My Students Love Me

Christmas vacation has begun. Today was just a half day at school. We had a Christmas party in the classroom, and everyone exchanged gifts. Here's the gift I got from the class:
It's a tree hung with about 20 gift cards to places such as Baja Fresh, Barnes and Noble, Borders, Blockbuster, Mervyn's, Red Robbin, Rudabagorz, California Pizza Kitchen, Baskin Robbins, Cold Stone, Regal Cinemas, REI, and more!

And that's just the "class gift." Most students gave me individual gifts as well. Among these is an awesome book called Fifty Places to Go Birding Before You Die. It's great. For each destination, there's a picture, an essay based upon an interview that the author had with the birder who recommended that destination, and an "If You Go" section with information about tour companies that lead birding trips there, the best time to go, and accommodations.

Here's the funny thing about a book like this: it makes me want to start another "list" just for it. So far, Jonathan and I have been to one of these places: Southeastern Arizona. So we've got 49 more to check off the list.

We can just coordinate our vacations around this book for the rest of our lives!

Biola Birds

Yesterday I went birding at Biola during lunch. This is the best time to do it because the students are gone. That means that people don't look at me weird when I wander around with binoculars, but, more importantly, it means that there are more birds! The birds come out of the woodwork around the dorms during the break - hopping right up to the doors. Since nobody is around, they are able to access food sources more comfortably.

Anyway, it yielded a good snapshot of what Biola's avifauna is like in winter. I did a little walk from about Thompson, down the creek, and then back over McNally Field to my office. I expected Yell0w-rumped Warblers to be the most common bird, but I was wrong! There was a huge flock of finches and waxwings down by Stewart. Many more than I've seen, anywhere, at one time!

Here's a list, in no particular order:

1. Western Bluebird - 12
2. Hermit Thrush - 1
3. Yell0w-rumped Warbler - 40+ (1 Myrtle's behind Hope!, the rest Audubon's)
4. House Sparrow - 15
5. Allen's Hummingbird - 2
6. Anna's Hummingbird - 10+ Anna's Hummers are currently mostly swarming the blooming Eucalyptus Trees. I heard more than I saw, and mostly around my office.
7. N. Mockingbird - 2 (heard only)
8. Scrub Jay - 1 (heard only)
9. Common Yellowthroat - 2 or 3
10. Nutmeg Mannikin - I saw 1 clearly, but it was part of a flock of three that settled in some willows by a drain. I think there may have been more, but I can't say for sure.
11. House Sparrow - 15 or so.
12. California Towhee - 2
13. Song Sparrow - 1
14. Lincoln's Sparrow - 1 There are quite a lot of little Melospiza sparrows hiding around the creek. I think most of them are wintering Lincoln's Sparrows because they're incredibly reclusive (whereas my experience with Song Sparrows is that they're much less reclusive). I've never gotten a perfect look, though, so I might be wrong.
15. Savannah Sparrow - 10+ I've never seen one of these at Biola before, that I remember, but a group of them were feeding along the edge of McNally field behind Hope.
16. White-crowned Sparrow - 3 or 4. This was weird - much fewer than normal, and I saw two individuals sitting high in trees, not doing anything and without an evident flock. Atypical, to say the least, for a gregarious bird that feeds on the ground. They are pretty nomadic, so it's hit and miss. Lately there's been a flock by Rose Hall, but I haven't been there lately.
17. Black Phoebe - 3
18. Cassin's Kingbird - 5 At dusk, more than 2 dozen come to campus to roost. They must disperse a bit during the day.
19. Red-shouldered Hawk
20. House Finch - 100+
21. Lesser Goldfinch - 50+
22. American Goldfinch - 50+
23. Cedar Waxwing - 50+
24. American Crow - 1
25. Mourning Dove - 25 or so
26. Rock Pigeon - 1 flyover from the flock on Biola Ave
27. Gull - 2 (probably Ring-billed or California, flying overhead at a great distance)
28. European Starling - 2 (there's a big flock that roosts at Biola, but I didn't see them at lunch time).
29. Mallard - 30+
30. American Wigeon - 2 I don't know why they'd hang out with Mallards.

30's a fair number. Earlier this week I saw a N. Flicker and a Say's Pheobe on campus, but they weren't there yesterday on my walk. Downey Woodpeckers are year-round residents, and I missed those. I'm not sure where the Green Herons are, there used to be a resident pair of them on the creek (and they had two babies this last summer), but I didn't see them, either. No Snowy Egrets or Great Egrets, either. Snowy if fairly common along parts of the creek, but not yesterday.

Psalm 23

This is just. so. cute.

Midnight Excitement

Last night around 11:40, Libby and I awoke to a bizarre loud whining sound. It was obviously an alarm or something - just one note, one pitch, and at a persistent level. It triggered a car alarm. Then that died down, and it took a little break. I relaxed. It immediately began again.

So, I finally got up to go look out our back windows. BAM. The bedroom window lighted up. I'm thinking - gunshot? I walk into the dining room and peak out through the blinds:

A white SUV was entirely consumed in raging fire. This was about 50 feet from our window, straight out from our apartment. Libby came out, and I called 911. They said deputies and fire were already on their way. The only other people we could see were in the back door of the dojo across from us.

As we watched, it suffered one more tiny explosion, sparks flying from the undercarriage. I should have taken pictures, but I was honestly worried that somebody might have been in the car, and I didn't want to take pictures of that. The fire was completely in the passenger area, not under the hood.

