Mammoth Ski Trip

http://flickr.com/photos/rowleypics/2371605701/in/set-72157604303150106/

This year's spring trip to Mammoth was great. There's nowhere so peaceful or soothing to spend a week, especially when it offers the complete sort of solitude it can in winter. While we would see others if we were skiing down on the trails below the cabin, we never saw a single other soul at the cabin. Nestled in the woods and snow, we had a refuge from everything. No TV, internet or running water - just books and family.

http://flickr.com/photos/rowleypics/2371603743/in/set-72157604303150106/

Dad got us all ski passes for the Tamarack Lodge's groomed tracks. That was fun, and very helpful since the snow was crummy. Libby learned a lot about how to snow plow, and I tried to learn a bit about stopping. We covered a lot of miles around Lake Mary, Mamie, and Horseshoe, and took some other trails we'd never been on before. We went up Coldwater Creek campground's trail to the very end, took the Pine Creek trail, and some others.

Conditions were, as I mentioned above, far less than ideal. It was about 60 when we started skiing on Monday afternoon. So, of course, it froze overnight, and the next morning saw everything covered in thick ice. Fortunately, it was warm again, and thawed pretty quickly. But Wednesday and Thursday were colder, and it never thawed in the shadows. We got a dusting of snow on Tuesday night, but it didn't accumulate - all the storm brought was intense wind for Wednesday. In some places it was windy enough to push you right along on your skis without any work. That's sort of fun if its behind you, but less fun when it's a headwind.

Another bummer was that Dad came down with a cold part way through the trip. That's especially a bummer for me because I apparently caught it from him. Libby caught it from him or me, too, but I seem to have gotten it the worst. Not that I'm complaining (sorry, yes, I am complaining).

http://flickr.com/photos/rowleypics/2371613343/in/set-72157604303150106/

On the way home we stopped at Fossil Falls (above) as we left Mammoth pretty early because of the icy conditions - there just wasn't much of a point to sticking around. That turned out to be a neat place; Libby and I hadn't stopped there before. It's just south of Coso Junction on HWY 395. Once upon a time, back during the last major glacial period, Owen's River actually came out of Owen's Lake and flowed down through the desert below Owen's Valley. There it flowed over an earthquake fault - a bit of an uplift that created a ridge of basaltic cliffs - creating a waterfall. This shaped the basalt into fantastic whorled shapes. When the glacial period ended, Owen's Lake became a salt lake without an outlet (like Mono Lake), and you can take the opportunity to walk around a waterfall's bed. Anyway, it was a neat stop, and there were some neat wildflowers and birds, as well as the neat rock formations. We were also treated to a flyover from an F-16. I've included pictures from there in our Flicker photo-album for the whole trip:

http://flickr.com/photos/rowleypics/sets/72157604303150106/

Santa Rosa Plateau Flowers

We're a bit behind on our posting due to a trip to Mammoth and subsequently coming down with energy-draining colds. Because I'm sure everyone is deeply disappointed, expect us to attempt to assuage your grief through poorly written prose and badly composed digital images in the upcoming days.

A week ago Saturday, the 22nd of March, we took a family outing to the Santa Rosa Plateau with my family. My Dad's brother Jim and his new fiancee Terri visited Grandma and Grandpa Rowley for Easter and Grandma's birthday. So, it was a big party that headed out to the hills to look at flowers.

We had a fun time. There were loads of people there, but there were also good numbers of flowers in bloom. A nice to way to celebrate Easter time, isn't it? Here's the Flickr album from the occasion: Santa Rosa Plateau Pictures.

Chocolate Lilies blooming at the Plateau
http://www.flickr.com/photos/rowleypics/2369544957/in/set-72157604295813652/

Jim and Terri are very knowledgeable about plants, so it was good to be there with them. The Chocolate Lilies, above, are a big draw at the plateau. We were able to find them pretty easily, as everybody seemed to know where they were. There were actually quite a lot, but some of them were fairly far into the preserve.

We also stopped by the Vernal Pools, where the shrimp and tadpoles were happily swimming, while being predated on lots of Garter Snakes. The snakes were swimming or slithering around the pools in Plague-like amounts. Loads of fun, since they're hardly poisonous. Funny story about poisonous snakes: we were birding Peter's Canyon yesterday. I was standing on the edge of the trail listening to some birds calling, when I heard a funny raspy rattling noise. "What sort of bird makes that noise?" I thought to myself. The sound came again, and I thought, "That's a mechanical sort of noise - something's shaking something." That's when I backed slowly away from the trail's edge as it rattled a third time. We didn't see the snake, but we didn't really want to make an effort.

Garter Snake checking me out.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/rowleypics/2370383502/in/set-72157604295813652/

Mammoth pictures are already up on Flickr, and we'll post about it in a bit.

Happy Spring!

