Red-tailed Hawk on Post

The Wind

It got very windy overnight and hasn’t really abated yet. There have been few birds flying about but there was a little flurry of yellowrumps this morning. Safer to get a good perch and hang on…

Scrub-jay in the Corn Pile

Bluebirds in Profusion

Bluebirds seem to have cycles, and perhaps we’re entering a new one. They investigated this very box for weeks earlier this year, only to opt for something different, from which the pair fledged at least two but probably more young. I sketched this bird this morning in good light and added color later. It was a bit strong, the color, but it was definitely this type of effect.

I sketched this other bird later in the day when the colors were more washed out and the bird itself, a juvenile, was in any case more muted.

Who knows whether they’ll continue to do this for the next few weeks or will range widely for food (lots is available now, and the rain has perked the place up a lot).

Three White-Tailed Kites

They nested here this year but I haven’t seen or heard them for weeks until today, all balancing precariously on the pine trees out back, all of them tail-bobbing…

Belted Kingfisher

A rattle, a flashing:
the kingfisher sees my puddle
and thinks it’s a lake

Stormbirds

The remnants of a typhoon have been clobbering us with wind and rain. No birds at all yesterday morning, but then in the afternoon there was a lull, and they came out in numbers. Yellowrumps bathing in the small lake that had collected outside my window, robins, phoebes, and the season’s first junco for me.

Apparently when yellowrumps get wet they show their yellow crown, because they all had one…

California Condor

A trip with the Ventana Wildlife Society to see the condors along the Big Sur coast. We saw several in the air and this perched juvenile, hatched in the wild.

Condors take a long time to reach sexual maturity and this youngster, hatched in 2007, has recently been pushed away from its parent’s home range as they attempt to nest again. It will be a few years before it’s ready to fine a mate of its own.

A Trip to Monterey

My friend Linda was visiting from Massachusetts this weekend and we went to Monterey to get out on one of the deep-water pelagic trips, the best chance to see murrelets. The trip was spectacular — over 20 Xantus’ murrelets, plus numerous shearwaters of 5 species, 20 black-footed albatross, many marine mammals including fin and Baird’s beaked whales.

We also saw several passerines far out from shore. This yellow-rumped warbler landed on the boat, exhausted.

Female Nuttall's Woodpecker

Chilly at nights now. Woodpeckers go to bed early; they spend a lot of energy excavating holes and want to be sure they aren’t evicted by squatters. This female has been hanging out in the nest box, peeking out at around 8:30 in the morning, deciding it still wasn’t quite warm enough to get up…