Radius Rarities, Glaucous Glory, Springing

Hey, an uncropped photo! Mourning Dove with a rainbow for a backdrop...MODOBOW. Photographed at the legendary and singular Rancho de Bastardos.

Aside from Belize, the vast majority of the birding I've done this year has been in the 5MR. My sweet, sweet radius, the radius that shelters me. Nourishes me. Asserts its dominance on me...after all, I am but the learner now, not the radial master. I've been checking out new spots, hitting up places I typically neglect, getting a better idea of where to go at the very edges of the radius ("the outer rim"), and of course looking for both new and 5MR year birds for the 5MR Challenge. As with birding in general, there have been ups, like getting my first self found rarity of the year, and downs, like actually exerting effort to find Brewer's Blackbirds...and failing. My radius is neither glorious, nor does it suck...I actually get a fair amount of habitat diversity that I'm pretty stoked about. I also benefit from a moderate amount of coverage from other birders...

Prior to going to Belize, I had dipped a couple of different times on a wintering Summer Tanager that I had seen before the new year...and when I came back, someone had found a new Summer Tanager somewhere else! It was a particularly confiding one too. Photographed at Vasona Lake County Park.

In January, I got three sapscucker species in the radius, Red-breasted, Red-naped and this Yellow-bellied Sapsucker, which has been present since last fall and is probably still present as of this writing. There can't be many other radii out there with triple sapsuckers on the year (none outside California?). Photographed at the Santa Clara Water District.

Clark's Grebe was a new radius bird, one of only a handful so far in 2019. Aechmophorus grebes are plenty common in the county, but noteworthy birds here in my zone. Photographed at Almaden Lake.

Almaden Lake has also hosted some American White Pelicans recently (first these two, now up to four), which are also rare in the area and not something I thought I would see in the radius this year...I was prescient enough to be out checking for grebes, but these illustrious fishlords took me by surprise.

Shorebirds are extremely hard in my 5MR, but at least I have gulls! A great many gulls. Shitloads of gulls on good days, about 98% of which are California, Herring, Glaucous-winged, Herring X Glaucous-winged and Iceland. Like last winter, I've spent a lot of time combing through flocks in the hopes of finding a proper rarity. Photographed at Almaden Lake...again...which is turning out to be more interesting than I thought it was.

Perseverance (agony?) finally rewarded me with a Glaucous Gull. It's been a great many years since I found one of these on my own, I was due, and after so much local gulling I am chuffed that it was here in my radius. It was a really nice looking one, slightly darker than the average first cycle but with heaps of white on the wings and some very delicate covert patterning. Photographed at Almaden Lake.

This is definitely my favorite 5MR bird of the year so far. The gull window will be closing soon, but after seeing this pasty wonder I am sated.

It is odd to have seen a Glaucous Gull down the street this year, but not a Mew or a Western. Yes, I live in a county with salt water and can get find flocks of thousands of gulls in my radius, but Western Gulls are somehow elusive....what gives? Why are Brewer's Blackbirds and Western Gulls so hard to find? Is the fast food in our mall parking lots not savory enough? I don't get it. I've also failed to find an Allen's Hummingbird at all, which is confounding. But it's all part of the still-nascent 5MR experience, you get a better sense of what is found here regularly, and a better sense of what birds are actually as difficult as you think they are. For example, I have recently come to the conclusion that there are no easily accessible native conifers accessible in my radius, which is pretty crushing and has dire implications.

I'm lucky enough to have some grasslands in my 5MR, which isn't exactly a common habitat in most of California. I was recently turned on to an extensive secret-not-secret piece of private property that contains a lot of grassland and could provide some great radius birding and potentially produce some species I've yet to record here, as this Western Meadowlark can attest to. Photographed at secret-not-secret spot.