Today's the first day of Spring! Yesterday I took a walk around Biola and La Mirada Park. I got a chance to greet some of the spring birds and flowers. I put up an album of the pictures I took on Flickr. Here's a Hooded Oriole from La Mirada Park (my FOS):

Hooded Oriole at La Mirada Park
http://flickr.com/photos/rowleypics/2347113912/

It's also Maundy Thursday. Today the western church, in various denominations, will commemorate the Last Supper. "Maundy" comes from Maundatum - Latin for commandment. Today we remember that Christ gave us a new commandment, to love one another.

This comes from John 13. After Jesus had washed his disciple's feet, and had sent Judas out, he said to his disciples:

"Now is the Son of Man glorified and God is glorified in him. If God is glorified in him, God will glorify the Son in himself, and will glorify him at once. My children, I will be with you only a little longer. You will look for me, and just as I told the Jews, so I tell you now: Where I am going, you cannot come.

"A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another."

This is the very mission of the Church. Tonight we'll have a service where we commemorate the Last Supper's institution, washing of feet (a symbol of the kind of love Jesus requires of us), and when the service is over we'll take our place waiting with him for Good Friday. All night, volunteers will take turns praying in the church. With our sleeplessness, we will strive to fulfill Jesus' wish where the disciples failed.

Failure is such a huge element of human life. Writing this I was thinking about how badly the church (and me!) are in fulfilling its mission. But two things encourage me. First, the very next passages in John 13 after the new commandment is given are Peter's promise to never betray Jesus. We are not alone in our failure, but Peter went on to do great things for God. Secondly, Jesus' death on the cross is the very and only cure for our failure, and on Friday we'll do well to remember that.

Isn't it amazing that the same Lord through whom a beautiful bird like a Hooded Oriole was created died on a dirty cross in Palestine? The return of a beautiful bird like a Hooded Oriole can be as powerful a symbol of the Resurrection as the first blooming lilies of spring - just keep your eyes open!

Chino Hills Stroll

This last weekend Libby and I took a bit of a stroll at Chino Hills State Park. Libby got a book of 101 Hikes in Southern California for her half-birthday from work, so we thought it would be fun to try out one of the closest hikes on a Saturday afternoon. Unfortunately, I mistook the wrong road for the trail head, and we didn't get to try out the hike described by the book, but we still had a good time wandering around through little trails on the exceptionally green hillsides.

You can see how green it was behind Libby in this picture.
http://flickr.com/photos/rowleypics/2342290746/

All of the plants were incredibly alive there, and there were lots and lots of flowers blooming among the grasses. A further pleasure was watching the wind blow through the grass and up over the hills. The wind would push through the grass, tossing it like wind tosses waves in the ocean. Unfortunately, it began blowing up a gale while we were there, and we found it prudent to head for safe harbor after only about an hour and a half or so. We'll have to go check it out some time when its not quite so squally.

I put up some pictures in a set on our Flickr page: flickr.com/photos/rowleypics. I sprung for a Flickr Pro account so that I could load pictures without any size restrictions. I've added quite a few lately, so if you're interested, feel free to peruse our entire photostream.

A Lark Sparrow perched on a rail checks out his own shadow.
http://flickr.com/photos/rowleypics/2341464813/

Despite the blustery conditions, we did see some interesting wildlife - ground squirrels squeaked from the hillsides, lizards on the trail, an awesome looking Jerusalem Cricket that Libby found, and some birds. It wasn't really a birding trip, though we need to scour Chino Hills for Rufous-crowned Sparrow (an Aimophila sparrow we've never seen, even though they're practically in our backyard) and maybe even for Black-chinned Sparrow when they've arrived (there's a very small population of these birds in the hills). Of course, even when we're not birding, we can't help but notice birds. So, the few we saw during our hour amidst the billowing gales follows in annotated list format:

1. Turkey Vulture (these guys really get tossed around by the wind)
2. Red-tailed Hawks (a few of these, highlight being a beautiful dark-phase juvenile that passed overhead)
3. American Kestrel
4. Anna's Hummingbird
5. Song Sparrow (the only birds we heard singing despite the wind)
6. California Towhee
7. Lark Sparrow (A particular favorite, strikingly beautiful for a sparrow)
8. Tree Swallow
9. Violet-green Swallow (FOS - yet again we saw Swallows migrating in a windstorm)

Albi (The Racist Dragon)

Flight of the Conchords are New Zealand's 4th most popular digi-folk parodists. Jonathan and I really get a kick out of them (probably because White people like singing comedians). We especially like this song. Though Business Time is pretty hilarious too.

