Waterfowl Field Trip February 20

Sixteen eager birders left foggy Walla Walla Saturday morning and drove over to the Columbia River to look for waterfowl.  Fortunately, the fog had lifted by the time we got to the river.  The birds were cooperative - we saw white-fronted geese, canada geese,  cackling geese, tundra swans,  trumpeter swans and seventeen species of ducks. One common loon was spotted far out in the river at the Wallula grain terminal and several American white pelicans circled above at McNary NWR Headquarters.  We saw about 20 bald eagles along the river and noted that there more adult birds seen than in weeks past. On our return to Walla Walla we drove Byrnes Road and watched a beautiful ferruginous hawk flying above us, a Cooper's hawk hunting the roadside, a singing Say's phoebe, two rough-legged hawks, a great horned owl on a nest, and numerous red-tailed hawks, northern harriers and American kestrels.  A nice ending to a beautiful sunny day in western Walla Walla County.       Ginger

Bennington Lake Today

We saw two northern shrikes on our walk this morning.  One of them was very agitated, either with the other shrike or with a kestrel that was nearby. The killdeer have returned to the lake - there were three of them today.  We saw one great horned owl, a sharp-shinned hawk, a male northern harrier and one red-tailed hawk.  There were 31 common mergansers on the lake, two mallards and two canada geese.  The Bewick's wrens were singing, and there were downy woodpeckers, juncos, robins, Townsend's solitaires, song sparrows, white-crowned sparrows and black-capped chickadees along the trail. One ring-billed gull circled the lake while a great blue heron kept watch from the top of the dam.  All in all, a pretty typical February day at the lake.      Ginger