Fire showed up pretty quickly and they got it put out in less than five minutes. They didn't look too concerned at that point, so I guess nobody was inside. Good!

December 7, 1941

Wikipedia has a recording of Roosevelt's speech on December 8, 1941. I don't believe I've ever heard the entire speech in its entirety before. You can listen to it here.

Every gun makes its own tune.

Libby and I finally finished the Man With No Name Trilogy of Spaghetti Westerns by Sergio Leone last night. They're all quite good.

Some highlights:

1) Fistful of Dollars seemed the most human to me. I rooted for the Man with No Name most strongly in this movie. The whole concept seemed Dantean - playing evil men against each other is just what they deserve. I suppose it's not surprising to find ideas from Dante in a Western if the movie's Italian, though, eh?

2) The gun battle at the end of A Few Dollars More is amazing. More amazing than the Good, the Bad, and the Ugly's iconic fight. The way Leone played with music was beautiful, and how it was intrinsic to the actual scene made it that much more powerful. Oh man, when Eastwood opens up the watch!

3) The last act of the Good, the Bad, and the Ugly makes the whole epic worth-while. It's slow up to that point, but the movie from the point where they get caught by the Union until the last scene is a great poetic meditation on human life.

I especially liked the scene where Tuco is standing on a cross, with his neck through a noose, gazing at money he thinks he'll never gain. While this affords the Man with No Name time to escape, it's also intensely purgatorial. This movie is really image driven, somewhat like Dante, but without the medieval structure.

Also, does anyone know if this was intended as a kind of prequel? What does it represent when Eastwood picks up the Poncho he wears throughout the other movies? Is it like a vestment?

It's curious to watch the most American of genres through the eyes of a foreigner. While American Westerns offer a stylized image of our own past, Sergio Leone offers a stylized image of that very image, and this new image is as revealing as the initial. Everything looks, on the one hand, so stark and austere. The sets are sparsely populated, the cities small, everything made of wood, dwarfed by the landscape always threatening to swallow it up. On the other hand, everybody's filthy dirty - inside and out.

Finally, Clint Eastwood played one cool character. I'm working on my sneering squint as I write this.

P.S. Funniest dialogue in the movies?

Tuco: "See you soon, id... id... ids... "
Eastwood: "'Idiots'. It's for you."

Salton Sea

Trips to the Salton Sea are a pretty draining affair. Even with an hour head's start because we started in Highland, it's a two hour drive. We started at 5:00 in the morning, which meant waking up at 4:30. That was pretty exciting. Thanks to Mom and Dad Moothart for their hospitality!

So, we hopped on the 10 East to the 86 South. At 6:30, we arrived at our first stop, which was Buchanan Street. This is a spot the internet advertised as good for Crissal Thrashers. These are very similar to our local California Thrashers, but are paler and live in dryer habitats. They're pretty uncommon and hard to find, but we poked around in some Mesquite/ dry wash type habitats right as the sun rose. No luck, which was alright. There were some Ruby-crowned Kinglets and Yellow-rumped Warblers. We heard a Gnatcatcher in the brush somewhere, and our first White-crowned Sparrows were foraging around a little drainage sink. Libby took this picture of the full moon setting.


Desert sunrises/ sunsets and moonrises/ moonsets are among my favorite things. I like how the sunlight sets the tips of the creosote and sage on fire as it races across the flats. In this shot, you can see the beautiful purple of the low horizon. A lot of fun.

We hopped back in the car and jumped on the 111 South. We skipped the Whitewater River mouth because someone had posted that it wasn't worth stopping at on a listserve. I wish I had checked it out, in retrospect, because we didn't have luck getting to any of the river mouths. I also would like to have some experience in case we ever go back.

Our next stop was at Salt Creek Beach. It turns out this is a pay area, but we forgot to bring cash (it's a self-policing system). So we just stopped the car for a moment and scanned the gull flocks. There were lots of Ring-billed Gulls, lots of Herring Gulls, and some California Gulls. There were also a few Eared Grebes. The wind was blowing pretty hard, though, and the sea was full of white-caps.

So, back into the car, after cleaning our shoes and boots (Libby's are awesome) to get off some foul smelling mud or other substance off them that we'd be wrinkling our noses at since Buchanan Road. Next stop was Wister Unit of the Sonny Bono National Wildlife Refuge.

Turns out that it is closed. Probably so that the hunters don't shoot you. Still, we birded the parking lot and it was pretty productive. There was a giant flock of Red-winged Blackbirds, some Common Ground-doves (a favorite of mine), Eurasian Collared Doves, a Ladder-backed Woodpecker (we missed this our last trip to the Sea) and a late Gray Flycatcher. Libby got a bunch of great pictures of the woodpecker. She stalked it and got up real close! She also took the Red-winged Blackbird picture below. I tried to take pictures of the Ground-doves and the Flycatcher, but both turned out poorly. I did get a picture of a flock of geese as it flew over, so I'll throw that in, too.

Ladder-backed Woodpecker

Red-winged Blackbird

White Geese flock

So, off we went, driving Davis Road south to Schrimpf (home of the mud volcanoes: pictures in our album). Along the way we stopped at Pound Rd and checked out some adobe ruins, a large and distant flock of white geese, a Belted Kingfisher, and some ponds with ducks and shorebirds. All along this road, Northern Harriers were thick. We saw up to four at a time over the reeds on either side of the road, flying this way and that, dipping and wobbling on their wings as they hunted. Besides American Kestrels, Harriers were our most common raptor. We weren't keeping track, but I'm sure we saw more than thirty. It was probably around 50.

