#i also got photos of a pelican and a whimbrel but they are not as clear as these
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I saw them try to steal someones lunch
#photography#seagull#birds#it is soooo much easier to take nice photos of seagulls#compared to the other birds near my house#these guys are not nearly as skittish#i could get super close without them getting startled#i guess it might be because theyre used to people#but i did also have to deal with annoying people who would yell and run directly into a group of birds while im takin photos of them :(#i also got photos of a pelican and a whimbrel but they are not as clear as these#and i could be wrong but i think this is a heermann's gull and a california gull
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A few more bird updates! Campanile falcons, birdwatching this morning, and a reply about a previous birdwatching outing.
The Campanile peregrine falcons fledged today! The female, named Lindsay [after the wildlife rehabilitation facility that treated Grinnell when he was injured in the autumn], went first, which is unusual, but I suspect she was the one who hatched first. She hopped down to the “fledge ledge” a little before 6am, and took her first flight before any of the Fledge Watch volunteers had arrived. When they got there, they spotted her on top of one of the campus libraries. Yay! And then this evening her little brother Grinnell Jr. jumped out and flew a little loop back to the nest level at the Campanile, and then a minute later he took a longer flight and landed in a tree.
This morning, I went birdwatching with a friend, but we didn’t make it to the salt marsh. Instead, we went to some mudflats when the tide was starting to come in after a very low tide. We saw lots of birds, including some I hadn’t really managed to identify before and also several “high-quality” birds:
4 American avocets
at least one whimbrel
lots and lots of marbled godwits (I reported 60), though some were far away and could have been whimbrels or curlews or dowitchers or something else.
at least 60 brown pelicans, some juvenile or immature [@lies, is there a technical difference between juvenile and immature? I feel like there probably is.]--they are ridiculous creatures.
2 great blue herons being tall and dorky
1 great egret, flying
at least 30 snowy egrets
3 black-crowned night herons! which is more than I usually see in one outing
a barn swallow
a bunch of (20?) cliff swallows
at least 3 northern rough-winged swallows, we think based on Merlin’s sound ID and the fact that some of the swallows didn’t have the coloration of the cliff swallow.
I was especially pleased about the swallows, which I normally struggle to identify--having someone else with me who is more familiar with swallows helped, and also there were enough of them swooping pretty nearby that we were able to get a good look. The cliff swallows and northern rough-winged swallows were new to my eBird life list.
A reply about a previous birdwatching outing:
lies said: I’ve usually seen “peep sp.” used to lump together Calidris shorebirds like western sandpiper and least sandpiper. From your report a fledgling black-necked stilt sounds like a good guess. Did it look like the young bird in this beautiful photo by Dorian Anderson? macaulaylibrary.org/ass…
What a great photo! Yes, that does look like what I saw, as far as I remember. Very cute! Should I edit the list to say it was a black-necked stilt baby?
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Day 8: Tarcoles River Bird Watching
In addition to the many crocodiles I saw on the Tarcoles River, I also saw different types of birds! Many of the birds were far away or high in the treetops, so I only got a few photos. All the birds I saw on this tour, were...
A Boat Billed Heron (photo #1)
A Roseate Spoonbill (photo #2)
A Little Blue Heron (photo #3)
A Bare Throated Tiger-Heron (photo #4)
A Common Night Hawk (photo #5)
A Magnificent Frigatebird (photo #6),
A Snowy Egret (photo #7).
Other birds I saw but couldn’t get a photo of included a White Ibis, a Brown Pelican, a Great Egret, a Whimbrel, a Willet, Black Vulture, a Yellow-Headed Caraca, an Osprey, a Mangrove Swallow, and an Amazon Kingfisher!
Seeing these birds in their natural habitat was an amazing experience. While birdwatching is very fun, it’s also very important that we do everything we can to protect these birds and birds all over the world. Some big ways to help birds include not chopping down trees, keeping the water and ground clean, and creating “wildlife refuges” where birds can feel protected. A wildlife refuge is a big area of land made just for birds and animals and is usually located far away from houses and noise. Some little ways to help the birds include sprinkling birdseed in your backyard, and picking up any trash that you find on the ground, so the birds don’t eat it. When people go on birdwatching tours like these (or if you ever want to watch the birds in your neighborhood), it’s important to stay far away and not make too much noise. In the eyes of a tiny bird, humans can look big and scary! And the last thing we want to do is make any bird feel scared of us.
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