Author: birdbanter

Supplemental Notes on The Bird Banter Podcast #71 Ed on Birding Resources

On The Bird Banter Podcast #71 I talk in detail about resources birders, both experienced and beginners, can use to get more enjoyment out of their birding, to learn to better find and identify birds they see, and about my own progression from beginner to a more experienced and proficient birder today. Here are links to help find some of the resources mentioned in the episode. Enjoy.

Episodes with great individual birding stories:
The Bird Banter Podcast Episode #2 with Ken Brown
The Bird Banter Podcast Episode #3 with Bruce LaBar
The Bird Banter Podcast Episode #68 with Dennis Paulson
The Bird Banter Podcast Episode #45 with Annie Meyer

The North American Field Guide Recommendations

Sibley Guide to the Birds second edition
The National Geographic Guide to the Birds of North America 7th edition (note I inadvertently stated that there is an 8th edition on the podcast, my mistake there.
The Birds of North America by Kenn Kauffman
Kaufman Field Guide to Advanced Birding.
The ABA’s Guide to the Birds of Oregon by David Irons

Supplemental Bird ID guides mentioned in the podcast episode:
Pete Dunne’s Field Guide Companion Kindle Edition here. Tough to find in hardcover edition.
Hawks in Flight by Dunne, Sibley and Sutton
Shorebirds of the Pacific Northwest by Dennis Paulson out of print, this link to an expensive used book on Amazon.
Oceanic Birds of the World by Howell and Zufelt
Molt in North American Birds by Howell is out of print and quite expensive used.

The Phone Bird ID apps mentioned are:
Sibley V2
iBird PRO after further research I don’t recommend buying this app as it sounds like future support could be in question.

The eBird app is described here.
The Merlin App for bird ID is described here.
This is a link to the ABA page to find any state or regional listserv for bird sightings.
I talk about Jerry Cooper’s book: Birdfinder: A Birder’s Guide to Planning North American Trips. Used copies are available inexpensively.

Please leave comments with other suggestions or advice to birders about resources you like. Thanks.

Good birding. Good day!

The Bird Banter Podcast #70 with Peter Hodum Photos and More Information


What fun for me to sit with Peter Hodum on the UPS campus and talk about his passion and work on seabird conservation both in Washington State and in the Juan Fernández Islands off the coast of Chile. Peter did his PhD work on seabirds near Antarctica, but his more recent work has been on seabird research in both Washington State and in the Juan Fernández Islands. These islands are located about 670 kilometers off the coast of Chile, and due to their remote location have a very large percentage of endemic organisms.

Map of the Chilean Islands

Per Wikipedia 62% of the 209 species of vascular plants on the islands are endemics there. (means that they are only found there) There are no native land mammals, reptiles or amphibians on the islands, and only 17 species of land and sea birds breed on the islands, with several endemic bird species.
If you are interested in the organization supporting this research check out the Oikonos website.
Peter’s research is primarily on the seabirds of the islands, but there are super-cool passerines there too, and he shared some photos with us for this post.
The islands are named after the explorer Juan Fernández who discovered them in the 1570’s and are famous as the place where th sailor Alexander Selkirk was marooned for several years in 1704. His story is believed by many to be the inspiration for the Robinson Crusoe book. Of note two of the three major islands in the archipelago are named Robinson Crusoe Island and Selkirk Island.
Enjoy.

We talk about how Tufted Puffins are able to catch, hold in their bill, and carry back to their nest to feed their yound large numbers of fish. Here is evidence!

The impressive bill up close.

Pink-footed Shearwaters breed on the Juan Fernandez Islands and are seen in fall off the WA coast.

Pink-footed Shearwater in flight.

The Juan Fernandez Firecrown is one of the sought after endemnic passerines breeding on the islands

Anothe view of the Juan Fernandez Firecrown

Another passerine there is the Masafuera Rayadito

Masafuera Myadita

Good Birding. Good day!