Our next complete stop was the headquarters of the Sonny Bono NWR (hereafter SBNWR). That's a fun place because they've retained some of the desert flora that has been removed in the rest of the valley. It's thick with Ground-doves, Gambel's Quail, White-crowned Sparrows, and desert Cottontails.

Desert Cottontail

We took a walk to get a better view of the geese flocks, but the real highlight of this stop was a single overflying Roseate Spoonbill. This is a rare bird in California, and the Salton Sea is the most common place for it to show up.

Roseate Spoonbill

Libby was the one that found it. I was trying to take a picture of a fairly cooperative Say's Phoebe when Libby grabbed me and said, "Look!" Whoa! Because I had the camera out I looked through its lens and pushed the shutter. It hesitated, and then I had it! And I dropped the camera (it was on a strap), and got my binoculars. "Check it's bill!" I didn't want it to be a feral Flamingo (this is actually possible at the Salton Sea). It wasn't, and we were elated. Ironically, we'd just talked to a lady in the parking lot who had also seen a northward flying Roseate Spoonbill that morning. Not sure where they were heading, though, as we checked out the salty mud-flats north of the SB NWR HQ without any luck. This is the kind of moment that makes birding really pay off. It's like finding treasure!


These American White Pelicans flew over us, too.

This is what the geese flocks look like from a distance. It's very impressive, and they are very noisy. This is at the HQ, but at Unit 1, where we went later, there were probably more than twice as many geese.

After eating lunch at the HQ, we headed south to bird the intersection of Lack and Lindsey Rds for Laughing Gulls. Mission accomplished! These birds were lifers for us, and fairly unique as far as gulls go. The Salton Sea is the only place they are found in the US' West, so we were happy to see a small group before the headed back down to the Gulf of California for the winter. They are actually lingering later than normal in large numbers this year. We didn't get any pictures, unfortunately, but it looked like this photo from Wikipedia:

Laughing Gull in winter plumage, Wikipedia

Next we spent a ton of time driving along between fields as I tried to find Unit 1, which was much further than I expected from Lack and Lindsey. In retrospect, I wish I had stopped at a couple of other roads to scan the sea, but you can't do everything. As we drove, I kept my eyes open for a few birds I wanted to see: Burrowing Owls, Loggerhead Shrikes, and Mountain Plovers. Libby was able to fall asleep, which was great for her! I was able to find a Shrike, but the other birds eluded us.

Here's the one I found. I love these little birds. They look like small stocky Mockingbirds, but they're ferocious little guys. They'll eat things as big as lizards, and they stash the food they catch on thorns and the ends of sticks. How macabre is that?

Just before reaching Unit 1 we had our last lifer of the day, a pair of Sandhill Cranes flew past our car through a field. Unit 1 had tons of geese. This is the place to go to see them! Unit 1 has an observation tower, and the road out to the tower is supposed to be a good place for Burrowing Owls. We didn't have any luck, but on the berm alongside the road we did get really close to a White-faced Ibis. Libby took a few pictures:

I like how exotic they look.

After Unit 1, we headed off south and way east to look for Mountain Plovers. We drove and drove, missed a turn-off, kept on driving, following dirt roads and paved roads. It's lonely out among the fields. We stopped at an intersection (Hastian and Pickett) to scope for possible plovers, and found a bunch of Horned Larks. What was really fun, though, was how you could stand in the middle of the intersection as long as you would like. Not a single car passed us for like 15 minutes. It's kind of spooky.

We decided from there to check out Finney and Ramer lakes. Crissal Thrashers are resident at one of them, and some Spoonbills had been there earlier. No luck on either this time, but we had quite an adventure driving around Ramer Lake through sand and mud in our little sedan. We even went down some bizarre little turn-off that just ended, but it was so narrow and overgrown, that you couldn't turn around. So I had to back up a couple hundred feet around a turn through bushes so tight you couldn't see10 feet! I also took our car up a little hill through sand about a foot deep. I tell you, our Saturn is tough. It will not be beat or get stuck.

Ramer Lake did have a big Egret roost, which was impressive, and we got our trip's Black-crowned Night Herons.

It was getting late by this time, so we headed down to a field south of Brawley on Keystone Rd, east of Spreckel's Sugar, to watch the Sandhill Cranes come in to roost. We had some trouble locating the field, until we were able to follow in flocks of Ibis. The Ibis fly in big liquid flocks, shifting and moving around. We could see them coming, mostly from the South, as the sun set, and they'd slowly dip down and skim the reeds, pop back up, and then circle around to the north before landing on the ponds. It was really fun, and gulls were constantly streaming by, too, on their way up to the Salton Sea. But no Cranes! Finally the sun had set all the way, and we were getting ready to go, when I heard some strange gutteral trills. Cranes! A small flock of maybe 20 or 30 finally arrived and dropped into the roost. We got out the scope and watched them as the light faded the rest of the way. I thought it looked kind of prehistoric. Cranes have a weird vibe about them, tall necks, large bulky tail feathers. We didn't get any pictures, but here's one from always helpful Wikipedia:

Lesser Sandhill Crane, courtesy Wikipedia

Then we headed home, from our furthest point south. We left at 5:00, and got home at 9:30. There was some holiday traffic on the 10, and we stopped for dinner at In-N-Out near Palm Springs. So it's a pretty long trip! All in all, we had about 66 species for the day.

