I spent most of the day inside working, but Connor, Rowan and I went for a walk down to Totem Park this evening. The kids played in the tidepools, and I watched birds and the changing light on the mountains.
Weather: It was overcast for much of the day, but cleared off this evening.
Birds: I saw my first sizable flock of Fall warblers through window to the backyard this morning. I am not sure how many there were, but I think there were at least Wilson’s Warblers and Townsend’s Warblers. They were fluttering between the branches on the trees like leaves. In fact from a distance it was easy to mistake them for leaves, except the leaves kept going down while they would reverse course and go back up again.
There was a flicker around the neighborhood today. I saw it and caught a couple of glimpses.
A Steller’s Jay has been visiting lately. The kids started trying to feed it peanuts today. I don’t know if it is one of the ones that showed up last year around this time or not.
On the way to Totem Park we saw probably 20 Robins foraging near the end of Hillcrest Drive and just into the woods beyond that.
At Totem Park there were 6 Spotted Sandpipers on the western shore. I think I saw another 5 or so near the river mouth, as well. The other shorebirds I observed were 3 Semipalmated Plovers and 7 Black Turnstones.
In the alders growing above the high tide line on the western shore of the park, there were a few warblers foraging. I did not ever get a very good look at one, however. They were probably Wilson’s or Yellow Warblers.
As we were getting ready to go around sunset, I saw a group of Common Mergansers and a few Mallards, both out by the river mouth and around the shore a little bit off the point.
Other Notes: I forgot to mention seeing a white butterfly down at Sage Beach sometime in the last week or two. I guess the last couple of years have been tough on them, as I have not seen very many at all this year.
There are lots of Pink Salmon in the stream, but I’m not really seeing dead salmon scattered around the beach yet.