Don't Forget to Duck When It's Raining

The post-Valentine's Day weather seemed to embody all the bitter singletons - it was miserable!  I decided to scout around a little to prepare for tomorrow's Valentine's Couples Birdathon despite the foul weather.  For the most part, the birding was slow and not worth waxing poetic or whatever you want to call what I normally do.  Instead, I will just focus on the fantastic views the ducks offered up at Patricia Bay today.

When it's pouring, sometimes the last thing you feel like doing is getting out of the car.  Well, maybe I'm just lazy and didn't bring a rain jacket.  Either way, I drove to the north end of Patricia Bay to scan through the ducks today and found the whole exercise to be rather enjoyable.  I will probably have to return when the light is better and I can stand on the shoreline for better photos, but it was certainly a satisfying challenge today from the car.

Greater Scaup were often close to shore, which allowed me to study their head shape.  I always take the opportunity to study their head shape, which, compared to Lesser Scaup, is more rounded and has the high point towards the front of the head.

A perfect side profile of a male Greater Scaup surrounded by four females.  Another feature to note on the male is the clean white flanks, which is apparently more commonly shown by Greater Scaup.  The females appear to show more extensive white on the face, which is commonly shown by Greaters.

One last shot of a male Greater Scaup, which again emphasizes the head shape and clean white flanks.  The grey appearance to the back is the result of fine barring; Lessers should have coarser barring.

Surf Scoters are always a treat to see up close, so this group consisting of two pairs was a nice sight.

A pair of White-winged Scoters momentarily made it in relatively close to the shore.  There is certainly a je ne sais quoi about scoters!

This appears to be a first-winter male White-winged Scoter to the best of my knowledge.  I believe an adult would show a more prominent bump on the bill and a more extensive white mark under the eye.

That's all I have to offer for now.  I hope the next time it rains, this has inspired you to take a drive and never your leave your vehicle.  Choose a good body of water you can drive right up to for best results!

Palm Monday

After spending eight weeks on a boat, I am glad to be back on solid ground.  All I want to do is wander around back on familiar territory and get reacquainted with the local birds.  I did exactly that today and decided to take my time and walk around some nice habitats on the Saanich Peninsula.

I started off my day around the Victoria Airport.  While driving along, I spied a hawk sitting out on a perch near the runways and decided to turn around and check it out.  While determining it was just a Red-tailed, I was fortunate enough to have seven Sky Larks fly up and circle around for a few minutes.  Not a bad start!

On a whim, I decided to get out and scour the hawthorns and blackberries around Sandown Park, which is the location of the old horse racing track.  It is certainly an interesting area and I could see something interesting turning up there.  I couldn't draw anything exotic out of the shrubs today, but I had a good variety of the usual suspects.  The highlight was a couple of Lincoln's Sparrows that offered up good views with a bit of coaxing.

Next, I made my way over to John Rd. to see if I could track down any good sparrow flocks or perhaps find a shrike out in the fields.  While driving, I spotted an American Kestrel as it flew off the top of a tree and proceeded to land on a snag.  Before hopping back in the car, I looked at another snag and was graced by a nice adult Cooper's Hawk.  I didn't make it too far before I noticed a decent-sized blackbird flock and I put in a rather frustrating effort trying to sift through it for either a Rusty or Yellow-headed.  The flock never did cooperate, but I have a feeling it could hold a gem.  I'll keep it in the back of my mind for a visit in the near future.  The rest of the fields were rather barren, which was disappointing.

I put in a quick stop at Patricia Bay to see if I could spot the Snow Goose that was reported there.  I always like to double check reports of white geese for Ross', but the only non-Canadas I could find were a couple of juvenile Greater White-fronted Geese.  Other waterbirds in the bay included: Greater Scaup, Surf and White-winged Scoters, Horned Grebe, Common and Pacific Loons, Common Goldeneye, and Red-breasted Merganser.

Next on my agenda was a stroll around the Vantreight bulb fields.  The birding was relatively slow, but I managed to spot a few decent birds.  The fields just north of the greenhouses had a single Western Meadowlark and four American Pipits.  Over by the westernmost reservoir, I had a pair of Mourning Doves, a Wilson's Snipe, and a couple of Lincoln's Sparrows.

