A Brit abroad

Busy day around the Bay

On Saturday, Marcel, Magali and I decided to do a loop of San Francisco Bay in search of various interesting birds wintering in the area. Our first port of call was Lake Merritt in Oakland, where our quarry was a drake Tufted Duck. In spite of combing through every Aythya we could see, the bird didn't show itself. This was compensated for by amazing looks at a flock of Barrow's Goldeneye, many of which were displaying.

The Eye of Sauron? (The real owner of this eye can be seen at the end of this post).

We next crossed over the south Bay, to look for a Rusty Blackbird at Bayfront Park - we saw plenty of blackbirds, but not the one we wanted. Green-winged Teal were displaying at this spot - note the raised crowns and obvious 'tuft' at the back of the head.

In Redwood Shores we searched for a female Tufted Duck. In spite of the appalling light and reams of Scaup of both flavours to sift through, Marcel picked up the bird (left) on head shape - not the most inspiring view I've had, but a US lifer nonetheless.

We then drove north up the peninsula to Golden Gate Park, where an Eastern Bell's Vireo was wintering. By now it was early afternoon and there were people everywhere, which didn't fill me with much hope of finding the bird. However, Magali spotted it as it foraged low in the foliage, and over the next 30 minutes we were treated to eye-popping views. Given the proximity and skulking nature of the bird, I was very pleased to get one decent digiscoped shot among the copious bad ones.

It was a much brighter bird than the Western Bell's Vireos I have seen in Arizona, with the yellow underparts and powder-blue legs standing out in the strong sunlight. Here's looking at you!

We drove across the Golden Gate Bridge (I still feel like I'm in a movie whenever I do this), getting glorious views of the San Francisco and the Bay. Our final destination of the day was Point Reyes, where I filled probably the most glaring gaps in my California list - one each of White-winged and Black Scoters just offshore from Drake's Beach. After dark, we followed a tip-off about Northern Saw-whet Owls near the Point Reyes Youth Hostel. I enjoyed a whistling dialogue with one nearby bird, and even managed a few seconds' worth of flight views in the spotlight. An exhausting but exhilarating day's birding!

Black-crowned Night-Heron at Lake Merritt.

Mountain Chickadee!

Once the worst of the rain cleared, I got back on my bike to search once again for the Mountain Chickadee found by Michael Perrone, only the second ever county record and the first in my lifetime! After almost 2 hours of circling Slide Hill Park and nearby streets (and 2 failed visits before this), I finally heard the bird on the east side of the park. For the rest of the afternoon, the bird remained faithful to this same general area, allowing several observers eye-popping looks at it. Digiscoping hyperactive species like chickadees is never easy, but I did manage a few 'record shots' of this smart bird.

Joan, Roger, Betty and I continued to the Davis WWTP - no unusual species, but a very nice view of a perched White-tailed Kite...

... and a bizarre-looking California Gull with an aberrant head shape. Was this just aberrant feathering, or did the bird have some sort of tumour?

Joan and I ended the day watching one of the North Davis Merlins in its usual spot.

We joined Terry Colborn and crew for a delicious Chinese meal - a great way to celebrate my 249th county bird! With just under a month left, the pressure's on to find number 250...

Thanksgiving bike tour of Davis

In order to be truly prepared for the onslaught of food consumed over Thanksgiving, I decided to do a grand birding tour of Davis by bike. An early morning stop at Slide Hill failed to produced Mountain Chickadee (see next entry), so I pressed on for Willowbank Ditch. I was soon greeted by the wintering Winter Wren, and a Western Tanager called nearby. Two Purple Finches along the bike path further west were only my second encounter of the species in Davis. Solano Park Garden was uneventful, so I stopped to photograph a Killdeer (it's hard to believe than in less than a month I won't be seeing - or hearing - this species for a long time).

The Arboretum held 4 Aleutian Geese and the long-staying (Ring-necked?) Parakeet. While checking the sparrow flock in the Putah Creek picnic ground I stumbled across my second Winter Wren of the day! The ploughed fields around Olive Tree Lane held many California Gulls, allowing me to study all three age classes.

