18 December 06
On Not Getting Soaked
Our Bird Count yesterday was cold, but sunny sunny sunny, and we were able to bike the ridge. It felt good to move, felt good to climb the few hills along the ridgeline, to be startled by the purple finch’s raspberry hue.
One of our area 8 crew got bitten by a gopher snake, however. She was trying to usher it off the road. (It was her second attempt: the snake just resumed its suicidal position.)
I’ll post a photo of said snake tomorrow, but Ron’s doing fine, I’m sure you’ll all be glad to hear.
Next year: shall we cycle up Mix? That’s a steep gradient and goes on for almost five miles. I’m not in any shape to do it any time soon, but would like to get that way…
List of Birds Seen in Area 8:
Great Egret 1
Canada Goose 8
Turkey Vulture 38
White-tailed Kite 1
Golden Eagle 3
Sharp-shinned Hawk 3
Red-shouldered Hawk 6
Red-tailed Hawk 18
American Kestrel 7
Prairie Falcon 1 (Count Week)
Wild Turkey 13
California Quail 47
Mountain Quail 1
Killdeer 21
Rock Pigeon 15
Mourning Dove 18
Great Horned Owl 9
Western Screech-owl 1
Northern Pygmy-owl 1 (Count Week)
Anna’s Hummingbird 7
Belted Kingfisher 1
Acorn Woodpecker 32
Northern Flicker 33
Red-breasted Sapsucker 2
Nuttall’s Woodpecker 14
Pileated Woodpecker 1
Black Phoebe 10
Say’s Phoebe 3
Loggerhead Shrike 1
Hutton’s Vireo 3
Steller’s Jay 17
Western Scrub-jay 48
Yellow-billed Magpie 22
American Crow 3
Common Raven 14
Wrentit 31
Oak Titmouse 25
Bushtit 59
Brown Creeper 2
White-breasted Nuthatch 8
Bewick’s Wren 6
Golden-crowned Kinglet 3
Ruby-crowned Kinglet 54
Western Bluebird 11
Hermit Thrush 14
Varied Thrush 21
American Robin 377
Northern Mockingbird 9
European Starling 24
Cedar Waxwing 30
Phainopepla 6
Yellow-rumped Warbler (Audubon’s) 17
Yellow-rumped Warbler (Myrtle) 1
Warbler species 1
California Towhee 9
Spotted Towhee 9
Lark Sparrow 4
Fox Sparrow 10
Savannah Sparrow 3
Lincoln’s Sparrow 3
Song Sparrow 1
White-throated Sparrow 1
White-crowned Sparrow 33
Golden-crowned Sparrow 75
Sparrow species 3
Dark-eyed Junco (Oregon) 121
Western Meadowlark 13
Red-winged Blackbird 215
Brewer’s Blackbird 8
Purple Finch 10
House Finch 63
American Goldfinch 7
Lesser Goldfinch 8
Goldfinch species 2
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Let me be a character witness for the snake, furthermore. I knew it would bite me and decided to persist anyway, because I also knew the bite would be trivial. The plants in my garden are much less kind to me. In fact, the snake displayed great patience and gave me clear warnings — it’s amazing how fearsome a hiss can issue from that dainty head.
As you’ll be able to see from the photo, it was a very unusual-looking snake, and I make the ID as a gopher snake as much on the basis of its patience as anything else. I confess I still wish I’d kidnapped the lovely critter.
Putah Creek has a great count. We had a ball!
Wow. That snake is beautiful. I had an encounter with a snake over Thanksgiving week. On a walk in Bear Valley, I spotted a garter snake in the grass. Ben started trailing it, then swooped down and lifted it up. The snake wound around his wrist and kept watch. I was entranced. No one had ever caught a snake for me before. Not knowing much about snakes, I’d acquired some idea that garter snakes were pretty mundane. Not so. It was beautiful. I suppose now I can say that there is no such thing as a mundane snake. This gopher snake is more proof of that. I looked at the garter snake up very close, but was reluctant to hold it. Ben had told me that garter snakes poop on you when they’re scared. I wasn’t in the mood to test this. This one didn’t poop on Ben, but it did release a foul odor nonetheless that remained on Ben’s skin until we soaked later in Wilbur’s sulfery water. And then he let it go. It was wild, hyper-alert, nothing like the domesticated snakes I’ve held in the past, and it darted back into the grass with such speed. I would have liked to have seen your gopher snake and all those birds. What a gorgeous day.