Thanksgiving Weekend

Wheww! Can you believe the weekend is over already?

On Wednesday we had some preventative maintenance done on our car, which ended up taking all day long. That's a story all in itself.

On Thursday we had a wonderful Thanksgiving. We went to Church in the morning, and my parents' in the afternoon. We had great food and a good time with Dad, Mom, Stanley and Grandma and Grandpa. A small collection of pictures is here: Thanksgiving.

On Friday we woke up really early to go to the Newport Back Bay for the crest of an unusually high tide: 7 feet. This is a good time to see rails and unusual marsh sparrows. We missed the sparrows, but added Virginia Rail and Clapper Rail to our life list. We also added American Bittern and Burrowing Owl to our lists. We met a nice birder from D.C. who had seen the rare Short-Eared Owl that's been hanging out in the area recently, but we missed it. That's OK, the Virginia Rail was an awesome surprise, and a very beautiful little bird. We have a fuzzy picture, but I won't impose it upon you.

This is what American Bitterns look like in the marsh - tall skinny necks. We also saw one in flight, though, which was a much better look. Even the scope view of this birds was more impressive - you could see a bill, anyway.


Here's our Burrowing Owl, watching us. Burrowing Owls are on the verge of extirpation in Orange County. The Back Bay birds are perhaps the last breeding colony.

After the Back Bay we dropped by Bolsa Chica so that Libby could check out Harriet Weider Park, a section of Bolsa Chica we'd never been to together before. Best bird there was a White-tailed Kite, which is at least my favorite common local raptor species. Lots of qualifications, I know, but Gray Hawks are so cool! Then again, so are Red-shouldered, Ferruginous, Zone-tailed... I guess I should stop.

White-tailed Kite at Harriet Weider.

I've divided the pictures from the day between two albums. They start on the last page of this album: Birds. They continue in Birds 2.

Friday night we went out to celebrate Abbey's birthday. Happy Birthday, Abbey! We went to Mongolian BBQ with the Moothart Clan. It was lots of fun. We spent the night there because we wanted to get a head start on our Friday expedition to the Salton Sea. I think I'll make that a separate post, though, because I have to get ready for work.

More Pictures

On my facebook account, I've posted several new photo albums from recent happenings. You can see lots of pictures of a pumpkin carving, a trip to the tide pools, Solvang, and Oak Glen.

Have fun, and leave a comment or two.

Last Solvang Post!

Libby posted a bunch of pictures from our Solvang trip on her Facebook account. You can link to it here (I think).

Some pretty flowers.

Yellow-billed Magpies, a California endemic, are found in the countryside around Solvang.

Solvang has a lot of pretty architecture.

We visited Nojoqui Falls just outside of Solvang on Alisal Road. The Falls are beautiful, though they were more of a drip this autumn. The countryside is rolling oak hill-land and pastures. It's very pretty! It's much wetter than our local oak woodland, with moss hanging from the oak branches. The oaks are also more densely packed.

Solvang Signage

One of the most quaintest things about fine Solvang is that it has many wonderful signs indicating the various wares for sale by the various proprietors. We found them charming, but sometimes a little humorous. We decided to humor them photographically. Below are (some of) the results!

I'm growling like a Viking because I'm about to eat Viking food! Viking food is apparently sausage, meatballs, and red cabbage. Pickled red cabbage is really big in Solvang.

Libby is communicating with the beyond! Just like the Mystic Merchant!

I doubt my look is as special as theirs, but I try!

Libby models something different in Jewelry. This is a one of the kind original design we thought of ourselves!

Thumbs up!

I also can play my mandolin.

ROAR!

Nordic Knives is not only frightening, but well signed. Libby will not really stab you, don't worry.

G. Wilikers, Batman!

This says: BZZZZ! So did I!

We won't tell if you don't tell.

Just a little bit of Denmark, not a lot of bit!

More Solvang posts to come!

Happy Anniversay to Us!

As of yesterday, Libby and I have been happily married for two lovely years. As is our custom at every such milestone, we've immediately instituted a policy of replying to anyone who asks us how long we've been married, "Oh, more than (insert milestone here: in this case, two years)," in an offhandish sort of way.

We marked the date by visiting the quaint and touristy town of Solvang, California. Or, as we like to call it, Dane-land. This is not to be confused with Denmark, as that country is in Europe. I imagine it is also much larger than Dane-land, which is about two city blocks of shops and Danish architecture.


We really are happy to be married. That's because we really love each other a lot!


We stayed at the Petersen Inn. It was very nice. The service was wonderful, the room was wonderful, and the dinner was excellent! We stayed in the Tower Suite - see below:


These pictures are huge, and it takes like half an hour to upload them on our DSL at home. So, I don't know how many of them we'll post. I liked visiting the out-of-the way courtyards and such. Here's my lovely wife ascending a staircase to the future!

Chess and Boxing: Chess Boxing

From the land that idolizes David Hasselhoff comes a new invention: Chess Boxing. The BBC reports on this exciting sporting development here.

