Hermit Thrush

This hermit thrush was perched in a cold wind at lunchtime on the jug outside, fluffed up to try to keep warm…

Rhinoceros Auklet

A quick chance at lunch today to see and sketch this marbled murrelet. rhinoceros auklet. It had more dark under the belly than is shown here and I knew I’d come back and add some in later when I added water to my ink sketch (right).

Marbled murrelet is an endangered species. One was brought in dead the other day. It’s great to see one alive and swimming… The second bird was brought in dead too. The bird I drew is, in fact, a rhinoceros auklet, faking me out with its unremarkable winter plumage… and the fact I was seeing it so close up.

A Trip to Stockton

We went to the Central Valley Birding Symposium today in order to attend Keith Hansen’s sketching workshop (oh, and buy me a telescope from Out of this World, which Numenius says he’ll blog about this evening).

Keith had us practice placing circles in relation to each other — head, heaviest part of body — and then gave detailed instructions on wing anatomy, foot anatomy, and how to render wing bars.

We stopped by Woodbridge Road on the way home to see the sandhill cranes. I’m going to take a while to get used to using the scope and this tripod to sketch with. But so far it seems very promising… and it’s way cute.

Back in the Thick of It

I went back down to Cordelia today, ostensibly to help out with media work. This didn’t materialize, and I ended up learning a) how to read Packed Cell Volume and plasma and serum counts (from someone who used to faint at the sight of blood, I consider this a major achievement); b) the best way to hold a common murre (and a surf scoter and a western grebe and a ruddy duck) in order for it to be tube fed electrolytes and fluids. (Like a rugby ball is the answer.)

At the end of the afternoon, though, I got a chance to sketch these mixed ruddy ducks and greater scaup. I don’t know when the next bird release will be, but they’re moving them through — and fewer birds are arriving alive…

Snowy Egret

Here’s the Cordelia resident snowy egret, which perches on pens and pools and knows how to get free food…

Sketched earlier in the week.

Surf Scoter and Eared Grebe

I saw birds swimming yesterday, birds that had been heavily oiled and were now clean and waterproof and swimming in pens.

I drew this surf scoter and eared grebe quickly, trying to stress the birds out as little as possible.

Then I cried.

Surf Scoter

This is what a surf scoter looks like, oiled. It doesn’t smell good either. This female is waiting in a warm pen till she’s stable enough to wash, probably tomorrow. There were dozens of pet carriers of birds in line to be taken in, weighed, assigned to a warm pen.

These others are in recovery and they’re able to swim, which is what they’re doing. And a red-throated loon. I don’t know how many of these birds will be this lucky.

There are thousands of affected birds, we’re getting reports. I need to go home now. I’ve been at it since 6:00 this morning. It’s going to be a very long weekend for a lot of people…

Oil Spill in SF Bay

Dear Birders,

You’ve no doubt seen and heard about the impact the SF Bay Oil Spill is having on birds and marine mammals. Members of the public have been generously calling in birds and asking how to volunteer.

I’d like to issue a special plea for birders please to try and get to “places less travelled” in the Bay Area where you know there to be birds. We got over 40 calls yesterday reporting one oiled surf scoter at Crissy Fields; one call reporting 40 oiled clapper rails in Anderson Marsh would really help sort out rescue triage.

The sooner, the better. The faster we can get these birds stabilized and washed, the higher their chances of recovery and survival.

Calls from the general public wanting to volunteer outnumbered bird reports yesterday by about 5-1. Volunteer opportunities for untrained members of the public are going to be very limited over the next few days but here’s a critical one: please make a special effort to look for oiled birds in places where the general public doesn’t go. Don’t approach or touch the birds but call (415) 701-2311 and provide the location (be very specific, GPS coordinates are great), the species, number of birds seen, whether dead or alive, and percentage of oiling. Please leave your name and a contact phone number. We are inundated and most of my veterinary and administrative coworkers have left Davis; of the ones of us still here who are answering this number, I’m the only one who’s likely to know what a clapper rail is, so please be patient if you get through to a live person.

Under no circumstances should people touch or approach an oiled animal unless they have HAZWPR training and are properly equipped. If you see someone doing this, please remind them that this is toxic material.

To Report an Oiled Bird: (415) 701-2311
http://www.owcn.org/

Western Bluebird

My new Komtrak sketchbooks arrived today, just in time for me to start sketching in colored pencil. Nothing like a bluebird to smash through the intimidating glare of a virgin page…

A Couple More Zoo Drawings

A couple more drawings from Sunday’s sketchcrawl—I did try to track down the wood duck at the pond, there, but it knew I was after it and it swam the other way.

It was a good opportunity, again, to study birds hard; interesting to see new things about both these species which I drew back in September.

Finally, here’s a female Nuttall’s woodpecker I drew outside my window yesterday. Nine in the morning seems to be maximum activity time around here…