Posted October 6 2019 from Seattle, WA I never thought much about the name Kinglet until I started seeing Kinglets take a bath in our recirculating creek. When you see these birds foraging in the woods, they look like little gray birds, but when they...
Posted from Seattle, WA on September 14, 2019 Anyone caught speeding is subject to having their cap snatched. This Barred Owl was on a Speed Limit sign near Hansville, WA in September. Barred Owls have been involved in many incidents of cap-stealing but I'm not...
Posted from Seattle, WA on July 11, 2019 I moved to Seattle in 1976, and I didn't come because I heard it was smokey in the summer. I am delighted that we've had normal or even above-normal rains so far in July, and I...
Posted May 2, 2019 from Seattle, WA Birds love to bathe and no longer have much opportunity in urban areas where all the runoff and most of the creeks are sent immediately down manholes and shipped to West Point, i.e., Seattle. So we provide the birds with...
Posted on April 13, 2019 from Seattle WA. We just got back yesterday from New Mexico. One good thing that happened down there is I finally got a shot of a Lucifer Hummingbird that I actually like and that does this handsome little hummer justice. The first shot...
Posted February 8, 2019 from Seattle, WA Butyl Creek has been a busy place in the last few weeks, what with the Great Miserable 2019 Beacon Hill Tennessee Warbler Stakeout and various snowstorms. Photo by Ollie Oliver The stakeout brought at least 40 or 50 people to the...
Posted from Seattle, WA Feb. 2 2019 A little bird that breeds way North of here and normally winters way South of here is visiting the backyard, but those visits have at times been painfully and excruciatingly sparse and while many birders have seen the bird,...
Posted from the central Peloncillo Mountains, New Mexico, Jan 2, 2019 The shot above shows Coatis frolicking in the snow across from the house here in the Peloncillo Mountains of New Mexico, which are located in the extreme SW "bootheel" of New Mexico. Coatis are related...
Posted from Seattle, November 17, 2018, (updated periodically In a moment of bravado I paraphrased a song and wrote, "The Creek goes on forever and the party never ends." Butyl Creek that is, the recirculating creek in our backyard. Well, the party is still on for...
Posted from Seattle November 7, 2018 Delia and I have become huge fans of Rainforest Trust, a 30-year old organization that has safeguarded 18 million acres of rainforest all over the world. We like to give to Rainforest Trust right up to the point of financial...
Posted from Seattle September 2, 2018 We have a recirculating creek in our backyard that Delia long ago named Butyl Creek. After a dry spring and a dry summer, it may hold even more attraction for the birds heading south through Seattle than usual. At the...
posted from Seattle on August 3, 2018 We were down at the ranch on July 12-20 to visit CD Littlefield and check on things. The Hooded Oriole pair was evident every day and the male posed on a Yucca, above, as if to emphasize just how...
Posted from Seattle, WA May 3, 2018 We had blowing dust and we woke up one morning to the smell of fire-a range fire on our western neighbor- the Diamond A Ranch. Lucky for us the Diamond A is pretty big and the fire was maybe...
Posted from Seattle, WA April 9, 2018 Our trips have been restrained this year so far, but we have gotten out here and there. We saw our first Rufous Hummingbirds in Discovery Park on April 1. When I was taking the pictures I was hoping the sun...
Posted September 24, 2017 from Beacon Hill, Seattle, WA Change the words to the old song: The CREEK goes on forever and the party never ends! . A rare bird--a Blackpoll Warbler-- for Washington State showed up to take a bath and be part of the ongoing party...
Posted June 7, 2017 from Seattle Washington Luckily, the open season on shooting upland birds and water birds and all mammals and anything else you want to shoot, including stop signs, with a camera appears to have been extended through the spring 2017 in Washington state. In...
Posted May 1 2017 from Seattle, WA and updated May 4, 2017 The theme of this blog is birds and water. The Warblers have arrived in Seattle on their spring migration north. Butyl Creek was busy on May 3 with Warblers of four species, Orange-crowned, Yellow-rumped,...
Posted March 8, 2017 from Seattle, WA We went to the wedding of the very wonderful son of long-time friends and his very wonderful fiance in New Orleans. You know you're old when at 11 pm after dancing all night you're shocked to see a Party...
Posted from Rodeo, New Mexico Jan 5, 2016 I guess it's the 6th Extinction, but the Christmas Counts were down this year. We found a Gray Flycatcher on the Portal Count and we flushed five Montezuma Quail on the Peloncillo Count. The next day we went...
Posted December 5, 2016 from Seattle, WA Our friend Brian Pendleton has been working on his Washington state yearbird list this year and yesterday we had the thrill of being there for Number 350. Brian had been fearing that 350 might be a Mute Swan, non-native...
Posted September 6 and Updated October 24, 2016 from Seattle, WA In Late September it was time to go down and check up on the ranch, where the 750ft. well no longer can get water up to the gravity-tank that supplies water to the house and...
Posted August 7, 2016 from Seattle, WA. Welcome to Washington!!! This Snowy Egret in Fife last weekend (Aug 1) was the first ever recorded in Pierce County. Snowy Egrets, like Great Egrets, may be making a push northward. Snowy Egrets are active foragers and this...