You play a round of chess, and then you box a round, and then you play a round of chess, and then you box around. There are eleven rounds to either knock out your opponent or checkmate them. Why? Well, it's art. Also, apparently,

"Chess and boxing have lots of things in common," Mr Rubingh assures me.

"If you move the pawn, it's like moving your jab. If you come with the knight, it's like a hook. If you come with the rook, it's a straight right. And if you march in with the queen, it's a knockout," he says.

This could make good television while the writers are on strike!

What other sport combinations can we conceive?

How about video games and sports?

Halo Golfing! Between tees, sit down and play a round of multi-player Halo with your golfing buds. You could hook up the system to LCD screens in the golf carts!

Wii Tennis! Play tennis on and off the Wii. Hook the wiimotes to the handles of your tennis rackets for really confusing sport. This, obviously, can be applied to any of the Wii Sports. Have a tournament that combines them all.

Or, what if we combined sports from different seasons?

Ice Bowling? Like Curling, but on ice skates, and with a ball. Knock down the pins, and perform that triple axle right after the release for bonus points!

Ski Golf. Like the biathlon, but you have to putt instead of shoot. Get through the course quickly, but also keep your score low. How do you putt in fresh powder? I don't know, but someone has to pioneer this stuff. Maybe you could use special golf balls.

If you want to stick to board games, here're some other ideas:

Checkers Swimming. The chess board is one one side of the pool, but before you can play, you have to make a lap. You can move as often as you can make the trip. Make more moves than your opponent if you're faster than him!

Risk Boxing. No more need for dice. Get your friends together, and have a brawl for every invasion. Move in 20 armies? You get 20 friends on your side against their two.

Post more ideas in the comments, if you have them.

Birds, Pictures of Birds

One of the reasons we bought the camera that we bought is that it's a really cheap way to take decent pictures of birds. It's not going to produce professional quality images, but we don't really need professional quality images. Professional images, after all, cost professional prices. We were able to skip on that, and I'm still content with our results. I've started a photo album with the pictures we've taken of birds in the last couple of days:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2034641&id=68600650&l=33bca&ref=share

On the topic of birds, recent discoveries in Arizona are tantalizing. Recent rarities there include:
Crescent-chested Warbler, Northern Jacana, and a (probable) male Eared Quetzal. These are all Mexican birds only rarely seen in the United States. It's almost enough to make one think about moving there! It's also enough to consider a road trip, but we'll see how long they stick around. I'm not too hopeful for the warbler and the quetzal, but the Jacana may linger for quite awhile.

A New Camera, the Beach, and a Haircut

Jonathan and I bought a new camera and had to try it out yesterday. It's a Canon, and we decided that it can shoot just as many things as a cannon, but more often in an ethical way. So there you have it.

We went to Newport Back Bay first thing in the morning. Jonathan is happy to be birdwatching.

About mid-morning we went over to Crystal Cove to meet Gabe, Emily and their boys for some tide-pooling. Here's my handsome husband.

And here's one of our very cute nephews. He had a good time running on the sand.

Barefoot in the sand is the way to go.

A fun time was had by all.

Can it get any cuter than this? I submit that it cannot.

But wait! This little guy's pretty cute, too!

Family photo time.
Tide pools and a cute kid.

Jonathan caught a crab. With his bare hands. Tied behind his back. Er, wait.

After we came home, we took a nap and then I gave Jonathan a haircut. Very respectable. :-)

Halloween

I realized today that the only part of the Halloween festivities for which I have any inclination is the mass consumption of candy.

I do like candy!

Saturday Birding

This Saturday was Libby's last day of class, and rather than sit around and twiddle my thumbs awaiting her return, I decided to drop by Bolsa Chica and see what was up. I decided to check Harriet M. Weider Park, an area on the west side of Bolsa Chica I'd not been to before. I was handsomely rewarded, and will definitely be adding this park to the general Bolsa Chica experience.

As I drove along Bolsa Chica on PCH on my way over to the park, I noticed that the tide was higher than I have ever seen before. There was no exposed mud, and much of the vegetation was covered by the water. I'd heard that Sunday was supposed to be a dramatically low tide, so maybe that was linked somehow. Anyway, I figured I wouldn't have much luck with shore birds. That wasn't quite the case, though, as there were many shorebirds (thousands) viewable from the park, and I stayed until the tide was quickly going out.

Anyway, at the park I saw hundreds of American Pipits (FOS), hundreds of White-crowned Sparrows, a FOS Northern Flicker in the trees, and a dozen Meadowlarks. I also had my FOS Hermit Thrush. Walking out along the oil pipelines in the area would thrush giant flocks of all of these species, and as I got down closer to the water, the sparrow flocks became more heavily Savannah Sparrows, though the White-crowns continued. At the furthest point I reached, I set up the scope and scanned the oil fields. I found a sitting Peregrine Falcon on a distant post, and a closer Say's Phoebe, which was another first for the season. Among the ducks in this area were also my first of season American Wigeons, Northern Pintails, but there were also Gadwalls, Green-winged Teals, and Mallards mixed in with the flocks. There was also a gorgeous White-tailed Kite hunting there the whole time. It was pretty exciting, to tell the truth!

The giant shorebird flocks were mostly Western Sandpiper and Black-bellied Plovers. There were also some Dowitchers and Godwits around, though.

