Sunday:
I didn’t really get out today.
Weather: Mostly overcast but a couple of sun breaks, temperatures were in the lower 40s.
Monday:
Connor was sick this morning, so I didn’t end up taking Rowan to preschool, they both stayed home. I did go for a walk through Totem Park to check the mail late this afternoon. Tried to pay more attention to the smells of things.
Weather: Overcast with some snow and rain mixed early. Cooler temperatures.
Birds: Lots of Pine Siskins still around the neighborhood.
Tuesday:
Weather: The first of the mixed-bag spring days (where it’s sunny, snowy, rainy, graupel, breezy, and cool with puffy clouds). Wind out of the Northwest. Swan Lake appeared to be well over half free of ice.
Birds: There were two Trumpeter Swans on the lake, several gulls were on the penninsula with the Mallards and Cackling Goose. Toward the upper end of the lake I saw quite a few scaup and Buffleheads. Toward the lower end there was a female Ring-necked Duck together with a male Lesser Scaup. I think a couple of weeks ago when I thought I saw a pair of Ring-necked Ducks, it might have actually been this mixed species pair. I didn’t pay close enough attention (and the male had its bill tucked under a wing, which didn’t help). I wonder if the will end up breeding together. The Channel was pretty empty early this afternoon, but this evening there were a lot of gulls and Long-tailed Ducks.
Wednesday:
Weather: There was a little bit of snow overnight, maybe a half an inch or so. It was sunny this morning and the snow melted off in the sun.
Thursday:
Weather: Rainy and overcast.
Friday:
Weather: There was a fair amount of snow falling at times this morning, but it didn’t really accumulate much. By early afternoon, it was clearing off in the north, but it took at least a couple of hours before things cleared off in town. Swan Lake just had a small patch of ice left in the center.
Birds: There were lots of gulls in the Channel. They were mostly Thayer’s and Glaucous-winged Gulls, but there were also quite a few Mew Gulls, several Herring Gulls, at least two first-cycle Glaucous Gulls, and a Western Gull. I saw a small flock of Long-tailed Ducks make several circuits on a fly-by, but they seemed disinclined to land with all the gulls around.
The scaups seem to have vacated the channel in favor of Swan Lake. The two Swans and Cackling Goose were also there along with a few gulls, the Mallards, and the Ring-necked Duck.
Saturday:
I went on a WhaleFest fundraising cruise this morning, where I was the speaker to talk about birds.
Weather: It started out sunny and calm this morning with a high, thin overcast moving over throughout the morning. Later in the afternoon it was overcast.
Birds: We didn’t see too many birds, they were mostly fairly dispersed. I did notice Marbled Murrelets, Common Murres, Thick-billed Murres (possibly some Commons going back into breeding plumage a bit early?), Pelagic Cormorants, a Double-crested Cormorant, a few White-winged and Surf Scoters, a handful of loons, some Long-tailed Ducks, and a Pigeon Guillemot. There were lots of gulls in the Channel on our return.
Other Notes: We watched three Humpback Whales which Jan Straley said were probably early returners. We also got to observe a pod of Killer Whales, a Male, two females, and a young calf.