January 25th Outing

    This morning I biked a usual path for a quick birding trip. I first went to the Palo Alto Baylands. As time was of the essence, I did not stop as often as I would normally. The first bird of interest I saw was a Clark's grebe in the San Francisquito Creek, a first for this year.

A not-blurry-at-all picture of this lovely bird

A somewhat less blurry picture of the Clark's grebe's very close relative, the Western grebe which I saw later. These birds can be distinguished primarily by the Clark's lack of black in front of the eyes. Additionally, the Clark's grebe possesses a brighter orange beak that is also slightly more upturned (hard to tell with my blurry picture but fairly evident in the real birds). Of course, sometimes they hybridize, making the process even more fun.

Next to the creek was this beautiful mystery tree. It was covered in these tiny yellow flowers. Judging by the leaves, I believe that it is a legume but further than that, I have no idea.

Sunrise over the airstrip

    

    Next, I stopped by Duck Pond to try and identify gulls. I expected the huge flock that I saw last week in the afternoon but it seems like most gulls are late risers and do not go to the pond until some time after 8. Nevertheless, there were still a few gulls of 5 species: California, ring-billed, Western, glaucous-winged, and mew. All are fairly common to the area but the mew gull was a new bird for my county life list. 

First cycle Western gull

Adult Ring-billed Gull

Mew Gull (second cycle?)

Golden-crowned Sparrow rooting through the mulch

    Following the gulls, I biked towards Shoreline Park through Byxbee Park. Around the entrance of the park, a merlin and red-tailed hawk sat on their high perches. As I neared the field of wooden poles, I took pictures of lumps.

Thanks for looking the other direction

The merlin is such a cute, little falcon (if you're not a small shorebird)

Backlit red-tailed hawk who doesn't care about the high voltage

What an interesting bunch of lumps on the ground

This trailside rock was calmly sitting there, allowing easy approach and photographing

This lump looks surprisingly avian. It was also moving.

Everybody look to your left.

Everybody look to your right.

Can you feel that... oh wait it's a burrowing owl. First owl of the year!

Why did the meadowlark cross the trail?

Gazing over Mayfield Slough

    Biking through the rest of Byxbee Park, I added my first dunlins to my year list. Nothing else was of much interest except for a lovely pale Northern harrier male flying right in front of me. Random picture time!

Long-billed Curlew

    

Morning shorebirds

First time that I've seen a Turkey Vulture perched on fence

Savannah Sparrow

Preening Great Blue Heron

    As I approached Charleston Slough, I scanned the area for any black skimmers. Of course they were not present. I then went to Adobe Creek to attempt finding the recently reported Eurasian wigeon to no avail. I did get a consolation prize-ish in the form of my first of year green heron and both the hooded merganser and bittern being out in the Terminal Road Creek. Unfortunately, the latter two birds, like last time, were too obscured to photograph well (of course).

American bittern blending in / blurred out by poor photography

White-tailed Kite by exit of park

As I exited Shoreline, I saw this hunting cat. I've seen it several times before in the same area so I assume that it's feral and well established.  

Although I think that this cat is beautiful, it is certainly a shame that a domesticated animal is living in an area set aside for wildlife.

Another Morning at Shoreline

    This morning (1/18/14) I birded in Shoreline Park, going from Charleston Slough to the kite-flying area, then back. I arrived around 7:50 am at the Slough. With the low tide, hundreds of birds were out but conveniently enough, the black skimmer that I had seeked for the past few weeks just happened to not be present on the mudflats or the island.

A female Northern harrier surveys her surroundings by Salt Pond A1

     I then went to Shoreline Lake to find my main bird of interest for the day: the BARROW'S GOLDENEYE. The lovely pair by the lake's northern shore was nice enough to separate themselves from the many common goldeneyes around and be close enough to photograph.

    Males of this species have a crescent-shaped patch in front of their (golden) eyes as opposed to the circular patches in common goldeneyes. Additionally, Barrow's males have mostly black scapulars with white spots as well as a short bar extended partially down the side of the breast. Female Barrow's have steeper foreheads compared with the rounded heads of the commons and often have fully orange beaks (really hard to see in this backlit picture).

Common goldeneye male

Note the greenish sheen on their heads. Male Barrow's tend to have a more purplish sheen when seen in the light.

This is the kingfisher's boat now

Male surf scoter in full breeding plumage. These ducks are sometimes known as "skunk-headed coots", for their comical coloration

Glaucous-winged gull

    As I left the Lake, I saw a small, white bird flying on the other side. It flew in a "graceful" manner and I assumed Bonaparte's gull. Upon looking with binoculars however, I found out that it was a Forster's tern! Although these birds are exceedingly common in the area during summer, this was my first tern seen at Shoreline for the winter, so that was exciting. I then headed for the small creek by Terminal Avenue flowing into the Coast Casey Forebay. 