Three Strikes Birding

This weekend we took a day trip to Anza Borrego State Park to look for three birds. Of our three targets, we found zero. Worst birding trip, ever. Here's a photo album, though.

female Phainopepla

Our three targets were Le Conte's Thrasher, Crissal Thrasher, and Long-eared Owl. Le Conte's was my most-wanted species, so we spent a lot of time wandering around Clark Dry Lake and the Borrow Pit area of Anza Borrego, but we had no luck. We swung at Crissal's Thrasher in the Borrego Sink - the only place where a tiny population of Crissal's Thrashers are hanging on in San Diego County. That was miserable. The sink is a low area that historically had a large and healthy population of mesquite tapping into the water. But now the city of Borrego Springs has used so much water that the water table has receded and all the mesquite is dead. It's depressing to wander around these shriveled and sun-blackened skeletons hoping to glimpse a population of birds that's undoubtedly doomed. We won't be going back. Crissal Thrashers are more easily found near the Colorado River, so we'll probably look for them there or in Arizona. Long-eared Owls are supposed to spend the winter and spring hanging out at Tamarisk Grove campground. We checked in with a ranger, and he said that his year they never showed up; victims of last year's drought. With no seeds to eat, the small animal population suffered, and consequently large predators have had to move on.

We did see a lot of neat wildflowers. There's a nice little bloom going on in a few places of the park. Here's an album of just flower pictures that we took.

Birdcage Evening Primrose

And we also did see a few birds. Best bird was a Prairie Falcon that came careening in a few feet above us and plunged into some creosote after some prey (probably Le Conte's Thrasher, heh). He came up empty, but it was very impressive.

Black-throated Sparrow

We also witnessed a large push of swallows migrating north in the twilight. The wind was blowing hard by this time, from the north, but they were plunging on inexorably. They flew low , passing within feet of us as they gave every bit of effort to make progress in flights of 10 - 20. Every few minutes a new flock would come up and pass us. Migration is such a force of nature. These birds were giving everything they had for every yard of progress, but they kept going.

For posterity's sake, I'll include a pitiful little bird list. Phainopepla were common around the small oases we checked out. This doesn't include birds seen on the road in the mountains above. We had a fair sampling of the year-round residents, Black-tailed Gnatcatcher, Black-throated Sparrow and Verdin are common desert-only species that we don't often get to see.

1) Common Raven
2) American Kestrel
3) Prairie Falcon
4) Black-throated Sparrow
5) White-crowned Sparrow
6) Verdin
7) Horned Lark
8) Phainopepla
9) Black-tailed Gnatcatcher
10) House Finch
11) Lesser Goldfinch
12) Northern Mockingbird
13) Ruby-crowned Kinglet
14) Swallow sp. (N. Rough-winged or Tree, I think)
14) Costa's Hummingbird: two males and a female on a nest in a Tamarisk
15) Loggerhead Shrike - these were very common around Clark Dry Lake.

We saw Roadrunner tracks, but we didn't see any.

Dusky-capped Flycatcher

Well, I submitted my Dusky-capped Flycatcher (Myiarchus tuberculifer) find to the California Bird Records Committee (CBRC). Initial feedback is that it's a convincing record. I don't imagine it will have any trouble being accepted. If it isn't, though, I'll still likely learn something valuable about identifying birds.

So what is a Myiarchus tuberculifer and why is it exciting (to me, anyway)? This is it:


It's a small bird in the family Tyrannidae. Tyrannidae is a uniquely new world family: it's only found in the Western Hemisphere. Nonetheless, it's considered the largest bird family on earth. That's probably subject to change as avian taxonomy is in constant flux. The members of this family generally specialize in eating insects, but some will eat berries, also.

The Dusky-capped Flycatcher is a mostly tropical species (like the vast majority of its family). You will find it in woodlands from southern Arizona south to northern Argentina. You usually will not find it in California, but it is apparently the most expected wintering Myiarchus flycatcher on the coastal slope of southern California (according to an e-mail from Kimball Garrett - someone who should know).

Some birds make a mistake when they head south for the winter and end up going in the wrong direction. This bird traveled northwest instead of south. It's probably been frequenting this Eucalyptus grove most of the winter. Who knows how many unusual birds were spending this winter in out of the way places? Finding these hidden treasures is one of the many pleasures of bird-watching.


So, how do you know if you've seen a Dusky-capped Flycatcher?

Dusky-capped Flycatchers are best distinguished from their nearest congeners by voice. Its typical call is a descending peeeur with a strongly mournful quality. But it definitely has other vocalizations, one of which I heard the first time I saw it. That was frustrating at the time, but I appreciate it, now, as I feel I have a little better experience with the species.

Dusky-capped Flycatchers are also the smallest of the Myiarchus flycatchers north of the Mexican border. It looks a little rounder rather than the more lanky appearance of its close relatives. Otherwise, the yellow on the belly is brighter, and the dusky cap contrasts strongly with its gray throat. This really stands out from quite a distance. One thing that many birders will look for on a Myiarchus flycatcher is the under-tail pattern - vaguely visible in the photos above. Many of the birds have fairly distinctive patterns (though there's actually considerable variation). Dusky-capped Flycatchers lack the strong rufous coloring that's obvious on the other species, and the paler inner feathers contrast with the outer feathers from the base of the tail to its tip. The Ash-throated Flycatcher is especially distinctive in that it shows a darker bar across the base of the tail - this is generally absent in the other three species found in the U.S.