So where do I stand? This time last year, I was at 114 species. Right now I'm at 119. Not a big difference considering I have 5MR tunnel vision in 2019, and not an increase that fills my heart with hubris and joy...but not bad either since I lost a lot of potential radius time to Belize (which, not gonna lie, was way way better) and bad weather. I've missed a number of winter birds that I mostly won't have a chance again with until next fall, which vary from radius rare (American Bittern, Ferruginous Hawk, Prairie Falcon) to readily findable with minimal effort (American Wigeon). What is also apparent is that this fall/winter was very poor locally for irruptive species like Red-breasted Nuthatch, Golden-crowned Kinglet, Varied Thrush and Pine Siskin, so I'll have to hope that next fall and winter is better for them. The window is closing now for a lot of species, but opening for others.

So here we are in March...March. Most years, unless I have a trip to the desert planned, its not a month that is super exciting. The chance of finding rarities plummets in most places and, here in the bay area, until the last week the number of northbound migrants is a slow trickle compared to the big April push that is going to be featuring all the FOY birds you got in March plus a whole lot more.

But this year is different. This is the year of the 5MR, and there is work to be done. Not only are there radius year birds to track down, there are a whole bunch of potentially new species I should be looking for this spring. To wit:

Allen's Hummingbird - I'm holding out for one to show up in my yard...I do have a geri birding situation in effect, after all. According to eBird data, ALHU are very uncommon in my 5MR but March is a great time to pick one up. Looking at the region on a larger scale, they are more abundant in every other bay area county....what gives?

Western Screech-Owl - Probably fairly common in the southern part of my radius, just need to go owling. This month should be as good of a time as any to get one.

Olive-sided Flycatcher - Decent chance of getting one in the mountainish part of my radius later in the spring.

Western Kingbird - You show me grass and I will show you a Western Kingbird. I have grass. They may start arriving/passing through any day now.

Swainson's Thrush - These are surprisingly uncommon in Santa Clara County but my 5MR has the riparian to lure in some migrants.

Nashville, Hermit, and MacGillivray's Warblers - All are uncommon in the county, but at the same time I think they are most likely all annual migrants in my radius...MacGillivray's could be easier in fall than spring though?

Other potentially new 5MR birds I'll be keeping an eye out for in the next couple months, in no particular order, are Hammond's Flycatcher, Bank Swallow, Purple Martin, Lawrence's Goldfinch, and Swainson's Hawk. I don't expect any of those, but I am the Global Birder Ranking System's #7 birder in the country, so it's not like I am exactly incapable of finding them either.

Of course, since I am a raging nerd, I suffer from pretty crazy pollen allergies, and March marks the first month of suffering those, which lasts into summer. It's total bullshit...not pleased about being allergic to my own radius. How embarrassing right? Well I may be in for allergies but March also means wildflowers finally. Since my radius is more than just bleak agricultural hellscape or urban climax dystopia, I am lucky enough to get some cool native plants in the spring. I think this is white fairy lantern, Calochortus albus, photographed last year along Hicks Road.

The Rancho de Bastardos 5MR is not going to win any awards for wren diversity, but at least we have an abundance of Bewick's Wrens throughout the year. I don't see anyone singing their praises (or just saying praises normally), but living here has increased my fondness for them, as there is a pair that lives in the yard and I can actually see one on the suet feeder - maybe the same one on this picture - as I type this. They are very curious and confiding, bordering on friendly. Familiarity does not always breed contempt.

Yeah, yeah, making fun of ICP is so ten years ago...BUT...apparently there is at least one juggalo or juggalette in my radius?!! I was shocked to find this conclusive evidence of juggalism, I haven't even seen "genuine, dee-licious" Faygo in stores here. We are not within core ninja range here...a remarkable find.

That sums up recent events in the 5MR. For those of you who have been toiling in your radius these past few months in colder climes, new birds are on their way! The myopathic birding atmosphere that can be early March will soon melt away, and birding...at least in your radius...may never be the same.

p.s. have any of you tried Faygo?

The Shit and The Sand-Plover

What's that sound? Can you hear it? Maybe not, but I can smell it...the shitwinds are blowing, and you can bet that this is just the calm before the shitphoon that is about blow ashore...