After that, I jumped in the car and drove over to the Boardwalk. There I was treated to some Eared Grebes, and my FOS Surf Scoters, Lesser Scaups, and Red-breasted Mergansers. I believe I haven't ever seen a Greater Scaup. At least, I don't think so. I walked down to the tide gates, hoping to find my FOS Buffleheads. I was pleasantly rewarded by two or three beautiful little males mixed in with the bobbing Ruddy Ducks. At the tide gates, the churning water attracted a flock of Brown Pelicans, Forster's Terns, and two Bonaparte Gulls, which I don't see very often. They're so small, I didn't notice them at first. They blended in with the Terns!

Anyway, it is beginning to look a lot like winter, now. It looked like there were a few Elegant Terns left, which surprised me (and I might be wrong about it, anyway), but otherwise the avifauna is basically wintry now. There aren't the numbers there will be later, but most of the species have returned. Here's my list for the day:

Pied-billed Grebe
Eared Grebe
Western Grebe
American White Pelican
Brown Pelican
Double-crested Cormorant
Great Blue Heron
Great Egret
Snowy Egret
Black-crowned Night Heron
Turkey Vulture
Gadwall
American Wigeon
Mallard
Northern Shoveler
Northern Pintail
Green-winged Teal
Lesser Scaup
Surf Scoter
Bufflehead
Red-breasted Merganser
Ruddy Duck
White-tailed Kite
Cooper's Hawk
Red-tailed Hawk
American Kestrel
Peregrine Falcon
American Coot
Black-bellied Plover
Killdeer
Black-necked Stilt
American Avocet
Greater Yellowlegs
Willet
Long-billed Curlew
Marbled Godwit
Dowitcher Sp. ( who knows?)
Bonaparte's Gull
Ring-billed Gull
Western Gull
Royal Tern
Elegant Tern
Forster's Tern
Rock Pigeon
Mourning Dove
Anna's Hummingbird
Belted Kingfisher
Northern Flicker
Black Phoebe
Say's Phoebe
Cassin's Kingbird
Tree Swallow
American Crow
House Wren
Western Bluebird
Hermit Thrush
Northern Mockingbird
American Pipit
European Starling
Yellow-rumped Warbler
Common Yellowthroat
California Towhee
Savannah Sparrow
Song Sparrow
White-crowned Sparrow
Western Meadowlark
House Finch

67 Species is a pretty good day!

Bird Books

I'm pretty excited about a couple of new bird books that I've gotten in the last couple of weeks.

First came Birds of the Salton Sea, by Michael A. Patten, Guy McCaskie and Philip Unitt - an exhaustive resource to that region.

It has five chapters: A History of the Salton Sink, Conservation and Management Issues, Biogeography of the Salton Sea, A Checklist of the Birds of the Salton Sea, and The Species Accounts. The last chapter, The Species Accounts, takes up 264 of the 365 pages in the book. It's an exhaustive list of all the species of birds ever found, or likely to be found someday, in the Salton Sink. It provides information on the seasons they're present there, whether or not they breed, what kind of numbers they're present in, what habitats they frequent, taxonomic information (which subspecies is present, for example), and what kind of trends their populations may be undergoing (increasing, decreasing, staying the same).

Anyway, it's really fun bedtime reading. And it will help a lot if we can make it out to the Salton Sea this winter. It should assist in finding species we missed last time, and having the kind of background knowledge it provides will help put everything into context. It's interesting to know that the Burrowing Owl you're looking at it, for example, is part of the largest, densest and healthiest population of Burrowing Owls in California.

Other really interesting facts:

• Most of North America's Eared Grebes (75%) use the Salton Sea on their migration in Spring and Winter. Estimates range all the way up to 2.5-3 million of them in January 1988 (pg. 75).
• A third of the world's population of Mountain Plovers winters in agricultural fields surrounding the Sea.
• One-third to one-half of the world population of American White Pelicans winters on the Sea. That would explain the large flock (about 100) that we saw heading South last Saturday over the hills around Oak Glen. Kind of a strange site at the time, a bunch of giant white sea birds in a kettle above the mountains.
• The Salton Sea is the only place in the United States that has a population of Yellow-footed Gulls. They are regularly disperse into the Sea after breeding in the Gulf of California, where they often number in the hundreds. Very few over-winter there.
• The Fulvous Whistling-Duck is nearing extirpation in California (perhaps already is). It once bred very commonly throughout the central valley and along the coast. In the second half of the twentieth century it could only be found breeding in small numbers at the southern end of the Salton Sea and in the Imperial Valley.
  

I also really like some of the tables they've included. Some illustrate the "approximate mean numbers of" different families of birds. So, they have a chart with waterfowl. It's nice to get a general idea of how many of each kind of bird winters there: 20,000 Snow Geese, for example, or 25,000 Northern Shovelers, and it's all in one quick glance. This helps understand how rare some birds are, too. We saw a blue morph Snow Goose while we were at the Sunny Bono NWR, for example. On average, there are 4-5 a year, out of 20,000 white Snow Geese!

They have similar charts for gulls and shorebirds, which is great since some of those are either difficult to identify or a member of a species pair that's hard to differentiate.

Overall, I'm very happy with this purchase. It was a great deal, and it's a fascinating snap shot of a troubled Sea. In ten years, who knows what the Sea will be like? Now is the time to go, and this book will be helpful in understanding what you see when you do go.