The Bird Banter Podcast Episode #69 with Francisco Garcia Additional Info.


I heard about Francisco Garcia a number of times over the years when talking with Marcus Roening and Heather Ballash about their many trips to Mexico. Francisco is based in San Blas, in Nayarit, Mexico, and leads birding tours through Safaris San Blas.  You can find them on Facebook @safarisanblas

It was really fun to hear about the excellent birding in the San Blas area that is accessible on relatively short drives from town, allowing a good bird list without spending long days traveling.  I checked on eBird, and Francisco is the #2 eBird lister in Nayarit, Mexico, with a great life list there. His list is 473 species, and of interest to me is that Marcus and Heather are #14 & #15 with 342 and 340 species respectively.   They have 640 and 619 in all of Mexico on their eBird Lists.  I knew that they had birded Mexico a lot, but Wow!

Nayarit is one of the smaller Mexican states in population, with about 1.2 millinon people, and has a good portion of the Pacific Coastline of Mexico.  The eBird list for Nayarit is 561 species of a total of 1099 in all of Mexico.

If you want to listen to the episode with Marcus and Heather, it is #64, and here is a link to their episode on Apple Podcasts. You can also listen on Podbean here on the BirdBanter.com site front page.

Thanks for listening.  Until next time.  Good birding. Good day!

Birding Around Field’s Spring State Park, Asotin County, WA

Marian and I took a 4 day-3 night camping trip to Field’s Spring State Park last week, staying the 3 nights in the park, and birding the two full days there on morning car trips from the campground to the two half-day loops described in the ABA’s A Birder’s Guide to Washington.

American White Pelican at Central Ferry HMU

We drove from Tacoma to the park on Thursday, with brief stops at the Central Ferry HMU in Whitman County on the way there to pad my Whitman County list. It was midday, birding was slow there, but I added 11 species to my feeble Whitman List while we had lunch. A Say’s Phoebe along with Bullock’s Oriole and American White Pelicans on the river were the highlights.
We got to the campground by late afternoon, and an evening walk and sit by the campfire added several new Asotin County birds to my life list there; not a tough task as I had only birded the county in winter previously. First evening highlights were Red Crossbill, a species that throughout the stay was easily heard and occasionally seen overhead in the coniferous treetops, and a calling Common Nighthawk as it got toward dark.

A Tee Pee at the Field’s Spring SP

The next morning I got a great group of songbirds excited just outside the campground with a Pygmy Owl imitation whistle, and added a few more species Then we drove down Hwy 129 to the Grande Ronde River Road and drove west for a few miles on that road. Several Townsend’s Solitaires, along with both Canyon and Rock Wrens, innumerable Lazuli Buntings, and several vocal Yellow-breasted Chats were highlights. The drive itself was spectacular, with many basalt cliffs, deep valleys, and open pine forest and huge meadows all around.
The river was cool too, but we missed American Dipper, and we got home in time to have lunch and to to Chief Timothy Park, where a swim and sit in the shade was enjoyable.

Grande Ronde River

he next day was my favorite day of birding. We headed down from Anatone on Montgomery Ridge Road, pretty much following the route suggested in the guide book in reverse. One side road went down to the river, and then on the main road down to Asotin we went through fields with many Grasshopper Sparrows, Mountain Bluebirds, and as we got to the deciduous riparian area near the bottom Red-eyed and Warbling Vireos. We visited Swallows Park and Looking Glass Parks along the river, with a few shorebirds, Caspian Terns, gulls and had a nice lunch at Looking Glass.

On the drive home we took the W. Mountain Road from Anatone to Prosser, a long very dusty but beautiful drive. I picked up a female FOY Williamson’s Sapsucker there, along with a county first Northern Pygmy Owl that responded to my imitation whistle, both in Garfield County.
Overall a trip I recommend to anyone who wants to spend some time in the northern part of the Blue Mountains.