We at BB&B are not the type of people to be optimistic about the next four (or eight) shitty years, not in the slightest. We are not the type of people to ask our brothers and sisters to reach out across the aisles of shit, to attempt handshakes that will just cover your hands in shit. We are far too realistic. For birds, the environment, and yes people too, the waves of shit are now towering above our heads, and when they break there will be nowhere to run. Drowning in shit is a frightening and very real possibility. The last Republican administration was a hellish thing to experience (on environmental and a great many other fronts), but remember this...even George W. Bush admitted that climate change was real, and who knows how things would have played out if his wife wasn't a birdwatcher! It's no coincidence that Papahānaumokuākea National Monument was created after Laura Bush visited Midway Atoll.

That said, I'm already sick of the blame game, the soapboxes, the half truths, the clickbait...especially the clickbait. We may be hanging our heads, but we are not the type of people to beat a dead shithorse. We will not drag this out any more today, just as we seem to be shaking off the great national hangover. But make no mistake...the shitreaper is coming, and we should all be very, very afraid. - Felonious Jive

Fall is winding down now...many of the summer's birds are already making themselves cozy on their wintering grounds, and we await for the winter's crop of waterfowl/raptors/gulls/rarities (???) to pile in. But the bay area's October bore one last juicy piece of fruit for me...LESSER SAND-PLOVER. After Matt Lau (birding hero) found and babysat the bird for several days, a small nerdsquadron was dispatched to make contact with the wayward Russian. Though a great many struggling birders had complained about the long, sandy walk out to the bird, we made a effortless beeline straight from the RCA Patch, complete with the blessing of the National Park Service as we were caught jumping the gate. Navigating our way through the dunes, we quickly found Matt Lau and a contingent of nerds, who were already on the bird.

I hadn't seen a Lesser Sand-Plover in a long time...a long time. Over 20 years in fact (thanks Don!). Now that I think about it, there is no other bird species I've seen before that I'd gone so long without seeing again. The plover did very plovery things, actively feeding almost the whole time we were there, which we appreciated considering that it does register pretty high on the drab scale.

Other birders really crushed the shit out of the bird on previous days, but we were in a foggy soup the whole time and wanted to avoid pushing around the Snowy Plovers it was with, so I'm happy with the mediocre images I got. Typically, one clueless birder coming towards us walked straight through the Snowy Plover flock without pause while we were waving our hands and shouting "no!" at him...ugh. Unbelievable. Not that a disturbance like that is the end of the world, but it's poor form to say the least.

Not that you can tell from these photos, but the thing that really struck me about this bird was how big it was...it was much, much bigger than its Snowy Plover buddies, and really stood out. It was also not particularly cute, which is unusual for smaller plover species. The bird I saw previously seemed very small at the time (but it was completely alone) and was also as cute as goddamn button, but it was an obvious juvenile. I'm not sure what the consensus is on the age of this bird. At any rate, I'd been hoping to reconnect with this species for a great many years, and was stoked to do it in a county I love birding in. Thanks again Matt!

There was also a pair of Red Phalaropes feeding on the open beach, which is super weird. There have been hordes of them inshore this year though, so it wasn't totally shocking.

While this has been a great fall for birding, it has not been so for photography, for some reason. Here are some American White Pelicans that helped buck the trend at Don Edwards National Wildlife Refuge.

White pelicans rank very high on the majestic scale, and I'm happy to have them around.

Not all monarchs migrate to Mexico; California has many important wintering sites as well. As with many birds, both the western and eastern monarch populations have experienced precipitous declines in the last 20 years. That's some shit. Photographed at Point Reyes, CA.

My last trip out to Point Reyes with Don Francisco was solid (hello golden-plovers, 112 species on the day) but did not produce anything interesting in the vague runt traps. The resident Great Horned Owls at Mendoza that roost above the cattle guard could give a fuck, but then again they don't seem to give a fuck about anything except sleeping.