    For the past few days, a female hooded merganser was reported in the area. The bird was very cooperative and was actively swimming right as I arrived. Unfortunately, the diving duck was too far away and obscured by cattails to get a good picture. My next order of business was attempting to find the resident American bittern. I had seen this secretive bird in the same place last October but not yet for this year. Thankfully, a group of birders with scopes arrived as soon as I was about to give up and they found the bird sleeping behind some reeds. As with the merganser, the bittern was too far away and obscured to get a picture. 

Believe it or not, this is the hooded merganser (her head is tucked in)

    I then biked to the kite-flying area in attempt to get the juvenile greater white-fronted goose and cackling geese. As my luck would have expected, all I got was a large flock of Canada geese. However, there was an interesting goose growing white feathers out of the black portion of its neck.

I still would have preferred either cackling or greater white-fronted geese...

Lesser goldfinches on fennel

    When I biked back to the Slough area, the skimmer was still not there. I decided to visit the marsh next to Terminal Avenue and heard a sora (it is the "sora spot"). Then, a colorful male common pheasant suddenly flew out of the cattails, moving surprisingly quickly for a mostly ground-dwelling bird. The spectacle was stunning, but I did not get a chance to take out my camera. 

    I headed back home at 10 am with 66 bird species on my day list, 5 of them being new for the year and 13 of them being ducks (blue-winged teal, green-winged teal, mallard, gadwall, surf scoter, canvasback, common goldeneye, Barrow's goldeneye, hooded merganser, lesser scaup, greater scaup, ruddy duck, and Northern shoveler). Hopefully, I'll get that skimmer soon.

End of Winter Break

    On January 4th, I birded in some coastal areas of Half Moon Bay. It was a beautiful day with balmy temperatures, clear sky, and ocean breezes. Unfortunately, good weather often leads to large amounts of people wanting to get out which could mean bad birding but I crossed my fingers and hoped for the best. My first stop was at the Pilarcitos Creek Mouth.

    For the past month or so, there were several birds of note for the area reported here, including a blue morph snow goose, Ross's goose, glaucous gull, and cackling goose. Unfortunately by the time I went, only the cackling goose remained according to reports. The bird stood out in a small flock of Canada geese, being much smaller than the others, having a proportionally shorter neck, and having a more stout beak. Although it wasn't a lifer, it was a good addition to my year list and a fairly unusual bird for the area.

Additionally in the flock was a very pale Canada goose

    After observing the goose flock, I walked back along an area of beach and saw a pleasant surprise, 22 snowy plovers, the most I've ever seen in one place! The adorable birds were quite fittingly hanging out in a fenced off dune labeled "snowy plover nesting area", enjoying their governmental protection from extinction. 

Posin' for the camera

    While walking back to the car following the snowy plovers, I saw another pleasant surprise: two beautiful flowerheads of the yellow sand verbena, blooming several months out of season. 

The rest of the plant

Erysimum sp. - some sort of wallflower

 A very fuzzy Artemisia sp.

The bridge over the creek was bordered by this lovely Cape ivy growing on willows. Although the plant is quite attractive and smells pleasant (hence the scientific name Delairea odorata), it is extremely invasive in this area, choking out native vegetation

Closer pic of the vine

    My parents then drove me to Pillar Point Harbor, where I got my first life bird for the day: a diving COMMON LOON. Bird activity was high, always a fun thing to watch.

Common loon - this state bird of Minnesota mainly breeds in Northern freshwater and migrates to both coastlines of the US during the winter

I did not expect to see snowy egrets in the wave-pounded rocks so close to the ocean. My other lifer of the day, the BRANDT'S CORMORANT was also present on these rocks.

Half-eaten kelp crab

Sanderling with a fresh catch of a worm being chased by another

Flying off with his prize

Dainty little mew gull

Western gull trying to eat a kelp crab in peace

Landing somewhere else

Victory at last?

Several minutes later, I saw this juvenile Western gull holding a kelp crab...with another gull in pursuit. The cycle goes on.

At the end of the rock jetty, I got this shot of a distant flying loon. Not sure of the species though.

Several harbor seals seemed to be relaxing, floating in this position

Sunset and gull flock

    As the fourth day of the year ends, my year list closes at 102 species (It somehow took me from July 14th to September 2nd of 2013 to get my first 100 species...), a fairly decent start. Now, however, I must part with my lovely two week winter break and will not be able to get out as much.