Oh, and the scientific name of Dusky-capped Flycatcher strikes me as pretty trippy: Myiarchus tuberculifer. What's it mean? It means "lord of the flies" "carrying a fleshy protuberance." This is from the Dictionary of Birds of the United States (a book I wouldn't mind having, actually). Tuberculosis is derived from that same root.

More information on Dusky-capped Flycatchers:

Wikipedia: Dusky-capped Flycatcher page.

USGS Patuxtent wild bird research site: Dusky-capped Flycatcher.

What Bird?: Dusky-capped Flycatcher page (field guide format includes vocalization and range map)

Internet Bird Collection: Dusky-capped Flycatcher video. This vocalizing bird's call is a little quicker than the ones I've heard (in La Mirada and Arizona). Since it's videoed in South America one wonders if that's reflective of a taxonomical difference. Of course, you can't tell from one video. There are four other videos of this species from South America, but I can't figure out how to link to the page that displays those options.

Myiarchus Pictures

This morning on my way to work, I observed a single Myiarchus flycatcher foraging in the Eucalytpus trees in the undeveloped parts of Creek Park just north of Imperial Highway. These three shots were very distant, but they were the best that I could manage.



I don't know what species it is. I think it's most likely an Ash-throated Flycatcher, but it might be a Dusky-capped Flycatcher. My impression at the time that it was small and yellow to be an Ash-throated, but the sun was warm and indirect. Its bill seemed large, and the tail seemed to lack the rufous of an Ash-throated. But, looking at these pictures, there seems to be some rufous in the tail (the second picture), and the wing bars seem pronounced enough to belong to an Ash-throated Flycatcher. The call more closely resembled an Ash-throated Flycatcher to a Dusky-capped Flycatcher. Either way, it's fairly rare, but Dusky-capped would be less likely.

Opinions welcome! Feel free to comment.

Astro-Blasting!!

Libby and I put off our celebration of St. Valentine's Day until this last Sunday, so we could eat at the Blue Bayou. We had a lot of fun at Disneyland. Here's us blasting some robots to save Star Command's power cells.

Look at how concentrated we are! Libby was having an off day, but we still had fun. I love this ride. It's like a video game and a fun theme park ride all in one.

Astronomical Wonders

Did you catch the eclipse Wednesday night? It was beautiful, and the weather was surprisingly cooperative for us. Every once in a while there'd be a thin veil of clouds, but generally it was very visible. Here's a record shot from our camera:


After I took the camera off the tripod we set up our spotting scope, which works OK as a telescope. We observed the moon through that for a bit, and then Libby went looking for Saturn. She found it! We could clearly see the rings sticking out on either side of the gas giant. Through the scope it was a beautiful clear star with two sticks on either side. We like to imagine it was something like what Galileo saw.

Regulus was also very clear just above the moon, and this is a great time to see the closest star visible in the Northern Hemisphere. Sirius is the brightest star in the south. You can use Orion's belt as a pointer - it's just straight off and a little below it (at least around 8:00).

Birding the Sacramento Valley

For Presidents' Day weekend, Jonathan and I went on a birding trip to one of the Fifty Places to go Birding Before You Die (I got this book as a Christmas present from one of my wonderful students). We went to destination 13: The Sacramento Valley. Jonathan has put pictures up on facebook.

We drove up Saturday morning, leaving at 5:45 am to get a good start. By lunch time, we were in Sacramento. We stopped at Sutter's Fort, had a picnic lunch and walked around. From there we went to the Capitol. It's a beautiful building on the inside and outside. No luck seeing the Governator, though.

Saturday evening we went looking for Short-eared Owls in a well-known hot spot, and had great success. They put on a good show along with Northern Harriers, a White-tailed Kite, and Red-tailed, Ferruginous, and Rough-legged Hawks all in one big field. And Burrowing Owls were abundant in the next field over. We weren't the only ones there. There were probably 12 or 14 birders total, standing on the side of the road, watching and photographing the scene. Jonathan had a funny idea: What if the way birders greeted one another was to give 'em the bird? I thought we should try it and see what would happen. However, he was not committed enough for this. I sure called his bluff.

After the owls, we still had about an hour drive further North to Willows where we would spend both nights. We passed the time in the car singing Anyone Else But You by the Moldy Peaches, and making up our own silly verses about each other.

All day Sunday, and also Monday morning, we birded all over the Sacramento National Wildlife Refuge. We encountered many other birders as we explored the area. And about 50% of them drove a Subaru. No kidding. I guess it's "the official car of birders" or something. I had no idea! But now I have to have one.