A lone 1w Herring Gull sat among them.

I did better than usual at West Davis Pond, with a Blue-gray Gnatcatcher and a good count of 15 Wood Ducks in a single 'flock'.

In addition to many Wilson's Snipe and Moorhen, North Pond held a pair of Hooded Mergansers, a long overdue bike tick for me.

A Golden-crowned Kinglet on my way home rounded off a very satisfying morning of winter birding.

Birders of the Symposium

In addition to the birds, the Central Valley Birding Symposium serves a great social function, allowing birders from across the state (and beyond) to meet up and talk birds for a whole weekend. Don Roberson gave an entertaining talk about the birders of the last century who shaped the modern California birding scene. Here are a few pictures of California birders who have been part of my birding experience here - many of them, I'm sure, will go on to shape the face of birding in the 21st century.

The Young Guns (L-R): me, Oscar Johnson, Ryan Terrill, Leigh Johnson, Cliff Hawley, Daryl Coldren, David Vander Pluym, Brett Tryon, Matt Brady.

Yolo birders: Karen Hochgraf, Sami LaRocca, Joan Humphrey, me. Sami and I are proudly displaying our certificates for the Central Valley Big Year.

More pictures after the jump:

Grete Adamson, Joan Humphrey, Roger Adamson: many a rare Yolo county bird have I chased with these folk.

The Symposium committee: David Yee, Frances Oliver, Kurt Mize, Cheri Pilsbury, techno-wizard lady whose name I forget, Sue Yee.

Astonishingly, Sami wins a wonderful Keith Hansen print in the raffle - of the T-shirt she's wearing!

For some reason, I have many pictures of young birders posing on cars. Here we have Ryan, David and Oscar.

Matt Brady (or is it Orlando Bloom?).

Daryl and David stare moodily into the sunset.

David unwisely takes on the mighty Cliff Hawley.

Some more photos from the Symposium, taken by Jim Gain, can be seen here

Birds of the Symposium

I was lucky enough to serve as a field trip leader for the 2005 Central Valley Birding Symposium, which provided a great opportunity to explore the diverse birds and habitats of the Valley, to meet up with old friends and to make several new ones. Here are the birding highlights of the last few days.

On Friday, Michael Perrone and I led a group around birding spots in Yolo County. Noteworthy birds at the Davis WWTP included 2 fly-by Great-tailed Grackles, a Western Sandpiper and great looks at flyover Aleutian Geese and my first Tundra Swans of the season. The Yolo Wildlife Area provided outstanding views of many secretive species in glorious sunshine, including several American Bitterns, a confiding Virginia Rail and a Sora. We finished the day along Putah Creek watching a mixed flock of Barrow's and Common Goldeneye.

On Saturday, the Camanche Lakes Fish Hatchery was our destination where good views of Red-breasted Sapsucker, Rock Wren (both found by Sami LaRocca) and Osprey were crowd-pleasers. I ducked out of the afternoon talks to join a group of young (and young-at-heart) birders in a Mountain Plover chase in Solano County. This was incredibly successful, and we enjoyed close-up looks at a flock of over 100 birds.

Unusually, these birds were foraging in long grass rather than their preferred winter habitat of bare fields. They were also engaging in a tail-fanning and -flicking behaviour that none of us had seen before - its purpose is not entirely clear, but it may be to flush insects forward for the birds to feed on.

In the evening we were treated to the spectacle of 17 Short-eared Owls flying all around us - I've never seen so many in one place!

The star birds of Sunday's trip to Flood and Waverly Roads were knockout looks at a Ferruginous Hawk...

... and a scope-filling view of a Burrowing Owl's head peeking out of its burrow. In the afternoon I made two trips for the controversial (see previous entry) Harlequin Duck at Stockton Sewage Ponds. The supporting cast of birds included a Mew Gull, both Yellowlegs, 2 white (probably Snow) geese, lots of Bonaparte's Gulls and Forster's Terns sitting on the water. Not a bad haul!

