Fern Ridge Wetland. 2-10-08

Fern Ridge wet land. 2-10-08

A few miles east of Eugene is a great wetland called Fern Ridge. Amanda and I discovered it while visiting the area and had to explore its birdiness. Unbeknownst to us, this wet land would provide us with three cool "lifers", one of them being extremely rare in our area.

Immediately after stepping onto the trail I spotted a large hawk sitting on a rock in the field. I popped my binoculars up to my eye and almost fainted. For about a half a of a second I thought this was a burrowing owl, given its location and the owl-shaped eyes. I think I may have even said, "BURROWING OWL!" and then shortly followed with, "Oh, um oops....I mean female Northern Harrier. Obviously, there is really no way of mistaking a Burrowing Owl with a Northern Harrier, since the Harrier is a hawk and twice the size of the Burrowing Owl. I was a bit hasty there.


A white spot in a tree just above the Harrier proved to be a White-Tailed Kite. This is the first time I 've had the opportunity to watch the Kite this long, and I was rather excited. Amanda and I even put our scope to it for a nice long stare. Raptors like this are great to find in the wilderness, because they can sit at their perch for several minutes unmoving, allowing bird voyeurs like us to get a nice long look at them.

While walking up this first stretch of the loop, we stopped to listen to a chorus of frogs. After a minute I started to say something, which spooked an American Bittern and sent him flying clumsily away. This is one of my dream birds. It's the bird that I always look for in grassy wetlands, but have only ever seen one time before. The first time I saw the Bittern was at Ridgefield NWR, while on my very first bird outing. I saw a clump of grass with eyes, swaying gently with the breeze. It was the most incredible thing I had ever seen...not to mention totally alien. I let out a few choice explitives of excitement and found out (thanks Sibley guide) that these birds were closely related to Herons and EXTREMELY shy. Shy indeed, because I didn't see another one until this day at Fern Ridge over two years later. Very nice find. I can't wait to see him again.

We walked around and scoped things like Song Sparrows, Yellow-Rumped Warblers and Northern Pintails. We were staring long and hard at a large oak tree when a jay-sized gray bird landed on a briar branch 20 feet in front of us. Instinctively and like well choreographed dancers, Amanda and I snapped our binoculars in their tell-tale salute and eyeballed this bird for a solid half a minute. When it landed this bird snapped its long, gray tail up and made a brief up turned V shape with its body. He flicked his tail a couple more times then flew off. Amanda and I both were able to pick out some distingushing features such as: Long tail, thin bill, pale eye, two white wingbars and white outer tail feathers. We immediately pulled out our Sibley and discovered (with a few excited whoops) that this bird was a Northern Mockingbird. Needless to say this was a lifer bird for us and an amazing find. Later, after researching it we found out that this bird has only been identified 6 other times since Fern Ridge has been sanctioned as a wet land. This bird is extremely uncommon in this neck of the woods.

Well, the Mockingbird was the catalyst for us to find two more great (lifer) birds. The Northern Shrike (I saw this one by myself while investigating the area, looking for the Mockingbird) and a Purple Finch. I stood and watched the Shrike for about two minutes with it sitting (very Shrikishly) on a branch at eye level 5 feet in front of me. I tried signaling Amanda, but had no luck in drawing her attention in my direction because she had discovered another great lifer, the Purple Finch. The Shrike flew off and I joined Amanda in looking quite intensely at her cool little finch through our scope.

To top off the day we had one more lifer bird on the way out of the park. In the marsh area we spotted a Wilson's Snipe. We spotted him with our binoculars seconds before he flew away. Perfect ending to a perfect afternoon.

I feel like there is never enough time in a day to see everyting at a wildlife refuge that I want to see. There is always something cool just around that next bend, but things like rain, impending darkness and hunger always pull us away. Amanda and I saw ALL of these great birds while walking along 200-250 yards of trail in this amazingly diverse wetland. But this place hasn't seen the last of us...maybe next time we can make it around that bend. Maybe further.