We had three target birds that we studied before the trip: Tundra Swan, Rough-legged Hawk, and Short-eared Owl. We ended up getting all of them. Here's the final trip list:

(in taxonomic order)
1. Pied-billed Grebe
2. Eared Grebe
3. American White Pelican
4. Double-crested Cormorant
5. Great Blue Heron
6. Great Egret
7. White-faced Ibis
8. Turkey Vulture
9. Greater White-fronted Goose
10. Snow Goose
11. Ross' Goose
12. Canada Goose
13. Cackling Goose
14. Tundra Swan*
15. Wood Duck
16. Gadwall
17. Eurasian Wigeon
18. American Wigeon
19. Mallard
20. Cinnamon Teal
21. Northern Shoveler
22. Northern Pintail
23. Green-winged Teal
24. Ring-necked Duck
25. Lesser Scaup
26. Bufflehead
27. Common Goldeneye
28. Ruddy Duck
29. White-tailed Kite
30. Bald Eagle
31. Northern Harrier
32. Red-shouldered Hawk
33. Red-tailed Hawk
34. Ferruginous Hawk
35. Rough-legged Hawk*
36. American Kestrel
37. Peregrine Falcon
38. Chukar* (We don't know if we can technically count this one, since they might not be from an established population.)
39. Ring-necked Pheasant*
40. California Quail
41. Common Moorhen
42. American Coot
43. Sandhill Crane
44. Killdeer
45. Black-necked Stilt
46. American Avocet
47. Greater Yellowlegs
48. Long-billed Curlew
49. Dunlin
50. Long-billed Dowitcher
51. Wilson's Snipe
52. Ring-billed Gull
53. Herring Gull
54. Rock Dove
55. Mourning Dove
56. Great Horned Owl
57. Burrowing Owl
58. Short-eared Owl*
59. White-throated Swift
60. Anna's Hummingbird
61. Belted Kingfisher
62. Nuttall's Woodpecker
63. Northern Flicker
64. Black Phoebe
65. Loggerhead Shrike
66. Western Scrub-Jay
67. Yellow-billed Magpie
68. American Crow
69. Common Raven
70. Tree Swallow
71. Cliff Swallow
72. Bushtit
73. Marsh Wren
74. Ruby-crowned Kinglet
75. American Robin
76. Northern Mockingbird
77. European Starling
78. American Pipit
79. Yellow-rumped Warbler
80. Spotted Towhee
81. California Towhee
82. Chipping Sparrow
83. Savannah Sparrow
84. Fox Sparrow
85. Song Sparrow
86. Lincoln's Sparrow
87. White-crowned Sparrow
88. Golden-crowned Sparrow
89. Dark-eyed Junco
90. Red-winged Blackbird
91. Tricolored Blackbird
92. Western Meadowlark
93. Brewer's Blackbird
94. House Finch
95. House Sparrow

Disneyland with a Toddler

Kids under 3 get into Disneyland for free. Jonathan and I have Disneyland passes. We also have a nephew just under the age of 3. It all fit together so nicely. So, we took the little guy to the Magic Kingdom. You can see pictures from the trip here. (This actually happened over a week ago, but I've been too busy to post about it until now.)

We had a good time. Little Jonathan said some funny things. Like when we were driving there:

Husband Jonathan: Aww, shucks.
Nephew Jonathan: Shut it! Shut it up! Don't say that word!

And then when we were getting out of the car, after arriving:

Me: Jonathan, do you need help getting out of your carseat, or can you do it yourself?
Nephew Jonathan: You should help me. Quickly! Before the train leaves!

It was a new experience for Nephew Jonathan and I think it was a little overwhelming. There were colorful, exciting things everywhere. And lots of people! He wanted to be held the whole time, and only walked by himself when we got back to the parking structure on our way out. But we rode the train, and the horse-drawn car (twice), and the Storybookland ride, and we saw a fire truck, and watched the Carousel (he was quite plain that he did not want to ride the Carousel, but he did want to watch the Carousel). And I think, all in all, it was a successful trip.

In The Place of the Lion

For my birthday, one of my gifts was Charles William's The Place of the Lion. Thanks, Phillip!

Charles Williams is not as well known as Tolkien or Lewis, but like them he was a member of the Inklings, an informal literary group of authors and critics that met in Oxford. He was a Christian, like Lewis and Tolkien, and wrote books that were full of atypical but Christian themes. The Place of the Lion is no exception.

The setting of the novel is a little country town. But for the novel, the address might be: Smetham, England, UK, Physical Earth. The point being that the plot of the novel revolves around the collapse of the heirarchical ideological immaterial realities of unchanging universals (personalized via ideas contained in Medieval thinkers) into the physical world. Kind of confusing, right? That's pretty typical of Williams' fiction.

Basically, some people in Smetham were fooling around with some kind of Neo-Platonism. The leader of this outfit is attacked by an earthly lioness escaped from a local circus. But when the lion contacts this Berringer fellow, the archetypical lion springs from the intersection and begins roaming the countryside, subsuming its lesser daughter into itself. But a lion to Williams is not only a giant predatory cat, it is also a spiritual reality. It is aggression and rage, also, such as you and I feel.