Harlequin Scoter

I just returned from a fantastic weekend at the Central Valley Birding Symposium. I'll post more about that later, but first I'd like to throw my two cents' worth into the debate about an unusual duck found on one of the symposium field trips to Stockton Sewage Ponds. First identified as a Harlequin Duck (only the second county record and possibly only the fifth for the Central Valley), several observers subsequently decided it more resembled a female White-winged Scoter, primarily on the basis of its large-looking bill. I still consider this bird to be a Harlequin: I'll present the case for the defense after these photos.

1. "Jizz". My evaluation of the bird's size was that it was a small duck, not an impression I would expect from a White-winged Scoter, being the largest of the scoters.

2. Behaviour. The bird was feeding continually on a drainage ditch, right at the edge of the rocks, submerging only its head rather than diving. It even climbed out onto a rock at one point (photo 3), behaviour consistent with Harlequins I have seen along the coast. I would have expected a scoter to be out in the middle of the sewer ponds and diving for food. Of course, either bird was far from home in Stockton, so we might expect unusual behaviour in a novel environment.

3. Bill. The main feature supporting the identification as a White-winged Scoter is the apparently large bill shown by this bird. The bird spent most of the time we watched it with its head underwater (the reams of 'headless' photos of this bird on my camera are testament to this), which can flatten the crown and dramatically change a bird's head shape, making the bill appear proportionately larger than our perception of a round-headed, small-billed Harlequin. Personally, having looked at many photos of White-winged Scoters recently, I believe this species shows a much longer bill than the bird pictured here.

4. Eye colour. The bird we saw unequivocally showed red eyes (photos 1 and 2). While I see no explicit reference to eye colour as an identification feature in Sibley, in an exhaustive Google image search, I have not yet found a picture of a scoter showing a red eye (which Harlequins do).

5. Face pattern. The bird showed a clean white circular spot on the cheek. The pale areas around the face were less clean, but the bird clearly showed pale patches above the line between the eye and the bill (the extent to which this feature was visible varied with angle).

I rest my case (but comments very welcome!)

As a postscript to this entry, most people have finally come to a consensus that this bird is indeed a Harlequin. Further pictures and more detailed discussion of the bird can be seen on Don Roberson's website and in the 'Ducks' folder of Chris Conard's website.

Sacre bleu!

I was just offered (and accepted) a postdoc in Paris next year. I imagine the local avifauna will be much like Britain's (with a few more Serins), but given the relative scarcity of birders there, a much better chance of finding my own stuff! Does anyone know the French for Wallcreeper? :-)

A bientot!

The curse of the invisible Sandpiper

I finally paid the price for my jet-setting when 2 Sharp-tailed Sandpipers were discovered in my home county while I was away in Florida. To add insult to injury, I arrived home to find a party going on in my house, where I met 2 birders (Ona and Carlos) who had seen the bird! They were, however, gracious enough to give me a ride out to the Wildlife Area in an unsuccessful search for it. Our consolation was an exceptionally late Wilson's Phalarope, and outstanding views of an American Bittern.

They still hadn't run into Burrowing Owl, so I took them to see our resident pair, only to discover that the male seems to be blind in one eye - hope he makes it...

Next day, while dipping yet another county bird (Swamp Sparrow), I was willingly 'abducted' by Daryl and Anne for another full day of birding. While birding was generally quiet, we did finally get to see American Dipper along Putah Creek - my 248th county bird! I arrived home to find a Praying Mantis on my door.

With no new reports of the Sharp-tailed, I had put all thoughts of the bird behind me when an out-of-area birder reported seeing the bird on Wednesday! I duly tried (and failed) to see the bird on Thursday, before heading south for the pelagic on Friday. Horror of horrors, the bird chose to make an appearance on Saturday when I couldn't do a darned thing about it. On Monday I made the decision to bike out to the Wildlife Area, walk the auto tour loop, and sit it out until the bird showed up. Bad idea. What started out as a calm, still day turned into a nightmarishly strong north wind. When my tripod no longer stayed upright without support I decided to call it a day. I was saved a dreadful ride home when the cavalry arrived - Joan drove in with a rope to attach my bike to her roof rack, and let me share in her chinese lunch to boot!

