November 23rd 2013

Hello,
    Yesterday was a fairly good day for birding as I biked the Bay Trail from the Palo Alto Baylands through Charleston Slough and Mountain View Shoreline Park Area to Sunnyvale WPCP. The main goal of the trip was to see the recently reported 5 swans in Pond A3W. They were very far out on the water but seemed to be MUTE SWAN (reported earlier in the summer, but probably escapees of waterfowl collectors), with curved necks and orange beaks, quite unfortunate as tundra swans would be a great addition to my county list. I still did not get the lesser flamingo which has supposedly been in the area since summer, which, like the mute swans, was also most likely an escapee. From Pond A3W, I biked towards Sunnyvale WPCP but didn't see anything too interesting. The marsh near the Lockheed buildings has been dredged and there were fewer birds there than usual. I only saw 1 WILSON'S SNIPE, as opposed to much higher numbers ranging into the 10s reported by others prior to the marsh's destruction. Supposedly this area is being cleared out because of mosquito control but shouldn't that be done when the weather warms up?

Resting Wilson's snipe

  Anyhow, as I headed back from A3W towards A2E, I noticed an interesting thing. On my left, a small breeze was blowing and I saw a snake-like object on barbed wire that was moving with the wind. Upon closer inspection, I realized that it was a snake! Probably a garter but it was already dried and almost mummified, with no color so I could not tell.

   On closer examination, I saw tear marks in the snake and I knew who's work this was: the loggerhead shrike! The loggerhead shrike is one of my favorite birds, with its striking black and white plumage and facial markings. Additionally, although it looks almost like an innocent mockingbird, one look at its hooked beak and you will know what it feeds on. This bird is known for using barbed wire or twigs to impale prey items, ranging from large insects to rats to snakes, storing them for later eating. Unfortunately, I did not find the shrike but here is a picture from the wonderful internet (taken from http://kaweahoaks.com/html/shrike1.htm):

 Beautiful, isn't it?

    After seeing this interesting but slightly ominous exhibition, I continued on back home and didn't see anything too unusual. A few of the more notable specimens were a MERLIN at Shoreline Lake and a PEREGRINE FALCON at the Palo Alto Baylands. 

 Merlin (Taiga form)

    The strangest thing for this day was that I did not see a single Northern pintail, as opposed to the previous week, when I saw hundreds at many locations. Perhaps the rains that occurred a few days ago had made them leave the area but I'm not sure. 

    At the end of the day, I had 91 bird species (not including mute swan), a record for me :)

On a completely unrelated topic, I was greeted this morning by a huge spider in my hallway. I believe that it is a wolf spider of some sort.