Two dapper Mourning Doves showing off at the Vantreight bulb fields

This House Finch also looked very sharp posing on a cabbage leaf

By the end of the day, I gave up on trying to dig out my own uncommon birds and decided to see if the two Palm Warblers reported from Martindale Flats were still around.  As I drove along McIntyre Rd., I got extremely distracted by the geese.  I enjoy the variety of geese you can encounter in Victoria from fall through spring.  In one flock, I had Cackling Geese (Branta hutchinsii minima), Lesser Canada Geese (Branta canadensis parvipes), Dusky Canada Geese (B. c. occidentalis), and Greater White-fronted Geese (Anser albifrons).  If I took my time and analyzed them a little closer, perhaps there was another subspecies or two in there like taverneri and whatever our mutant residents are called.

The darkest geese in our local flocks over the winter are Dusky Canada Geese.  The middle bird, I suspect, is a Lesser Canada Goose.

The three birds on the right are Cackling Geese and the four on the left are Dusky Canada Geese.  I believe the Cackling Geese belong to the subspecies minima.

The six birds in front are Greater White-fronted Geese and the ones in behind appear to be Lesser Canada Geese.

All of the aforementioned taxa are in this photo - test yourself!

Finally, we'll get to the star species of the day: Palm Warblers.  I rounded the bend at the end of the lane that leads to the western edge of Garcia Nursery and recognized the Reader-Lee family unit all aiming cameras at some ornamental maples.  I figured this was a good sign.  As suspected, they had located both Palm Warblers and were documenting the tail-bobbing birds.  Despite the light starting to get a little low, we all worked our camera skills to the best of our abilities.  It was nice to hear this was a lifer for Emma and Rebecca and it caused me to recall that my lifer Palm Warbler was only a few hundred metres away... twenty some-odd rotations around the sun ago!  It was a great way to cap off a relaxing day of birding back on my home turf.

When you capture a Palm Warbler in dull light, it really doesn't do them justice.  The vivid yellow undertail created great contrast to the drab brown back and the cap still had the slightest hint of chestnut.

This is even worse - I make Palm Warblers look like the drabbest birds in the world.  You'll just have to take my word for it when I say it rocked its own style of charisma!

Gull Bladder

I have a weak gull bladder so I decided to drain my urge today with a scan through any flocks I could come across.  Over the last week, a Glaucous Gull (Larus hyperboreus) has been sighted among the usual Mew (L. canus), Thayer's (L. thayeri), American Herring (L. smithsonianus), and Glaucous-winged Gulls (L. glaucescens) on the Saanich Peninsula.  Glaucous Gulls are an expected but scarce winter bird on southern Vancouver Island, with only a few records occurring in a typical winter.  As the etymology of 'hyperboreus' implies, they  come "from the north" after breeding in the high arctic.

Locally, the method for finding unusual gulls in a flock usually involves looking for pale or dark-backed individuals.  Glaucous Gulls fall into the former category.  Today I could only find one decent-sized flock of gulls on the polo field adjacent to Maber Flats in Brentwood Bay.  Scanning through the group, nothing really jumped out.  The Glaucous Gull was originally located near Maber Flats by Mary Robichaud on Friday, February 10th and it later was seen by several others when it was relocated at the Vantreight bulb fields a few days later by Kirsten Mills.  When I passed by the Vantreight bulb fields off Central Saanich Rd., I saw a whopping six gulls on one field and once again nothing jumped out of the mix.  After wandering around Sidney for a couple hours and having a bite to eat, my day ended with a check at Patricia Bay.  Last year in March, I found a first-winter Glaucous Gull at the mouth of Wsikem Creek where it drains into the bay.  I hoped to relive the magic but was a little deflated when I got to bay and saw all the gulls were heavily backlit by the low sun to the west.  I still gave my best effort and could see one gull that was intriguing.  I made my way down to the beach and walked out towards the sparse flock of gulls until the viewing conditions improved and the bird in question could be identified.  The overall paleness of the bird was not a trick of the light - the wingtips were nearly pure white, the body appeared to be uniformly dingy white, and its bill was pink with a black tip.  A perfect specimen of a Glaucous Gull.  I think it was a second-winter bird but I'd like to see it in better light to slap a proper age label on it.  I wasn't able to get a photo due to the low light, but I will share a couple shots of the first-winter bird from March last year at the same location:

This classic first-winter Glaucous Gull is distinguished by its white wingtips, white mantle with grey-brown vermiculations, sharply bicoloured bill, and overall bulk (approximately the same size as the hybrid Glaucous-winged x Western Gull to right)

The bird is aged as a first-winter Glaucous Gull by its dark eye; typical second-winter birds have a pale iris

The sighting gave my gull bladder the sweet relief I needed.  I'm sure I'll have to go again by midweek, so I may sneak back down to Patricia Bay and try to relocate the bird or perhaps something rarer from the dark-backed end of the spectrum.  Fingers crossed!