While the Sharp-tailed was a no-show, I saw my first white goose flock of the season...

... enjoyed the masses of waterfowl in the flooded fields,

and some other good birds including Virginia Rail, several Bitterns, Tricolored Blackbirds and Sandhill Cranes. I've given up on the invisible sandpiper now - at least until the next report!

Parkland birding in SoCal

As soon as we could bear to get up after yesterday's pelagic, we motored down to Banning Park in LA in search of another cluster of oddball sightings. We quickly connected with this smart Yellow-bellied Sapsucker.

Shortly after, Marcel spotted our main target bird here, a Thick-billed Kingbird. The bird vanished, and I spotted a kingbird perched further down on the same wire, but the bill seemed too small for Thick-billed. In a classic case of the '2 bird theory' actually being true, this second bird turned into a Cassin's Kingbird, and was later seen chasing (and being chased by) the Thick-billed! I had only seen Thick-billed Kingbird once prior to this, and this bird gave fantastic views as it perched...

preened....

... and stretched.

Just look at the bill on this thing!

Many Monarch butterflies were around (perhaps they winter here?), including this confiding individual.

Our next stop was Waller Park in Santa Maria, in search of an elusive Wood Thrush (and true to form, it did elude us). Our compensation was great looks at a female Varied Thrush...

... and several foraging Western Gray Squirrels (much more approachable here than around Davis).

The neighbouring duck pond held a lost Ross's Goose and Aleutian Goose.

This young Black-crowned Night-Heron wasn't shy either.

Big Sur and a loooong pelagic

Friday was a public holiday here in the US, so Marcel and I spent the whole day doing a leisurely drive from Davis to Santa Barbara in readiness for tomorrow's pelagic. Our first stop was in the Carmel Highlands, in search of a cluster of rarities which had been frequenting someone's bird feeders. In spite of 2 hours' waiting, we didn't manage to connect with any of these birds! Fortunately, we got to enjoy a few of the coastal birds which don't regularly make it into the Central Valley, namely Pygmy Nuthatch...

... and Chestnut-backed Chickadee.

In contrast to my last visit, visibility along Big Sur was crystal clear, affording spectacular views along the coast.

We stopped off in San Simeon to see the first returning Elephant Seals.

There wasn't much activity, and the alpha male spent much of his time lying around.

These young males, perhaps last year's pups, were indulging in some play-fighting.

Next morning we got up at the ungodly hour of 4am to make the 5am departure of the Condor Express, a fast, swanky boat complete with breakfast, lunch and dinner menu as well as a bar! Needless to say I traded in my manky home-made sandwiches for a delicious turkey burger....

Around about 10am we came across a pocket of bird activity. Having already missed Least Storm-Petrel and Short-tailed Shearwater by being in the wrong place at the wrong time, I was delighted to connect, finally, with Leach's Storm-Petrel as a lifer (one of the more embarrassing gaps on my British list). Not long after 3 Xantus' Murrelets streamed past, with gleaming white underwings contrasting with their jet black backs. But best of all, my attention was drawn to a bird displaying a Buller's Shearwater-like upperwing pattern. This bird was small, however, the flight action not quite right for a shearwater, and there was a black bar along the leading edge of its white underwings - a COOK'S PETREL! Unfortunately, the bird was headed away from the boat, and those taking shelter from the choppy conditions in the cabin did not get to see it.

From thereafter the birding became very dull. There were rarely more than one or two birds on show at any time, and despite motoring south for several hours to an upwelling zone, we did not connect with any new species. The increasing swell and spray took their toll - my regular trousers got soaked through my waterproof trousers, and remained wet for the rest of the journey, while poor Marcel not only got seasick but fried his camera when seawater got in a gap between the lens and the camera body! Fortunately, the birders on board provided good company, and a chicken and steak dinner washed down with a glass of white wine helped lift the spirits! We finally got back into port at 9:30pm, spending a total of 16.5 hours at sea. Finding new birds in the western US is definitely getting harder!

Florida Days 4 and 5 - Cape Canaveral to Miami

Today we visited Canaveral National Seashore, which offers a good view of the Kennedy Space Center.