The Bird Banter Podcast Episode #68 with Dennis Paulson Additional Info.


I have knows about Dennis Paulson since first moving to  the Puget Sound area in 1987, and after getting his Shorebirds of the Pacific Northwest book have enjoyed reading that and reviewing it every spring and fall as migration approaches.  Dennis is an iconic figure in the Washington birding community.  He has taught the Seattle Audubon Master Birding Class for many years, curated the Slater Museum at the University of Puget Sound and taught there, has talked at just about every local and regional birding related event for decades, and is such a nice guy that he is truly beloved by WA birders.

We talk about lots of topics on the podcast. Here are links to some of them.

Shorebirds of the Pacific Northwest is out of print, and expensive on Amazon. If you want a copy, search and maybe you can find one.

Shorebirds of North America a Photographic Guide is still available.

Hawks in Flight by Pete Dunne and others is here on Buteo Books.

Pete Dunnes Field Guide Companion is the third book I mentioned that is one of my favorites.   It is best found as a Kindle Book on Amazon now, as the hard cover ones are expensive.  It is not a book with photographs or color plates, so a digital version should be great. ‘

Here is a link to the online Slater Museum Collection  of wings and tails.  You’ll need to search by scientific name, so be prepared.

Both of the dragonfly books we discussed,  the Dragonflies of the East and Dragonflies of the West are still available on Amazon.

We talk about the Washington Ornithological Society convention. Here is a link to the WOS web site.

The Audubon Guide to the Birds of Oregon we talked about is by David Irons, my guest on The Bird Banter Podcast Episode #58. with a link here.

You can find the Seattle Audubon Society website page on the here to check on the next Master Birding Class with Dennis.

Thanks for visiting. Please subscribe to the Bird Banter Podcast wherever you get your podcast feeds.

Good Birding. Good day!

 

A Day of Mason County Birding with Ken

Barn Owl

County Birding has becoome my way of expanding my birding experiences in WA over the last couple of years. In the winter of 2019 Ken, Brian, Ryan and I took a 4-day trip to the far Southeast corner of the state to get the gray our of our county maps on eBird. By this I mean that when you look at the profile page of an eBird users profile page, areas with no sigtings are colored gray. The color changes by the number of species reported. For me the last 3 states without reported sightings were Asotin, Columbia and Garfield. We birded those three areas and that got color over the whole state. It seems like that visual has been removed in favor of a list of counties and information about birds seen in each county with the latest upgrade to eBird, so that visual is gone, but we joked about it at the time.
This week Ken took me birding on Wednesday in Mason County. I sent him my eBird Needs list and he thought I could find maybe 8 first county birds on the fabulous route he planned. We met a little after 7 AM and headed for Belfair State Park. It is good shorebird area where I expected to find Western Sandpiper, and we hoped for a Semi-palmated Sandpiper. I havn’t birded the county in shorebird migration before, so both would be first county birds for me. Western was easy, along with lots of Least Sandpipers, but as we looked around I spotted the head of a larger sandpiper just over the vegitation farther away. I thought dowitdher by size and behavior, and sure enough it was the FOY Long-billed Dowicher for Ken and a county first for me. Ken did his first victory dance of the day.
A quick stop at East Adler Road added no new species, but Bayshore Preserve had all the finds Ken hoped for and more. He thought we could find California Scrub Jay, Chipping Sparrow, and Brown Creeper, and with some effort we added all of these, but on the walk out Ken spotted an owl in a tree, his county first Barn Owl. Owls are always special, and we got great looks and Ken added a Mason County lifer. Completely unexpected. A flyover Red Crossbill was also sweet.

