Spotted Sandpiper

I co-led a trip to the Davis Wetlands this morning, where we were lucky enough to see two stilt sandpipers. I did sketch them a bit but had better luck with this spotted sandpiper. I’m hoping to go back to this spot tomorrow morning and do some more sketching. There are possibly nine new birds we could get on our Bigby list, and they are NOT going to hang around…

Bank Swallow

One of the most exciting things about doing this Bigby is that birds I’ve seen before but usually briefly and on the way to somewhere else have become a focal point. This is certainly the case with bank swallows, which I’ve seen here and there but never spent much time on.

This is a small, dainty swallow with a brown back and head and a dark brown band across the chest. It’s easy to confuse it with a juvenile tree swallow, especially in flight. But today we had them sitting side-by-side for luxurious oodles of time at the Yolo Bypass. Birds would take off and return, the bank swallows showing off their two-toned underwings and delicate jizz compared to the more robust and more powerful tree swallows.

We now know the call of the cliff swallow well, having had two pairs build nests in our car port (I think they were all seen off by house sparrows); so when a bird called high overhead we confidently said “cliff.”

Swallow school: long overdue, well worth the effort.

Turkeys Under the Walnut Tree

Apologies for the dearth of posts. Much going on. But I couldn’t resist these guys outside the kitchen window…

Long-billed Curlew

We biked out to the Davis Wetlands this morning. It was pretty quiet — very dry — but I had a great time with the curlews that were on the levee between two oxidation ponds…

Black-headed Grosbeak

We were sitting reading when we head a lot of screeching outside followed by a dull thud. I got up to look but saw nothing; Numenius found this grosbeak later. We think a hawk may have been going after it given the commotion and the fact that these birds don’t usually fly into windows…

Turkey Vulture With Ground Squirrel

We don’t see so many turkey vultures in summer (unlike turkeys, which seem to be all over the place). The crows went after this one with gusto, but it held its ground…

Turkey Hen With Chicks

This morning the hen turkey brought her chicks around under the walnut. It’s a sweep I think they make at least once daily… I tried sketching quickly. There seem to be six chicks left…

Tree Swallow

OK, there’s also a cliff swallow in there. Trying a new ink, an india ink without shellac suitable for fountain pens, it doesn’t run with watercolor. I’m liking it so far… It’s called “Pen & Ink Sketch” by makers of a Moleskine lookalike sketching journal I’m finding I prefer to the Moleskine.

White-headed Woodpecker

A quick glimpse of this male, only, up at Yuba Pass on Saturday. But a lovely glimpse it was…

Red-shouldered Hawk with Ground Squirrel

It has been so windy here that finding birds that do more than blast by has been a challenge. (The wind is supposed to die down tonight, bringing us 100° temperatures for the next few days.)

A lot of crow squawking in the tree alerted me to this red-shouldered hawk, disappearing into the canopy with a ground squirrel. I was just able to see it through the the branches.