Birding here produced more of the standard Florida waterbirds, plus offshore Northern Gannets, a Pileated Woodpecker on a palm tree and the first Blue-winged Teal of the winter. We were skunked again by Manatees at a watchpoint, but bizarrely, watched this female Surf Scoter swim up the mangrove-lined channel.

A visit to the northern spit of the seashore revealed no sign of the Cape May Warblers or Painted Buntings reported two days ago, but did produced some attractive butterflies: a Zebra Heliconian...

... and a Long-tailed Skipper.

The rest of the day comprised the long drive back to Miami, with another abortive stop for Purple Gallinule (Wilma had closed off the park) and a fruitless search for Smooth-billed Ani at Fort Myers International Airport.

I had a couple of hours to spare in my last morning in Miami, so I headed out to the Miami Springs neighbourhood in search of 'exo-ticks'. The hurricane damage to this area was pretty startling!

During my wanderings I came across many noisy Monk Parakeets...

... two Spot-breasted Orioles (much bigger than I expected)...

... and some untickable Mitred Parakeets.

The big surprise of the morning was the number of 'real' birds seen. Blue-gray Gnatcatchers and Palm Warblers dripped from the trees, while other migrants included Baltimore Oriole, Yellow-bellied Sapsucker and Yellow-throated, Black-and-White, and Black-throated Blue Warblers.

While waiting for my taxi back to the hotel, I sat in a tiny park in front of the Miami Springs Public Library. At first sight the park was deserted (save for a pair of feral Muscovy Ducks), but some idle pishing produced a Gray Catbird, Yellow-bellied Sapsucker, American Redstart, Ovenbird, and a flash of neon red which turned out to be my life Painted Bunting! This bird was a gorgeous male, and a wonderful way to end my time in the state.

I'll have to get back to Florida one day to 'clean up' - but I won't visit in hurricane season again!

Florida Day 3 - Placid Lakes to Cocoa

This morning we had planned to walk the scrub trail at the Archbold Research Station in search of the Florida Scrub-Jay, only to find that last night's downpour had made the path impassable! Fortunately, a kind researcher told us that Scrub-Jays could easily be seen in nearby Placid Lakes, and sure enough, we had excellent views of this charismatic endemic.

The road to Archbold had a flooded field which held many waterbirds - the blobs in the background behind this Wood Stork are actually Mottled Ducks.

Next stop was the Venus Flatwoods in an attempt for Red-cockaded Woodpecker, which was foiled since the reserve is now off-limits to birders. As some consolation, we did see our only Eastern Bluebirds and Eastern Phoebe of the trip, as well as these Sandhill Cranes.

Driving east towards Okeechobee yielded a few Crested Caracaras and an alarming number of roadkill Alligators. Lake Okeechobee itself held a nice flock of Black Skimmers.

I had no idea how thin their bills were when viewed from the front!

Higher than normal water levels thwarted my attempt at Purple Gallinule, but we did see an abundance of Fish Crows, Forster's Tern and Boat-tailed Grackles.

We finally hit the coast in the late afternoon, at Fort Pierce Inlet State Park. Numerous Ospreys, Common Ground-Doves and a mixed flock of terns were the birding highlights - three tern species are (just about) visible in this picture.

As we were about to leave, Andrew spotted this Gopher Tortoise feeding at the roadside - an unexpected addition to my Florida list!

A visit to nearby Jack Island seemed to be good only for mosquitoes, until pishing revealed my first US Prairie Warbler. We ended the day at Sebastian Inlet State Recreation area, where the cove offered astounding views of Wood Stork...

... Reddish Egret...

... and another perfect sunset.

Florida Day 2 - Ding Darling to Corkscrew Swamp

Our first stop of the day was the J. N. 'Ding' Darling NWR for wonderful views of many waterbirds. Many of the species were too close to digiscope, and had to be digibinned! I got pleasing shots of a Roseate Spoonbill,

a fishing Little Blue Heron,

Yellow-crowned Night Heron,

White Ibis

and Osprey.