The tide was too low to see much at the Hwy 106 Skykomish Delta Overlook, and a brief stop at Hunter farms didn’t yield the hoped for American Kestrel, but we made our day great at Potlatch State Park. Marbled Murrelet was the target county first for me. We looked a full bay scan and found little, but on the second pass Ken spotted a not-too-distant MAMU. Then, way out in the bay Ken spotted a huge brown bird, and though ?Brown Pelican? We both got scopes focused and sure enough there was a Brown Pelican floating in the water. It may be only the 3rd or 4th county sighting of this species, another county first for Ken, bringing his county life list to 199. We were really pumped, and as I watched the pelican a Common Murre flew right through my binos view. I called it out, and Ken couldn’t believe it. I was certain, it’s an easy ID when seen well in flight, a black head, breast and back with a sharply demarkeded gleeming white belly and alcid flight and shape. We looked for a bit and it had circled back and landed on the water in the distance, so presto! Mason lifeer #200 for Ken, and it wasn’t even noon yet.
We finished up the day with stops at North Sunnyside Road where we got my county first Cassin’s Vireo and American Kestrel, and I got to meet Ryan , a very good young birder who lives on that road with his family on a large farm, and then went on to stops at Forest Road 2340 and finished at the George Adams Salmon Hatchery where two adult American Dippers were looking after a young bird.
All-in-all a spectacular day, 12 county first for me, 3 county lifers and 4 FOY birds for Ken, and a really fine day of birding with a good buddy. Life is good.
Good birding and good day.

The Bird Banter Podcast Episode #67 with Dr. Roger Lederer Additional Info.


On The Bird Banter Podcast Episode #67 with Dr. Roger Lederer we talk about a nice variety of subjects, including his birding story, his experience as a university professor of ornithology at California State Chico, about his website Ornithology.com as well as tips to listeners who might be interested in a career in ornithology or just learning more about bird biology.

He has done a number of seminars at the Osher Foundations events, a learning for adults >50 years of age program. See the link to that program.

On a recent episode the Andrew Emlen we talked about his sea kayak programs on the lower Columbia river with the Roads Scholar program, another destination focused adult experiential education program.

In the intro I talk about county birding. As guests in the past I’ve had some top county birders. Brad Waggoner is the #1 county birder in Kitsap County, and Bruce LaBar is the Pierce County birder still living with the largest county life list. (Patrick Sullivan deceased reported having seen more species per the WA Birder Website county birding pages.
On the day of birding I talk about with Ken Brown, here a couple of photos and the list of the 12 new Mason County species I saw that day.
American Dipper

Amerian Dipper

American Kestrel
Cassin’s Vireo
Common Murre
Marbled Murrelet
Brown Pelican
A terrible digiscope photo for documentation of this unlikely Mason County bird.

Barn Owl
How cool are Barn Owls?

California Scrub Jay
Brown Creeper
Chipping Sparrow
Chipping Sparrow

Western Sandpiper
This individual was photographed the day prior in Pierce County.

Long-billed Dowitcher

Thanks for listening.
Good birding and good day!

The Bird Banter Podcast Episode #66 with Andrew Emlen Additional Info


Andrew trying to hear a Hutton’s Vireo from his Alcyon Farm.

 

To record this episode of The Bird Banter Podcast I had the privilege of spending the day birding in Wahkiakum County, WA with my guest Andrew Emlen. Andrew is the top eBird lister in Wahkiakum County, is a very good birder, and a super nice guy. In addition he lives on and owns the Alcyon Farm, a fabulous Creekside property with a large area of restored riparian habitat and is a proprietor of Columbia River Kayaking.

Andrew and me looking for an American Dipper from the bridge across the creek on his farm.

On our day in Wahkiakum Andrew took Marian and me birding on his farm, and in local areas before we sat in the shade in the early afternoon at one of his Kayak put-in spots to talk about his birding story and his esperiences birding, kayaking and living in the area.

A Barn Swallow nest on Andrew’s porch viewed through a mirror on a pole to show the nestlings.

