Japonski Island Forest

Overcast with drizzle this morning. Clouds lifting and even breaking up a bit this afternoon and letting the sun through.

Yesterday’s high of 53F (which happened in the middle of the night) set a record for the day. Today’s record is also 50F, but it doesn’t look like we reached it.

I drove around a bit this afternoon, but spent the bulk of my time on Japonski Island.

I arrived at Sealing Cove as a flock of crows flew in. They landed at a place where folks have been tossing bird seed for smaller birds. I had previously thought they wouldn’t really go into the bushes looking for food. I was wrong. At least about the bushes at this location. Perhaps in places where they are thicker, it might serve as a deterrent.

The main problem with crows discovering a feeding station is they gobble up a lot of food quickly. It’s difficult (and expensive) to make sure there’s some out for smaller birds when crows are going for it.

I went back out Seward Avenue to look over the rock outcrops I had wanted to look at yesterday.

Nothing really caught my eye, and I decided to walk down to the shoreline.

I had left my big camera in the car to look at the outcrops. It would have been in the way, and I was parked right next to them. I decided to leave it in the car when I went down to the shoreline.

I guess it was time to reinforce the lesson that I should always have my camera with me.

I noticed a movement in the trees off to my right as I got down to the edge of the beach. Looking closer, I saw it was a raptor, probably a Sharp-shinned Hawk.

It seemed to have something, but I couldn’t really be sure.

I went back for my camera. While on the way, the bird flew past and up over the slope and into the forest. On its flyby, I saw enough to be reasonably confident it was a Sharp-shinned Hawk and that it had caught a smaller bird.

It didn’t look like it had gone too far into the forest, so I grabbed my camera and found a reasonable way into the woods.

Walking up the hill, I saw it fly off again from further up. I saw the direction it went, but not where it ended up.

Since I was already up there, I decided to explore the second growth patch of forest a bit.

Once up on the hill, the forest opened up a bit. Based on a couple lean-to type structures I saw, I suspect it’s been cleaned out a bit over the years by folks gathering wood to make shelters and/or burn in a fire.

One of the shelters seemed quite fresh. Hemlock needles were still on the branches, so certainly parts of it had been constructed in the past few months.

It’s easily accessible from both the Coast Guard base and SEARHC campus, so I suspect someone(s) from one or the other was practicing shelter making.

Going a little further, I noticed a fairly well-travelled path. The sun had come out and was casting nice light through the trees.

When I grabbed my camera, I left my backpack. I didn’t figure I would have much use for the other lenses. I was mistaken.

It would have been handy to be able to switch from my telephoto zoom to a wider lens to capture the nice light on the trail. I took a couple pictures with my cell phone. I was able to back up a bit to get one with the lens I had. It turned out okay, but I think would have been better had I been able to stand closer (a tree was in the way from further back).

Coming out of the Beak this evening, I saw the crescent moon and stars. Arriving home I could see the big dipper and Polaris, so got out my binoculars to look for the comet that’s visible these days.

It’s not very dark at my house, but I was able to see a hint of the comet through binoculars if I looked out of the side of my eye.

I drove out as far as Harbor Mountain Road and found it too cloudy that way. Japonski Island had clouds in the way as well. I tried a couple other places as well, but the only place I checked that did not have clouds in the way was at my house. It’s supposed to be more clear tomorrow, so I’ll probably try to get out earlier in the evening.

My iNaturalist Observations for Today