We also had an encounter with a fearsome-looking American Crocodile - I originally misidentified this as an Alligator, but the
attenuated nose, light coloration and prominent teeth on the lower jaw give reveal its true identity. Apparently this 11-foot monster is frequently seen at this spot on the tour loop.

This site held many shorebirds (as did nearby Bunche Beach), and on the drive off of the island I encountered a young Scissor-tailed Flycatcher - only my second ever.

A brief stop at Manatee Park produced no Manatees, but a Soldier Butterfly and this Red-bellied Woodpecker.

Corkscrew Swamp was our next destination, in the hope of finally catching up with Barred Owl. Alas, a warden informed us that Wilma had blown over their favourite roost tree, and the owls had not been seen since! As some consolation, the warbler/gnatcatcher flock included a stunning male Black-throated Blue Warbler, plus Pine and Black-and-White Warblers. One species we were lucky with was Limpkin - we saw 3 birds, all of which seemed to like walking along the handrail of the boardwalk! It was extremely gratifying to get such great views of a life bird...

... though they were almost too obliging to digibin!

Shortly after this, the heavens opened, making any more birding nigh-on impossible. In a brief reprieve, we had good views of a Pileated Woodpecker (but my scope was now to fogged up for photography), and this tiny Tree Frog.

After more heavy rain we abandoned any hope of reaching the east coast, and instead spent the night just north of Lake Placid.

Florida Day 1 - Miami to Fort Myers

Well, this was certainly a trip to remember! Birding Florida in the aftermath of Hurricane Wilma was tricky, to say the least, and to make matters worse, young upstart Daryl Coldren gripped me off big-time by finding a Sharp-tailed Sandpiper in the Yolo Wildlife Area, the first county record in a decade and a much-wanted US bird for me! Nonetheless, we saw some excellent birds and wildlife during a 4.5 day whistle-stop tour of the state.

An early morning seawatch from Miami Beach produced many Laughing Gulls and Royal Terns, as well as my first US Sandwich Tern. A stiff wind and overcast skies made this feel more like Bognor than Baywatch!

The rest of the day was supposed to be dedicated to birding the Everglades, so we were pretty horrified to discover that Wilma had shut the entire national park! We decided to drive the Tamiami Trail (the northern boundary of the park). Here I had my first lifer of the trip - a smart Snail Kite.

I would have waited around to appreciate it more, if the police hadn't pulled up and told us to move on! Big Cypress National Preserve was also closed by Wilma, though we were able to pull up in the parking lot and watch the roadside ditch. Here we came face to face - literally - with the first of many American Alligators.

We had our first up-close encounters with many of the characteristic waterbirds (including Anhinga and Tricolored Heron), while interesting passerines included Indigo Bunting, Carolina Wren, Palm and Yellow-throated Warblers and Ovenbird.

Collier-Seminole State Park was open, but practically birdless save for a flock of Black Vultures scrapping over a garbage can. Not exactly the prettiest of birds...

The Briggs Nature Centre had apparently closed years ago (one of the perils of using an out-of-date site guide), but driving in yielded nice looks at a Red-shouldered Hawk.

At Fort Myers Beach I saw my first US Reddish Egret...

... and a good selection of shorebirds including Ruddy Turnstone and these (not very) Red Knots.

We stayed overnight at Fort Myers beach, and enjoyed freshly-caught fish, Key Lime Pie, and a spectacular sunset over the Gulf of Mexico.

The Big End

For my last day in the Central Valley before the end of the Central Valley Big Year, Chris, Daryl and I headed south in search of a few more birds. We started at dawn in the picturesque Knight's Ferry, where we soon heard a singing Canyon Wren (my 242nd and last new species for the Big Year).

The middle part of the day was somewhat less interesting, save for an enjoyable 20 minutes spent watching a Peregrine harrassing a Black-necked Stilt flock. After unsuccessfully sifting through thousands of Coot at the O'Neill Forebay, we decided to see out the Big Year with one of the more charismatic spectacles of the Valley - hundreds of Sandhill Cranes coming in to roost at sunset along Woodbridge Road.