Many of Andrews Kayak trips are for Road Scholars, the over-55 experience based learning network. He leads 5-day kayak and nature courses in the lower Columbia River area, as well as some trips to the Sea of Cortez, in California Baja.
Andrew talks briefly about Steamboat Slough. Here is an article about the history of the steamboats of the Columbia.
Andrew is also the base violin player for the Skamakowa Swamp Opera band. You can find them on Facebook here. If you like music by birders, check out The Bird Banter Podcast Episode #52 with Stephanie Seymore.
Andrew’s farm is called Alcyon Farm, derived from the generic name for kingfishers, Halcyon, and for the myth of Halcyon. Read about it here.

A female Purple Martin on gourd nest at Alcyon Farm.

Andrew’s Alcyon Farm has made use of the USDA Conservation Reserve Enhancement Program (CREP) to restore the Creekside riparian corridor at his farm.

One of many Osprey we saw near the Columbia on our day of birding.

The Baja kayak trips that Andrew leads are through Sea Kayak Baja Mexico. Check it out on their web site here.
The Julia Butler Hansen Preserve in Wahkiakum County is well knows for its birding, as well as for the Columbia race of White-tailed Deer.

 

If you enjoyed the music of the Skamakowa  Swamp Opera you can buy their last album on Amazon.

 

The Bird Banter Podcast Episode #65 with Patrick O’Donnell


Patrick O’Donnell started birding as a 7-year old in Niagra Falls, NY. From there he has birded many places in the U.S. and for the last few years has lived in San Jose, Costa Rica where he guides day birding trips, is a freelance writer and is active in the Birding Club of Costa Rica.
Patrick has published an eBook available in many formats called How to Find and Identify Birds in Costa Rica. I have bought the Kindle version and it seems to be all that is implied in the title and more. I look forward to reading it soon.
We talk about several of Patrick’s favorite places to bird near San Jose including:

Parque Nacional Braulio Carillo.

In addition we talk about some of the more well known birding hotspots and ecolodges:

Rancho Naturalista

I’ll try to fill in other location links soon. Please come back.

Here is a National Smithsonian Article on Macaws and Clay Licks.

Until next time. Good birding. Good day.

The Bird Banter Podcast Episode #64 with Heather Ballash and Marcus Roening Additional Info.


37×1024.jpg” alt=”” width=”937″ height=”1024″ class=”size-large wp-image-1117″ /> Heather and Marcus on the Pacific Crest Trail part of our hike to Government Meadow yesterday. [/caption]
I have known Marcus and Heather Roening for a long time. Marcus has been a prominent Pierce County birder and conservationist for most if not all of the time I’ve lived here, since 1987. More recently I got to know them much better on a birding trip to Morocco. You can hear more about that on several episodes I produced in April 2019. Michael Carmody, the tour leader was my guest on episode #12. We don’t talk much about the trip on this episode, so check there to see more about that trip. I bring this up because it was the time when I feel like I really got to see how fun it was to be around both Heather and Marcus. They are both excellent birders and I enjoyed their company and birding expertise on that trip.

Heather and Marcus with Michael Carmody (left) in Morocco in 2019.

Yesterday we went to Government Meadows, a large meadow near Mt. Rainier, in hopes of finding a few FOY (first-of-year) species for Pierce County. This was Heather’s idea, as we were trying to work out a place to record an episode and she thought it would be fun to do it outdoors, and if we could also manage to find a couple FOY Pierce County birds she might pass Bruce LaBar and go into first place for the most species seen in Pierce so far this year on eBird. We talk on the episode about this ongoing friendly competition. Rain, sleet, snow, and fatigue kept the recording from happening there, and rain pushed us indoors to their garage, a place big and open enough to properly social distance and accomplish the recording.
We saw some great scenery and got a good hike in yesterday, but alas no FOY species for any of us.
I hope you all enjoyed the episode. Feel free to leave comments here with ideas for guests, suggestions for improving the podcast, or just to reach out or give feedback.

Until next time. Good birding. Good day!