Soon other archetypes start popping up. The perfect serpent, eagle, butterfly, horse, and unicorn all appear. As they appear they subsume their earthly emanations. So the countryside is emptied of animals (except for sheep), but also, those humans who most closely serve each spiritual significance. A man becomes a ferocious lion, a woman a snake. A man who collects butterflies sees the idea of butterfly and is so consumed with its vision he eventually neglects life and dies. Buildings start falling down, the weather turns unbearably hot, and the end of the world appears nigh.

Pretty crazy, right?

Anyway, I really liked it. There are a couple of Dante-esque moments that would make any fan of the Comedy smile, and the ending was a pleasant surprise. The book was encouraging in its commitment to the way things really are, and the necessity of spending ourselves for the sake of truth, and not vice-versa. That's especially nice during the political season, when knowledge and opinion are bartered for votes, popularity and power.

I recommend the book, especially to those who have a bit of Classical education. It's fun to see the connections and to find someone who reveres the Medievals.

Anna's Chirps

Researchers have developed a new theory to explain an Anna's Hummingbird's chirp at the base of its dive. This is something anyone in California can observe - Anna's Hummingbirds are everywhere around here - and it's something he or she can probably observe right now, as we're well into the Anna's courtship season.

Anyway, it turns out that the chirp at the base of their dive (quite distinctive, and quite loud) is actually made by vibrating their tail feathers. Since they feathers are stiff, when they spread them at about 50 mph, they vibrate like a reed in a clarinet. It sounds louder to me than anything they use their voice to produce - and Anna's Hummers are accomplished singers.

Here's a BBC Article about it.

Here's a You Tube video.

Santa Rosa Plateau

Last Monday we went hiking on the Santa Rosa Plateau. It was a good time. Here are some pictures.

We saw a Bobcat and nine Coyotes. We also saw some birds:

Acorn Woodpeckers
Nuttall's Woodpecker
Red-tailed Hawk
heard a single Western Meadowlark singing
saw some Yellowlegs (probably Greaters)
Northern Shovelers
American Wigeons
a single male Phainopepla
Western Bluebirds
California and Spotted Towhees
Savannah Sparrows
Juncos
W. Scrub Jays
Oak Titmice
Bushtits and
White-breasted Nuthatches

I also just saw a Nuttall's Woodpecker outside my office. That's interesting because previously I've only seen Downey Woodpeckers around Biola. But this had an all dark back liberally streaked with horizontal white. Definitely a female-plumaged Nuttall's. I'm always keeping my eye open for wintering Sapsuckers, but it's interesting that a Nuttall's would be found. They're resident in Southern California, and thus not likely to wander. Thus, it may be indicative that we have an urban population. I've heard that they're beginning to adapt to urban mature-growth woodlands, but this is the first one I've ever seen outside of their favored oak-woodland habitat.

My Friend

I haven't seen my commuter-friend, Genius 7, as often this school year as I did last year. Since September I've probably only seen her 4 or 5 times, but two of those times happened this week.

Today, I was stopped right next to her for 2 consecutive red lights on my way home. And I learned some things.

1. She wears a pink rain jacket, despite her bright red hair.

2. She talks to herself using animated hand gestures.

3. Unless that was a dog I saw in the front seat. If so, she talks to her dog using animated hand gestures.

4. But I think it was just a white grocery bag and not a dog.

Beach-side Birding

Yesterday Libby and I had a pretty good time birding. One of our plans this year is to try and see most of the rest of the birds that are common in Southern California that we've missed so far. That will mean doing a trip to Santa Cruz Island for the endemic Scrub Jay, and we're talking about doing a pelagic birding trip. But we're also going to try and see some of the birds that are closer to home, and that we've just overlooked.

We're also going to try and study up before our little trips a little better than we have so far, in order to get a better shared understanding of what we're looking for. We're emulating Phoebe Snetsinger, whose biography Libby is reading, and doing a pre-trip notebook for all the species we might see. So, before our trip on Saturday we studied up on five birds: Common, Pacific and Red-throated Loons, Surfbird, and Wandering Tattler. The Loons aren't all the difficult, especially in summer plumage, but in winter, they're all pretty drab gray colored and the differences are subtle: bill size, and plumage features like the demarcating line on the neck being bold or subdued, faint chinstraps, collars, and also some behavioral differences. The shorebirds are just plain gray birds that live along rocky shores.

We've seen a Common Loon a few times before now, but we had never seen the other four birds. Mostly because they're not common in protected bays, which is where we normally go birding near the coast (Bolsa Chica or Newport Back Bay). This time we went to the Newport Pier and to Crescent Bay in Laguna Beach.