I went out to Marin again last weekend to check out the new tidal marsh at Hamilton Field for the first time...damn, that place is good! Much vague runt potential there, and an impressive example of what restoration can do around these parts (it used to be an airfield). I stopped at the Las Gallinas Ponds on the way back, and had nothing unusual save for a brown blackbird with a yellow eye that I could not will into being a Rusty. This immature Red-tailed Hawk let me walk right under it though, so I gave it a quick crush.

Gadwalls...what would we do without Gadwalls? It is a necessary duck. Mark my words...the day Gadwalls go extinct will be the day human beings go extinct.

The bay area offers a great many opportunities to observe and photograph waterfowl at close range, but Cinnamon Teal are not particularly confiding, especially now that the Radio Road ponds are going to be out of commission. This hen didn't seem to know that though. She had a very drab, almost featureless facial pattern typical of the species.

That's all the time we have today. The Great Ornithologist Felonious Jive would like to thank the phenomenal Trailer Park Boys for his inspiration today. Until the next post, I highly recommend you hang up your keyboard commando boots and go birding...

Or drinking. That helps too.

The Right Side of History...Amateurs of Skulk...A Fowl of Mystery

This mama harrier was being followed around by a gaggle of needy juveniles. Nesting season has about run its course, and now thousands of birds are getting ready to fly the wrong direction and vagrate their way to California.  Coyote Hills Regional Park, Fremont, CA.

Before I start rambling about recent bird sightings, I need to talk about the last post...I couldn't believe the response that it elicited. That post rapidly rocketed to the second most popular post BB&B has ever put out, and really it is the most popular post among birders (Reddit traffic accounted for the higher popularity of another post).

This took me completely by surprise...but I think it captured something that no one had bothered to really explain before, at least not in depth. And the people were ready for it. Birders were coming out of the woodwork to congratulate me on that one, and amazingly I have yet to be trolled. Maybe it's because I have birding history on my side?  Or maybe the birders who prefer asking the internet for bird identification rather than opening a field guide don't read BB&B?  I don't think anyone read that post and thought "Things will never be the same...", but as #7 I have no choice but to bellow my trendsetting voice into the Birdosphere and hope the people will hear me.

And now, on to birds.

It's always deeply unsettling for birders to see harriers soaring high above them. Maybe because we are not used to it? Or maybe because this is the last thing millions of birds and rodents have seen over the years before they met their demise? This must be a terrifying angle of harrier-viewing for many creatures.

Big flocks of American White Pelicans wheeling around in the sky is never an unsettling sight. I can still remember how remarkable I thought it was the first few times I ran into some some big migrant flocks. Though no longer remarkable, I still find it difficult to look away. Photographed at Coyote Hills.

Lesser Goldfinches don't make it onto BB&B very often, mostly because I see them constantly. Familiarity breeds contempt. I don't despise them, it just doesn't occur to me to put them on here...and I don't know why I'm still trying to explain all of this to you. Lesser Goldfinches are late nesters, as evidenced by this female enthusiastically gathering nesting material. Photographed at Coyote Hills.

You know what they say...if you are going to put up pictures of absurdly common birds, you better crush them. This is for all of you out east who live a lonely, single-goldfinch-species-life.

Monarchs are suckers for milkweed, aren't they?  This one was busy laying eggs, not something I see very often with any butterfly. Photographed at Coyote Hills.

Not long ago one Flycatcher Jen graced the bay area with her brownish presence, but it was a bit of a struggle to figure out where we should go birding. Finally we settled on chasing a bizarre rarity...of sorts...with a stop for Least Bitterns on the way. The bitterns were not hard to find (a luxury when looking for Least Bittern, trust me) and we got solid looks at this mostly-grown chick. Photographed at the Las Gallinas Ponds, Marin County, CA.

There were two chicks doing a mediocre job of hiding in the reeds, with at least one adult flying around foraging for the chicks. I did not expect to be seeing Least Bittern chicks...they are masters of skulk, but I guess the young ones were still working on their mastery. This was a sweet sweet lifer for FJ, and a savory Marin County bird for me.

