Wild Birds Unlimited

 http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=c0Lw23yQFwQ

 Conk-a-ree they sing out from the reedy edges of ponds and lakes where they feed and nest, V-rrrrreee! Their voices provide the sound track of lazy summer days. Males are polygynous, with five or more nesting females in their territory. Their song may be uncomplex but they put their whole bodies and voices into singing it-- wings rounded, tail fanned out and heads in the air. Their singing style has its own name, "song spread." The males show those lovely "epaulets" of the upper wings to advantage. The shoulder badges on the wings stand out strikingly against jet black feathers. He's got this one flashy attribute to boast of with his robust singing and he makes the most of it. "If you've got it, flaunt it." Redwings form immense flocks, in the hundreds and tens of thousands, during the winter. Within this family group are other blackbirds as well as Screaming Cowbirds (I kid you not) and Boat-tailed Grackles, among others.

Gulls: What's so Special about a "Seagull"?

tgreybirds.com (California gulls)

   I am able to drink up sea water and expel the salt with a pair of salt glands located in my head above my eyes. Super salty water is absorbed from my bloodstream and excreted through the glands down my beak, trickling out my nostrils. Did you know I have this magic? Did you know we birds have nostrils?

 

www.kiwifoto.com

  I saw many gulls in their great colonies on the mudflats at Alviso Marina County Park. Ho-hum, seagulls; of course I kept my eyes peeled for something less ordinary. The ones pictured here, in an apparent embrace, are Western gulls, residents of the Pacific Coast. Many types of seagull (and people probably won't stop calling them that despite birders' urgency for accuracy) are birds I see daily without looking for them as they fly high overhead or float around on a city pond or take leftovers off the schoolyard. Birders are ever in pursuit of that rare sighting, but, for me, there is no ordinary bird. Gulls too possess their secrets.

http://www.pbase.com/tgrey/yard  Tom Grey has a helpful, friendly website with amazing photographs he took of many types of birds. Check this out!

Bushtits, or no see 'ums

North Coast Land Conservancy/Teresa

If you are reborn as a bushtit, you will never have to be alone. Bushtits travel in fluffed out little bands of ten, seventeen, twenty, forty, and then some. There isn't a creature such as the Lone Bushtit. They are the heart of sociability. They are dark, restless little forms like commas or apostrophes in a tree. Their bodies are small like several cotton balls stuck together with a longish tail tacked on. Psaltriparus minimus is their "proper," Latin name. Minimus would be a fitting name for one of those teensie chihuahuas or a parakeet, or maybe for a large pit bull or giant goldfish. "Minimus, down!" These birds are accomplished knitters binding thready green, grey knee socks in trees to hatch and raise their young inside. Their nests are long, coarse, flexible, spongy tapestries of moss, webs, animal hair and other filaments the pair weaves together on the outer limbs of trees. They are remarkable in the nest world and unique. The hanging shelters would seem to have been blown there and snagged by the tree except for the little cheeps and shaking of the lichen threads when the bushtitties are active. If I were a bushtit to-be, I would be warm, dry and happy in my sleeping bag, with its inner lining of feathers right where my bushtit tush fits. The parents climb in through a small opening at the top of the tube sock and pick their way down with insects for their nestlings. A perfect arrangement, in all.                                               

Sharp-shinned Hawk

http://www.pinterest.com/pin/132363676521127807

 I was walking at dusk by the Chinese statuary and birdbath sales yard near Kelley Park Zoo. I figured it was a bit dark to bird anymore and I wasn't likely to see anything "special" out in front of a 7-11 on a busy intersection. I wasn't paying any particular attention, but some swift motion, or it could have been a powerful presence, up to my left drew my eye. I looked up and there perched on a billboard was a Sharp-shinned Hawk taking a look on the birdbath and street scene below. I find the element of surprise keeps birdwatching new and exciting. Sometimes I surprise the bird and other times I am the one caught by surprise. Sharp-shinned Hawks are small birds of prey and they hunt passerines (perching birds) on the wing. They  also eat small mammals, an occasional reptile or amphibian, as well as large insects such as dragonflies. The "Sharpie" I saw was poised forward, his eyes fixed on the tree canopies for his end of day catch. He had handsome colors like the one here pictured with the rusty and white speckled breast and slate back. They have a reputation for taking food to-go from backyard birdfeeders, but wouldn't you? Hard to pass the buffet table without taking a nibble or two of the offerings...A bustling birdfeeder must be the Sharped shinned Hawk's idea of a QuickieMart stop.

howardsview.com (immature Sharp-shinned)

                                                                                                               