We hoped to have all three species of Loons and maybe try a little sea watching from the Pier. When we pulled up there were a bunch of gulls and some Brown Pelicans circling the beach - mostly Heermann's and Western. We saw one or two Ring-billed, too. On the way out we saw some Eared Grebes, Horned Grebes, and some Surf Scoters feeding on the barnacles encrusting the pillars. At the end, we found a place along the rail next to all the fishermen and started looking for loons. We soon found a Red-throated Loon! Soon we also had a Common Loon, and we spent a long time watching birds fly by the pier at quite some distance. Most of those we couldn't identify because they were so far away. Our scope is a little fella' and we've no experience with truly pelagic species. There was a constant procession of small birds with quick wing-beats skimming the surface of the water. I'm guessing they were a Shearwater of some sort. There were also distant rafts of Cormorants. Only a single Pelagic came close to the pier. It gave us great looks of its unique iridescent feathers.

I was disappointed not to see any Pacific Loons near the pier, but we decided to move on and check out Crescent Bay for the shorebirds. I missed the turn the first time, but we doubled back and found it soon enough. There were some other birders there looking for an American Oystercatcher that was reported last weekend. We set up on the overlook and started scanning the rocks. The low ones sported both Western and Heermann's Gulls, Black-bellied Plovers, a Whimbrel, and some Willets. The rocky off-shore outcroppings were covered in Sea Lions, Brandt's Cormorants, Black Oystercatchers, and Brown Pelicans. And then, there was an American-type Oystercatcher! We got the scope on it, and right behind it was our lifer Surfbird! Cool!

American Oystercatchers are common along the Atlantic coast, and they also breed on the Pacific coast of Mexico. However, our local Oystercatcher is the more range-restricted Black Oystercatcher. Its breeding range extends south into Baja California where it overlaps with the northernmost breeding American Oystercatchers. And that's where they hybridize. So when an American Oystercatcher appears north of the border, there's always some debate over whether or not it is an American Oystercatcher or an American x Black Oystercatcher hybrid. Last Saturday someone ran the bird through a scale named after an ornithologist named Jehl to determine its descent and decided it was good for an American Oystercatcher, but we heard second hand while we were there that someone had seen two American Oystercatchers on the beach that morning. So now we don't know if we saw the same one someone had earlier rated, or not. It definitely was not an ideal American Oystercatcher. It showed some a dirty rather than clean line on the breast between its black and white plumage, and it showed a few flecks of black on the undertail. The wing-stripe appeared slightly restricted, but the tail looked good. Overall, I'm leaning towards it being the bird earlier described (which was rated a 33 out of 38 - 30 or lower being a definite hybrid).

We hung around for awhile waiting for the appearance of the second bird, or our Tattler. We were rewarded with a good look at another Pelagic Cormorant coming in for a landing on the rock (showing big white patches behind the wing - a wonderful field mark) and a Pacific Loon! One came steaming along feeding and preening through the area. Great luck. And then I found a bobbing shorebird far away in the rocks. It turned out to be our Tattler. And with all five targets wrapped up, with a bonus hybrid or lifer to boot, we headed for the car. And were stopped by a pod of dolphins heading through! And then by a pair of Lincoln's Sparrows, some Golden-crowned Sparrows, and a White-crowned Sparrow in the cliff-top park. So that was fun!

Day list:

House Sparrow
Heermann's Gull
Western Gull
Ring-billed Gull
Brown Pelican
Rock Pigeon
Black Phoebe
Horned Grebe
Eared Grebe
Clark's Grebe
Surf Scoter
Snowy Egret
Red-throated Loon*
Common Loon
Pelagic Cormorant
Black Turnstone
Willet
Whimbrel
Black-bellied Plover
Brandt's Cormorant
Black Oystercatcher
American Oystercatcher?
Anna's Hummingbird
Surfbird*
Allen's Hummingbird
House Wren
Pacific Loon*
Wandering Tattler*
Golden-crowned Sparrow
White-crowned Sparrow
Lincoln's Sparrow
House Finch

TGIF

What a day. I had to confront a kid about cheating on a Math test. And I also had two kids bleeding, and another one throwing up in class, though not all at the same time.

At least it's Friday.

Bird Pictures

This weekend I completely organized Libby's and my bird pictures using Picasa's album feature. It's neat, because you can sort pictures in albums without moving them between folders. What I ended up doing was making an album for every taxonomic avian family we've photographed a representative from. This was quite time consuming, but it was also fun. Finding it fun, I suppose, separates me from most other human beings. Anyway, I can now find pictures by folder - which is organized by date or a title indicating the nature of the event we visited, or find a bird picture by family!

I thought I'd share two of my favorite bird pictures so far:

This Anna's Hummingbird (Calypte Anna) was photographed at the San Diego Wild Animal Park back in December when we visited it. I'm mainly happy about catching the iridescence on the head so well, but the fact that it's a hummingbird flight shot is also fun. My biggest complaint (besides quality limitations) is that there's an artificial feeder in the scene.

I found this Hermit Thrush (Catharus guttatus) at Irvine Park last Saturday when I went to take a picture of the wintering Lewis' Woodpecker and to just spend some time in the great outdoors. I was walking along the little nature trail up on the hillside above the park, when this little Hermit Thrush came right up to me! It was a special moment, as the bird was obviously interested in me for some reason. I was able to reach back, grab my camera (which was still in the bag) and take this one picture before it flew off. Unfortunately, it was obviously a little shady and so the photo's uncomfortably dark, but it's fun to get so close to any kind of bird. It's even more fun to capture the moment!