There were hordes of Common Gallinules out that day, with HY birds and chicks everywhere. I was dumbfounded when I saw this HY gallinule feeding a chick, which is obviously not its own (too young to breed). Maybe a sibling from a different brood? Anyone seen this before? One of the parent birds was very nearby and seemed ok with it. Photographed at the Las Gallinas Ponds.

This Cinnamon Teal hen was loafing in the sun with a few ducklings. The lighting was rough but it was too cute to not try for photos.  Photographed at the Las Gallinas Ponds.

We also saw this creature. Do you recognize it bellowing?

You probably recognize it, good for you. This Black-bellied Whistling-Duck was seen by birders for about a week on the east side of Santa Rosa before it disappeared. It is a troublesome bird, not because it was hard to find or because it attacked people with incapacitating whistles (I heard it whistle hella, and I remained capacitated), but because it is difficult to know where it came from.  It had no bands, no missing hallux. Could it be a natural vagrant? Maybe. Could it be an escaped bird? Maybe, but my source says it definitely did not come from Safari West, which houses myriad exotic animals. Photographed at Lake Ralphine, Santa Rosa.

The bird was hella tame, which some birders thought was indicative of a captive origin, though these birds are about as wary as your average park-dwelling coot or Mallard down in Texas.  I didn't find that very concerning. As the old saying goes, waterfowl can be wary or not depending on their location...my old Tufted Duck friend from Lake Merritt probably spent most of the year fleeing people on sight and the rest of the year swimming a couple feet away from horrible children hoping to be tossed a bread crumb. On one hand BBWD are notorious for being found far north of their normal range (mid-spring through early fall, generally), but on the other hand they don't have much of a pattern of occurrence for doing that in California. It's a tricky bird, more so (in my opinion) than the Gray Thrasher found in San Diego the same day, but a betting man would not put money on this bird getting a stamp of approval from The Bird Police. Such is birding.

A Variety of Cheese-laden Baleen

Baleen. When you see this, you believe it to be a variety of cheese-laden baleen. Surely this is baleen, no? Or perhaps the soft parts of a seagoing mollusc...just another friendly clam. Hello clam friend. Or is it just layers and layers of delicious sherbert lasagna?

There seems to be a large hole involved. Maybe we see a sea cucumber butthole? What's in that hole? A little fishy? Some have suggested that it is the armpit of an elderly birdwatcher; elderly birdwatchers can frequently be identified by their vibrant armpit colour, everybody knows that.

Nah, you are looking at none of those things. Just a wrinkly American White Pelican pouch.

This is one of the wild American White Pelicans that comes by to visit Hank at Lake Merritt for part of the year.  Once settled in they take a clue from Hank and abandon all fear of humans, and instead attempt to get handouts of succulent Tilapia from the staff at the lake' nature center.  I'm used to seeing Brown Pelicans stoop this low, but it is an odd thing to be looking at wild white pelicans from a few feet way while it eagerly hangs its massive bill over the short fence in hopes of a fish treat. They are imposing birds, after all.

Such sturdy feet.  Such stout legs.  So profoundly orange.

I don't often get to see how broad the mandible is on these birds, a perfect trap door for anything unfortunate enough to get caught in the bird's pouch.

Breast feathers.  I find this image calming.

If you are ever lucky enough to get friendly with an American White Pelican, enjoy it!  Despite the limited color palate, there is a lot to take in.

Winter Hangs On In The East Bay

Mmmmmm....Nelson's Sparrow.  Show me your orange face.  Show it to me at high tide.  Does anyone else think of Nelson Muntz whenever they hear the name of this bird?

Much of the Birdosphere is already talking about spring, and the eastern half of the U.S. is dying for spring, but here at BB&B we are desperately clinging to winter, if only because that is the season we associate with desperately needed rain and snow.  Listservs are being flooded with grave news of birds pairing up and flirting with each other, but that is not a dialogue that BB&B will be joining...not yet.  Foxtrot Oscar Sierra and Foxtrot Oscar Yankee are not phrases that abound, at least not for another couple weeks.  Winter birds are still here, after all, and aside from a swallow here and an Allen's Hummingbird there, the local avifanua remains distinctly winter-flavored.  Well, let's start things off with a rare bird and take it from there.