Tricks of Light and Feathers, The Steller's Jay

 'BR' of Yosemite NP

Birdgirrl

   The Steller's Jay is the boisterous bird that  hops right across your picnic table to snatch a pretzel or peanut. They are often in campgrounds making a racket in trees surrounding your tent in oak/pine and coniferous woodlands. It has a long black crest (mohawk) and a garrulous, bold nature. You may find one of its feathers on the trails, and it takes some restraint to leave it there. These attractive and faintly black-striped feathers contain no blue pigmentation! Their blue is an optical effect which is due to "structural coloration." "There is no blue pigment in bird feathers- instead, the color results from the way light interacts with nanoscale bubbles in the feather barbs" (Schmoker, Bill). Jays belong to the Corvidae family and are grouped along with songbirds, but not for their singing ability, because they sound like squawkers and screechers. You won't have to tiptoe or creep around to see a Steller's Jay because he or she will not shy away. They may pick a fight with you if you loiter around their nests. I have had my hair messed up by another species in this family, the Western Scrub-Jay. If you can't get enough on avian coloration...

National Geographic Bird Coloration  by Geoffrey Edward Hill

http://www.nps.gov/yose/blogs/Stellers-Jay-Coloration.htm

White Pelicans: Aerial Ballet

John Young

http://static.photo.net/attachments/bboard/00A/00AyY1-21650384.JPG

and, view:
http://www.monolake.org/today/wp-content/uploads/2011/04/amwp_21.jpg

   White Pelicans are overwintering along the Pacific Coast and the Gulf of Mexico. They are the second largest bird of North America with their 9' wingspans, longer than any of our tallest basketball players! Most people recognize them as the bird with the long, flat orange bill and flexible pouch attached to the lower mandible. At first glance from afar, you might mistake a flock of pelicans for gulls with their flashing white forms, but look again through a pair of binoculars. There is nothing quite like their slow, "ponderous," quiet, dramatic presence high above. They are a rewarding sight with their wings' black edging, their mighty downstrokes, and their graceful leisurely soaring. They are sky dancers flowing as one body in a "unified wheeling"(http://birds.audubon.org/). They make the elitest Swan Lake Corps de Ballet look like a troupe of stumblers. This is a bird both "improbable" or "semi-comical" in its dimensions who, nevertheless, achieves an overall effect of grace and power. We, a stray assortment of birders, saw some 70 of them rising on thermal air columns from the vantage point of Ulistac Natural Area a few miles inland from Don Edwards Baylands Trail National Wildlife Refuge (http://www.fws.gov/refuge/Don_Edwards_San_Francisco_Bay/map.html.) Each of us was silent and transfixed for a few breaths. I live on the Pacific Flyway, hooray! Take a walk anywhere on the SF Baylands Trail system in the South Bay to look at waterbirds of all shapes, colors, sizes, and squawks.

One for the Home Team--California Thrashers

 http://www.briansmallphoto.com/images/California-Thrasher_B9H9215.jpg   
 further information-
 http://birds.audubon.org/birds/california-thrasher

   
      Funny birds inspire some birders to get funny too. Here come the nose jokes. (Okay, so I surfed around and there's not a lot of thrasher humor but there are some comical descriptions of "loud" looking  woodpeckers). This bird fits right in with any of your colorful California characters. I had to look twice and laughed out loud when I first spotted the thrasher in the chaparral of Almaden Valley's foothills. Its beak was so long and awkward looking! The bird's overall shape, or silhouette, makes it a quick study in your field guide. Once you've encountered the bird, you know it and remember it. Another funny trait it has besides its looks is its way of sprinting bouncily away from you with its tail up rather than fly off to escape. I saw one yesterday at Ulistac Natural Area (Santa Clara) towering over some sparrows. All of the birds were tossing around leaf litter for seeds and insects. The thrasher rakes with the prominent tool on its head uncovering insects and other invertebrates to eat. These birds are residents of California or Baja California chaparral country. As the thrasher sped away from me, I could make out its light cinnamon belly and undertail coverts. Ground foragers like thrashers and towhees are always a relief for my neck after I've been craning it up to look skyward at hawks and other high flyers. And here's a little bonus factoid from whatbird.com: "It (the thrasher) has been observed standing on nests of carpenter ants and allowing them to run over its body and through its feathers, a behavior known as anting." Anting is also odd. Biologists hypothesize that birds that do this are performing their own way of ridding themselves of mites and lice and bacteria. Some rub themselves with ants, then eat those ants once they have leaked out biocidal secretions onto the bird's skin.