Second came my new Sibley's Field Guide to Birds of Eastern North America, by David Sibley. Texas and New York, here we come! There's actually not much in it that's not in my Western Guide, but it gives ranges for all the Eastern Warblers, and the Eastern birds that never wander out west aren't in my Western Guide. It's interesting to read about the Western birds from an Eastern perspective, too. For example, the Blue Jay is treated as the standard by which other Jays are compared (darker than a Blue Jay, larger than a Blue Jay). He also excludes the Pacific form of the Western Scrub Jay completely (understandably!).

The colors are a little different between the guides, which is interesting. I think there were probably some printing problems in producing my Eastern Guide, as there are some minor differences in the color shades used to code the range maps on facing pages. I don't think it will be a big problem - field guides aren't supposed to be completely accurate, and we always have Libby's National Geographic Guide to use in comparison.

Autumn In Southern California

You can be completely certain that Autumn has arrived in Southern California when you step out of your door onto a layer of brown ash. The hills of Los Angeles, San Diego, San Bernadino, Santa Barbara, Ventura and Orange Counties are all burning today, and it smells pretty bad in La Mirada.

Libby's back to work again today. She's feeling pretty good - just has a little congestion and a persistent cough. I had a little bout with some sort of stomach complaint, but it didn't last very long, and I'm definitely grateful!

Update!

Well, this is how the course of Libby's illness is progressing. After staying home Tuesday, she felt much better that evening and was happy to go back to work on Wednesday. This she did, courageously, but unfortunately came home with a fever again (but a lower one, 100). She also lost her voice that morning. She whispered her way through most of the day, and we could only converse in whispers last night. She went to bed at 8:00 feeling quite tired.

This morning the fever is gone, so she's going back to work with a bit of her voice recaptured. She's also coughing, now, and still has nasal congestion. It's a sad state for my favorite person to be in!

Uh oh!

Well, Saturday was nice, but the next day wasn't quite so nice. Libby woke up with quite a cold. She's been struggling through it, ever since, and actually took a sick day today. I think this is her first day of missed work because of being sick. Yesterday she did go to work, but came home with a fever of a 102!

Thankfully, her temperature is back to normal today. A day of rest should help her out a lot, so keep her in your prayers.

A Good Day

Today was a really wonderful day. It rained almost all morning, though only very lightly, and it had rained half of the night. I opened the windows this morning to that glorious fresh rain-smell, and Libby and I had soup and hot chocolate for lunch (a little optimistic, perhaps). We got our little apartment cleaned, and so that's alright.

The afternoon we'd planned to go birding. We wanted to go back to the San Joaquin Wildlife Sanctuary I had visited last week, but, then, someone posted about seeing a couple of interesting warblers at Huntington Central Park, so we decided to visit both places. As they're both near the 405, that turned out to be very feasible.

Huntington Central Park was very wet, and quite birdy. There were big flocks of Yellow-rumped Warblers everywhere. There were also a large number of Townsend's Warblers, which are really quite beautiful. I'll put a full list at the bottom. We only found one of the two Eastern warblers reported: a single beautiful male American Redstart. This was the second time we've seen one, the other time was at the Salton Sea, but it was the first time Libby got a really good look at one (a satisfying view), and I was very happy to see one again, also.

As we were walking around trying for better views of the Redstart, I noticed a Kingbird, and decided to check it out, on the principle that any Kingbird in coastal California in the Fall may, very rarely, be a Tropical Kingbird heading dreadfully off course. This was one of those very rare situations! Libby and I had seen Tropical Kingbirds before in Arizona, and we worked together on each field mark indicating its species. It had a large, long bill, a dark mask, the yellow on the chest came up to the white throat patch, without the intermediate gray line of a Cassin's or Western Kingbird, and the tail was notched (though not so deeply as the ones we saw in Arizona - I'm not sure what that means, maybe it's a hybrid, but it's tail was quite worn, so that might also explain it). It finally called, and it had a perfect Tropical Kingbird voice. Awesome! This was the first time Libby and I had found a previously unreported rare bird together on one of our trips.

We soon headed over to San Joaquin, where we found both the Pectoral Sandpiper and Sora that I had seen the week before. These were both lifers for Libby, and so that helped keep our lists on par with each other. Other highlights were: a couple of White-faced Ibis. Oh, and three Bobcats that were quite tame and allowed us to admire them for a long time. I'll post a list for that location, too.

Huntington Central Park:

American Crow
Red-tailed Hawk
Common Yellowthroat
Yellow-rumped Warbler
Townsend's Warbler
American Redstart!
Orange-crowned Warbler
House Wren
Song Sparrow
House Finch
Lesser Goldfinch
Mallard
Mourning Dove
American Robin
Bushtit
Wrentit
Blue-gray Gnatcatcher
Ruby-crowned Kinglet
Hutton's Vireo
Western Wood Pewee
Black Phoebe
Downey Woodpecker
Tropical Kingbird!