Christmas Break Photo Round-up

Over Christmas Break (Yay for Holiday pay and the wonderful category of Bonus Day pay here at Biola), we had an opportunity to spend some time with both sides of the family and even got to do some birding with Bill and Becca.

Christmas Eve was spent with at Grandma and Grandpa's house, and that was a lot of fun, and so was Christmas at the Mootharts. Libby put up some pictures in an album on Facebook.

On the 26th, we headed off to Bolsa Chica with Bill and Becca, and we saw 65 species for the day. Nothing really out of the ordinary, but lots of fun looking at all the wintering water fowl. I was pleased we were able to find the resident White-tailed Kite for them, though we missed the resident Reddish Egret. The tide was really high, so we didn't do much shore-birding at all. A real highlight was a very confiding Brown Pelican sitting above a tide gate that let Becca get almost within arm's reach of him before flushing!

On the 27th, we visited the San Diego Wild Animal Park (photo album here). It was a real blast to see all the neat African animals. Of course, we really enjoyed the aviaries. Golden Orioles are beautiful anywhere, and so are Golden-headed Quetzals! There were also a good number of native species hopping in the bushes or flitting about. Bill and Becca got to see Say's Phoebes, Nuttall's Woodpeckers, and Cassin's Kingbirds. Libby and I got our binoculars on a beautiful soaring dark-morph Red-tailed Hawk - which was our first of that color morph for Red-tails. It was very striking.

Oh, and it turns out we saw a semi-wild Wood Stork that lives at the Wild Animal Park (but isn't an exhibit bird). We saw a stork flying between exhibits, but I just thought it was an escapee. It did occur to me that it looked just like a Wood Stork - white body and wings, with dark head and black flight feathers - primaries on down - but as I'm unfamiliar with the family in general, I couldn't eliminate other options. But I just read on a birding blog - 10,000 Birds - that there is a wild Wood Stork living there. I don't think we'll count it, though. On the one hand, I'm sure that we saw one, but on the other hand we didn't know what we were looking at, and I'd like to appreciate it better. Kind of like how we've held off on counting Varied Bunting so that we're sure to find it again and appreciate it in color (rather than in a distant silhouette).

We spent the last few days of that week relaxing! But on Monday the 31st, we went birding/walking with Mom and Dad at the San Joaquin Wildlife Sanctuary. We had a pretty birdy day, with high-lights being all three local Teal species together in one place, Northern Shovelers feeding in their circles, an escaped exotic Weaver species, a female Phainopepla, and a Peregrine Falcon. We walked downstream on the trail toward the UCI Marsh, too, and saw lots of White Pelicans, egrets, herons, lots of White-throated Swifts and some Northern Rough-winged Swallows, and loads and loads of Red-tailed Hawks. One field showed 5 in one binocular view, with one more sitting about 2 degrees to the right!

After that, Libby and I headed off alone to chase down some Wilson's Snipes reported further upstream in San Diego Creek. That was a successful chase, too. After a little head scratching and intensive scanning of every little bump in this little urban run-off channel, we came up with 10-15 of the funny looking birds. So, that was our last lifer of the year, on the last day of the year. As we were watching, we also had a White-faced Ibis fly in, and out again, which was just a nice touch.

That afternoon we installed Microsoft Office on my parents' computers and a router, before going off to watch the new National Treasure movie (silly, but fun), and have a delightful fast food dinner. We got home and were in bed by 9:30 so we could get up early the next day for Disneyland!

Happy 2008!

Jonathan got me Disneyland for Christmas. Well, two annual passes. Which is a lot of potential Disneyland fun! We went for the first time yesterday, to start the year off right. We had a great time, despite the large crowds (a lot of people had the same idea about starting the year off right). We took it easy, and didn't stress about having to see this or that attraction. After all, we've got a whole year!

You can see more pictures from our trip to Disneyland here.

The Muppets Christmas Carol - One More Sleep Til' Christmas

It's true. There's only one more sleep til Christmas!

COMICS!

Nothing like a good old cartoony comic strip to brighten your day, right? Libby and I have been enjoying the newly opened archives of American Elf, one of the most entertaining web comics around. It's a strange mix of touching family strips, humorous commentary on the mundane, and then all of a sudden there will be a bunch with lots of bad words and "adult" situations. Anyway, I recommend it in a very qualified way - if you're sensitive to this kind of thing you'll likely be offended by looking at the site (and I won't put up a link but obviously Google sees all).

So, on a slow night last week a while ago we made our very own comics. Since we don't have a scanner, I just put up on the fridge and took pictures of them. Here're the results:




Libby's is the top, better, one. Mine are the two lower ones. Aren't we brave to post them on the internet?

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.