The "Little Brown Jobs" LBJs

http://identify.whatbird.com/img/4/50207/image.aspx

  If you want to set off a migraine, then go out in the field and try your hand at distinguishing the numerous races of sparrow out there. You might assume there is a limited way to combine grey, brown, white and black patterns in a bird, but there is not. It was probably a perplexed ornithologist in the midst of organizing the sparrow section who coined the term "Little Brown Job," to heap countless small, somewhat plain, and easily confused species. Can't you just see him now? It's well past lunchtime and his brow is furrowed under a sage-toned canvas hat. His vision is blurring, stomach growling, and he just sighs and shuts his sketchpad; "Oh for now, they're all just LBJs!" Thankfully, the White-crowned Sparrow has a crown of neat black and white stripes to tip us off on our birdwalk. I spotted a few amidst the cruising bushtits and a handful of finches yesterday afternoon along the Los Gatos Creek Trail. They would have blended into the bare tree limbs but for the crown's eye-catching white. Wait! Before you breathe a sigh of relief-- There are indeed several races of the White-crowned Sparrow...but she's not going to fly onto your finger and let you riffle her crown to see which one she is, so we shall leave it at that and let the obsessives handle it from here.

Anna's Hummingbird

Las Pilitas Nursery

Hotlips Salvia

The Anna's Hummingbird dropped in on me as I watered the autumn blooming Hotlips Salvia as if to ask me, "What is your business here? This is mine." She is possessive about her favorite red flowers. As she tilted her wee body slightly in the last of the day's sunlight (it was already past 6 pm), her gorget, or throat patch, glowed a delicious raspberry hue nearly matching the red of the many blossoms luring her. She whirred only inches from my eyes as I stooped with my waterhose in the superfast way they have of flying in place (an optical oxymoron? Can you physicists explain it?). How are they in frenetic motion and also stationery? Annas ruffled out her skirt out and stared at me from her grey eyes over her long, needle-thin beak . If you can hold yourself still, they keep on flower feeding right in front of your nose. These tiny birds have no time in their schedules to waste and must fuel their quick metabolisms: They require a few times their body weight in nectar daily. BzrrrrrrrrWhrrrrrrrr drum the mighty wings. And when she is done she streaks across the sky in an arc and is up and over the next houses and across the street in about two winks. She is not cowed at all by your size and will take brief and keen interest in your hat if it's red, orange, or some other bright color attractive to her. She will let anyone in her domain know if they are infringing on what is hers, her mapped and crucial nectar spots. This magical and tiny bird is a delight in the garden. I don't have to venture very far to encounter her here winter, spring, summer or fall. Have you ever noticed the energy hummingbirds exert defending a feeder that isn't even hung up but they have recently visited? Indeed, she is a diligent, boldhearted, astonishing bird.                                                                                                                                                                       

Gulls with Geese

Waterbird Mixer

"Birds of a feather flock together," except for when they flock with birds largely unlike themselves. Canada Geese and gulls share the lawn at Penitencia Creek Park located at the bottom of San Jose's eastern foothills. Remember, when you flock among birder friends and associates, do not spout the old "two birds with one stone" saw. Bird lovers frown upon it. Binoculars, cameras, sketchpads, and naked eyes, yes! Stones, BB guns and slingshots, no! While we are on the subject of bird inspired proverbs, two birds in the bush is very fine. Identify this bush, sneak up close to this bush and catch a glimpse of the birds. Yes, some people will stare at you. What colors do you see? What are the birds exclaiming from the bush? Birds of a size often flock together, but that just won't cut it as a popular saying. Little birds like chickadees and titmice all in brisk cheeping cliques defy our cute saying. Or else birds of a common habitat and habits flock together like these geese and gulls. Birds will be birds and don't bother themselves too much with our generalizations about them. What do they do? We can find out by stepping outside and watching them. We may observe something new or puzzling about their lives.

'Name-Tag' Birds

  

 Isn't it fantastic when you need not consult your field manual to reference a bird you've identified a number of times already? There are some birds who announce themselves by their call or by plumage details; such is the Yellow-rumped Warbler who gives itself away with a flash of bright yellow from its rump as it flits away with a decisive, or perhaps, it is a bothered, 'chit.' They go round in loose flocks, so you are likely to hear chit, chit, chit from various spots overhead as you stroll through your neighborhood on alert for visiting birds. Sibley's ear hears 'chwit,' but I am just starting to tune my ear to the dialectical distinctions of common urban birds. It's best to ask your own ears what sounds they hear as soon as you sight the bird. You can file it in your brain's audio input as you learn and store away the bird's name. Later, just by listening to songs and calls you may be able to name the birds all around you. It can also be fun to dispute your bird guide on pronunciation since, really, isn't it your own trusted ears against Sibley's or Peterson's or whoever may be your preferred Last Word on the Bird? When the Yellow-rumped Warblers come through in fall to rustle the Chinese Pistache trees, gleaning the sticky pinkish drupes for insects, their pretty swatches of yellow offer up a satisfying memory aid. I thrill with recognition, "I know that bird!" No--not a sparrow or a bushtit: too much yellow with sharper lines than a sparrow, a little long in the tail and wing-streaked for a bushtit. As soon as you spot its yellow rump flag, you can be certain it's a Yellow-rumped Warbler. It's as sure a marker as the cotton ball you espy on the hindquarters of the cottontail as she hops under a shrub. I like to think of these warblers as birds that 'ring a bell.'