White dot- Norther Harrier and White-Tailed Kite

Maroon dot-American Bittern and Wilson's Snipe

Yellow dot-Northern Shrike

Red dot-Northern Mockingbird

Purple dot-Purple Finch

The Northern Pintails were hanging around the pond in the middle of the picture and the Yellow-rumped warblers were diving around that arch of tree in the north of the center of the picture.

Willamette Valley birding 2-16-08

Champoeg State Park & the Willamette Mission State Park. Saturday, 2-16-08

Amanda and I woke up to a beautiful sunny Saturday morning and decided we needed an adventure. We packed the car with binoculars, pb&j's and our new camera. We headed south with no real destination in mind, looking for something new and hopefully some cool birds along the way.

We found ourselves at Champoeg State Park, which lies nestled along the Willamette river in Aurora, Oregon. Immediately upon driving into the campground in the northeast corner of the park we discovered a hanging seed feeder covered in nuthatches , chickadees and siskins. Though these were primarily Red-Breasted Nuthatches we also saw our first White-Breasted Nuthatch of the year. He was quite a bit more cautious and really only fed when we weren't very close. We took some great photos with our new Powershot:














As we wandered through the oak grove in the center of the park, a raptor flew in front of me and landed in a large oak. It was hard to identify its exact species because he sat with the sun behind him in one of the top most branches of the tree. He was falcon-sized and I could barely see a mask, though the sun was blinding me pretty well. I made an assumption that this was a pergrine Falcon, though I am still not exactly sure. Here's a photo Amanda snapped of the Falcon:

Later, in the day after much more wandering around the Willamette Valley, we stumbled (quite literally) upon the Willamette Mission State Park. In a grove of walnut trees, we found a flock of Red-Winged Blackbirds. And then snapped some nice pictures of a Downy Woodpecker in the Hazelnut trees.

After leaving this park Amanda and I rode our first ferry. Apparently there are tons of these things all up and down the Willamette River. They are definitely a more interesting way to cross a river than a bridge. Pooh-pooh, bridges-pooh-pooh.

On the way home, we drove through heavy farm country and found our first "lifer" of the day. Dusky Geese. We were quite excited to see these since they are fairly uncommon. These three were in a flock of about 30 birds.

After a satisfying day full of birding and hiking, we decided to end the day the most perfect way possible... with good beer and good food. Since we were in the neighborhood, we decided to go to McMenamin's Oregon Hotel to enjoy the sunset over a nice mug of beer on the roof of this historic hotel.

Tualatin River NWR Jan. 26

I've had 34 birthdays in total, counting the latest. I told Amanda that the only thing I wanted for my birthday was two things: birds and beers. Well, to be more specific, I wanted to start the day bird watching and end the day with beer (good beer). She was happy to oblige since those two things happen to be two of her favorite pasttimes as well.

We got up at 5:00 a.m. that Saturday morning, packed up our binoculars, bird guides and telescope and shot out into the early morning dark to one of our favorite bird friendly places; Tualatin River Nature Park. Our goal was to get there while it was still quite dark and wander around listening for owls. Though it was rather cold, we were warm with anticipation. This was our first owl prowl.

We wandered and talked (quietly) for an hour or so, while the sun slowly made its way into the forest. Just as first light was spilling through the evergreens, we heard a shriek. We had studied a few of the calls of the likely owls for this forest and recognized its scream immediately. Then, it soared down off of its perch in a tree in front of us. It was a sort-eared owl. Not only was it a short-eared owl, it was also a "lifer". And what a lifer it was. Not bad for the first bird seen in my early to mid thirties.


After a nice mid-day birthday nap, we met friends at the Horse Brass pub for beer and conversation. Though this isn't my usual hang out and doesn't suit me that well (see explanation below) I had a great time and a few tasty beers. Some that I remember were the Hairy Eyeball (Lagunitas) Terminal Gravity, and possibly Broken Halo. A nice time was had by all. The night ended at Chopsticks III (karaoke bar) with me doing an easily replicated version of Tom Waits "The Piano Has Been Drinking" and Amanda rocking the joint with Kate Bush "Running Up That Hill."