23

San Joaquin Wildlife Sanctuary:

Clark's Grebe
Eared Grebe
Pied-billed Grebe
Double-crested Cormorant
American White Pelican
Pectoral Sandpiper (a lifer for Libby)
Long-billed Dowitcher
Black-necked Stilt
American Avocet
Kildeer
Black-bellied Plover
White-faced Ibis
Great Blue Heron
Great Egret
Snowy Egret
Black-crowned Night Heron
American Coot
Common Moorhen
Sora (a lifer for Libby)
Green-winged Teal
Cinnamon Teal
Mallard
Gadwall
Northern Shoveler
Ruddy Duck
Forster's Tern
Turkey Vulture
Osprey
Northern Harrier
Red-tailed Hawk
American Kestrel
American Crow
Marsh Wren
Common Yellowthroat
Yellow-rumped Warbler
Yellow-breasted Chat
Song Sparrow
White-crowned Sparrow

38

Birdin' San Joaquin

I went birding yesterday at the San Joaquin Wildlife Sanctuary. I went by myself because Libby was at school. I had a better time than I anticipated (oops!), so it wasn't a perfect trip. I was also going to try and take some pictures, but our digital camera's gone wonky. It won't stay on for more than 30 seconds (despite fiddling with the auto-off settings), so I couldn't digiscope any birds.

I got there in the early afternoon, and the weather was perfect. It was sunny and cool, in the seventies, I guess, with a bit of a warm inland breeze that carried the gentle scent of sage.

Bird-wise, there wasn't a whole lot going on, but there were some birds that were my first of the season (FOS) and two lifers. That puts my life list at 301, as I was at 299 before the trip. There was a Pectoral Sandpiper in one of the ponds there, which had been reported ahead of time. This is a fairly rare bird for Southern California. I also had a Sora, and then, later, two Sora, feeding in the same pond. Soras are fairly common, but you hardly ever see them because they spend most of their lives in the reeds. So, that was a great bird, much anticipated, and interesting. It's a pleasantly unique bird.

It was feeding with a much larger Common Moorhen, which is always a fun bird. This Moorhen lacked the red facial shield, which is a very interesting feature.

Oh, and as I was preparing to go, I saw a Bobcat moving in and out of the reeds, followed by an agitated flock of small birds.

Anyway, here's the list in no particular order:

Eared Grebe (FOS)
Pied-billed Grebe
Double-crested Cormorant
Great Blue Heron
Great Egregt
Snowy Egret
Black-crowned Night Heron
Sora (Lifer)
Common Moorhen
American Coot
Ruddy Duck
Gadwall (a very pretty male)
Green-winged Teal (molting into breeding plumage) (FOS)
Blue-winged Teal (a female or two)
Cinnamon Teal (mostly drab, but there was one very vivid Drake)
Northern Shoveler
Ring-necked Duck (quite a lot of these, in the deeper ponds) (FOS)
Mallard (of course)
Long-billed Dowitcher
Pectoral Sandpiper (lifer)
Least Sandpiper
American Avocet
Black-necked Stilt
Kildeer
American White Pelican (FOS)
Turkey Vulture
Osprey (FOS), there were at least two
Red-tailed Hawk
Northern Harrier
American Kestrel
American Crow
California Gull
Forster's Tern
Belted Kingfisher
Mourning Dove
Anna's Hummingbird
Cassin's Kingbird
Black Phoebe
Common Yellowthroat (tons and tons)
Song Sparrow (also tons and tons)
White-crowned Sparrow (FOS)
Red-winged Blackbird

There was a very small flock of swallows that stayed far enough away that I couldn't identify any of them. I think that's 42, which isn't too bad. Two lifers in the same day is pretty awesome, though.

A Note on the Backpacking

A couple of things relating to my trip (now more than a week past).

1) I saw my first Bobcat on the way home. This should be recorded for posterity. It was wandering unconcernedly along a fence on the outskirts of Lone Pine. I was driving at the time, looked right, double-taked (double-took?) and said, "Bobcat," pointing. We zipped by at high speed, and I admired the drolly strolling stocky spotted feline from the corner of my eye.

2) I uploaded some pictures to Facebook, but you can see them without having an account. Merely go here: Bishop Pass Backpack Album

I'll have you know I typed that URL. It wouldn't let me copy-paste.

Duck!

You don't need to, but we did on our way to church today. This can be a birding post. On our way to church today we saw one bird:

Mallard (female)

We were driving down a steep hill (for those familiar, it's the corner of Bastanchury and Associated, coming down from the intersection with State College). We were almost to the intersection, and slowing down to stop, thankfully, when we notice a female mallard swinging out in flight over the road from the left. Not too interesting, so the first impulse is to disregard it as one of those many events that your consciousness assigns to "not important" while you're driving so you can focus on the road. I still can't remember that part very well. I can't remember, for example, if the bird was taking off just off the left side of the road, or if it came down and over the road from Craig Park.

Anyway, the bird soon impressed itself on my mind (and Libby's!) as VERY important, as it straightened its course directly at our car. It was low, and in the ensuing second it became very clear it was going to hit or nearly miss our car. I slowed further, Libby yelled, and...

BAM

... the duck slammed into the top of our windshield.

Oh my gosh. That was a very loud thump. "We just killed a duck," I thought with alarm. My eyes had gone directly to the point of impact, above the rear view mirror. It was wet. Just water, but for a second I was really worried. Libby turned around, and I turned around as we came to a stop at the red light. The duck was walking into the middle of our lane behind us. It was alive, but for how long?

The light turned green and we headed off, throwing glances behind us. No point in getting out to do anything, as we'd be endangering ourselves and others. You'll all be glad to know that there was no damage to our car, and on the way home, we couldn't see the duck anywhere along the road. It might have been in the gutter on the far side, of course, but we prefer to think we may just have hit Super Duck. At least, we know we hit Stupid Duck.