Nelson's Sparrows winter in California in low numbers (very low numbers), and after trying many times over the last few years to see our local bird or two at Arrowhead Marsh, I finally succeeded.  Although secretive (as expected), the bird was pretty confiding, giving some of the best looks I've ever had.


I had to manually focus for this shot, and bump up the ISO a bit.  Not bad, eh?  If I had a county nemesis bird, this would be the one, so getting such good looks was supremely satisfying. Good luck to you Nelson, on your way back to Saskatchewan or wherever it is you are about to be going.

Like Nelson's Sparrows, Marsh Wrens hate when you look at them, especially if you are nearby with the sun to your back, so it's always nice when they pop out in the open and even better when they sit for a portrait.  Unlike Nelson's Sparrows, Marsh Wrens have yet to be split, although some feel that that would be appropriate.  Photographed at Arrowhead Marsh.

For years I have known that Lake Merritt's outlet, the channel that connects it with the bay, was a good place to see Barrow's Goldeneyes up close, but I had always settled with seeing them occasionally on the lake itself, often at great and uninspiring distances.  I finally decided to check out the channel and was rewarded with this female Barrow's, my Foxtrot Oscar Sierra and Lima Oscar Sierra, which provided some of the best looks I've had of the species.

Interesting pattern on the bill...I'm not sure how much of that darkness is actual pigment and how much is accumulated gunk.  It's possible she is a young bird, retaining some of the mandibular darkness of a juvenile, but I don't think there is a way to conclusively know.

Perhaps you, the discerning birder, were concerned about the first two photos of the Barrow's Goldeneye.  Perhaps you liked the yellow bill, but not the head shape.  This is where your concerns can be laid to rest.  This is where you can tuck them into bed and say goodnight, and sing them the last lullaby they will ever hear.  Birds can change their head shape....it is known. Diving ducks often flatten their crowns when actively feeding...now you know.

It would have been preferable to have the hen Barrow's next to a hen Common, but drakes are better looking so I'm not complaining.

A female Common Goldeneye shows off the classic head shape and bill pattern one would expect of the species, although I wasn't expecting to see her on such a towering perch. Interesting approach.

Greater Scaup are the bane of molluscs, and they take their mollusc-bane very seriously. Photographed at Lake Merritt's outflow.

I wish my digestive system would allow me to just choke down entire shellfish...but if I could do that I might be a type of scaup, which is an odd thing to consider.

Big plumes are sprouting from the backs of egrets everywhere.  Great Egrets are ubiquitous in wetlands around the bay, and despite their abundance they will not be ignored.   I think it's fascinating that birds with such large ranges can be incredibly variable or, to our eye, very homogeneous...for example, there are 13 recognized subspecies of Marsh Wrens in North America, but just 1 subspecies of Great Egret that we know of.  Perhaps if they had more variety in their color palate there would be noticeable geographic variation, but then again maybe not.  Photographed at the Lake Merritt outflow.

Is Willet the new phalarope?  A Peregrine Falcon in the area was keeping the shorebirds from their preferred roosting destination, and out of frustration this Willet flock simply landed on the open water. Photographed at Arrowhead Marsh.

Did that unconvential Willet flock get you worked up?  Relax with this bucolic Spotted Sandpiper. Photographed at Lake Merritt's outflow.

You all know Hank, the world's most famous American White Pelican that lives at Lake Merritt.  I prefer to photograph Hank's wild, free-flying buddies when they are around (Hank is a cripple and was brought here from Oregon, where she collided with powerlines), but Hank just looks so damn sexy this time of year I had to crush her face.  And yes, as far as anyone can tell Hank is a girl, she was presumably named before anyone saw her next to any other pelicans (males are noticeably larger, though there is overlap).

This is my favorite photo I have of her, without a doubt.

In case you were thinking about being in a good mood today, here is a lynched cormorant for you to look at. What a shitty way to die...life is pain. Photographed at Lake Merritt.