Buena Vista Lagoon January

Today was the monthly bird count.  We didn't see very many birds this time.  The weather started out somewhat cool and cloudy, but the clouds soon went away and it became quite hot.  Below are two photos I took of the lagoon.

For some reason, we've suddenly started seeing northern flickers at the lagoon.  Before now, we almost never saw flickers, but last month we saw one and today we saw three.  Northern flickers are found in Alaska and Canada in the summer and Mexico in the winter.  Throughout most of the United States, they are around all year.  They have bluish-gray heads and light brown bodies.  They have black spots on their bellies and black stripes on their backs.  Under their wings is bright red.  Males have a red malar (area on the face just below the cheek).  One of the flickers I saw let me get fairly close to it before flying a short distance away.  I was surprised at how large it was.  They're about a foot long from beak to tail.  They are also very loud.  The one I saw was calling "kew" over and over.  Below is a photo of it in a tree.

Northern Flicker

They were several common yellowthroats flitting around through the reeds and bushes.  Below is a photo of one of them.

Common Yellowthroat

There were several red-tailed hawks as well.  Below are photos of two of them.

Red-tailed Hawk

Red-tailed Hawk

Since it was such a warm day, quite a few western fence lizards came out to bask in the sun.  Below is photo of one of them.  It was watching me very carefully, and dashed into a crack in the wood when I came to close.

Western Fence Lizard

There were quite a few song sparrows around.  A few of them were singing.  Below is one of them in a bush.

Song Sparrow

There were many Anna's hummingbirds flying around.  They were chasing each other all over.  One of them, a male, came up close to me and sang its squeaky song.  Below is a photo of it.

Anna's Hummingbird

There were a couple mourning doves here and there.  Mourning doves are very nervous birds.  The one in the photo below was looking down at me and flew away when I walked underneath it.  Another one ran away from me on the ground.

Mourning Dove

There were probably over two hundred northern shovelers at the lagoon.  They were everywhere.  Below is a female swimming and 'shoveling' with its bill.

Northern Shoveler

The Vista Village Creek

I've been visiting the Vista Village Creek in downtown Vista a few times with my parents.  I've been looking for an adult male hooded merganser.  Right now, there is almost always a female and immature male (see the bottom of this post), but I haven't seen the adult male yet.  He's been there, though, because my parents saw him once.

The Vista Village Creek is a small, artificially-made park, but sometimes there are interesting birds, especially in the early morning or when it isn't crowded.   I've seen green herons fairly close up there, and there are also the mergansers.  My parents saw Townsend's warblers there as well.  Below is a view from the park.

In the early morning there aren't many ring-billed gulls.  There are usually only two or three.  Later in the day, there are many more of them.  Below is an immature ring-billed gull.  Immature ring-bills have pink legs and beaks, a dark tip on their beak, and dark eyes.  They also have some brown on their wings.

Ring-billed Gull

Today, there was a great blue heron standing on a rock in the creek.  It just stood there for a while, looking at me.  Then it crouched down to hunt.  I don't know what it's eating there, but it caught something in the water.  Below is a photo of it.

Great Blue Heron

All day long, there is a large flock of mallards at the creek.  In the early morning, they are up on the grass, but as more people come by, they move to the water.  Even though mallards are common, they're still very pretty ducks, so below are a few photos I took of them.

Mallard

Mallard

Mallards

Before I saw them at the creek, I'd never seen hooded mergansers before.  Hooded mergansers are found in the southeast and west coast of the Untied States in the winter and the northeast and southern Canada in the summer.  In parts of the eastern United States, they are around all year.  Females are brownish gray with darker backs and white below.  They have a brown crest, yellow-edged beak, and dark eyes.  Immature males are similar to females, except their beaks are black and they have brown or yellow eyes.  Adult males have black backs, white bellies, reddish-brown sides, yellow eyes, and a white crest.  Both males and females are small with fairly long tails and thin beaks.  They eat small fish, crustaceans, and insects, and they nest in trees.  Below are two photos of the immature male, and a photo of the male and female.

Hooded Merganser

Hooded Merganser

Hooded Mergansers

Guajome Park

Yesterday my dad and I went to Guajome Park.  The sky was clear and it got pretty warm.  There were more people than usual there, but we still saw quite a few birds.

There were many, many northern shovelers there.  Many were in large, compact flocks out on the water.  Below is a male.

Northern Shoveler

I hadn't seen Canada geese at Guajome before (probably because there isn't a lot of open ground), but yesterday a flock of nine flew in and landed on the pond.  Canada geese summer in Canada and winter in the southern United States and Mexico.  They are around all year in most of the United States and parts of Canada.  Typically, they have dark necks and heads with white cheeks, gray bodies, and black tails.  However, the shade of gray, their size and the amount of white on their face can vary widely.  They're often found in open spaces such as flat marshes and golf courses.  There were many feral geese at the park as well, but the Canada stayed far apart from them, away from the shore.  Below are two photos of the Canada geese.

Canada Geese

Canada Geese

I don't think there were as many American coots as there were shovelers, but there were still a lot of them.  Below are two photos of coots.  There is also a shoveler at the top of the first photo.

American Coots and Northern Shoveler

American Coot

There were a few feral geese, as I mentioned before.  I believe they were domesticated greylag and swan geese.  (Greylag geese are brownish gray above and white below and are native to Europe.  Swan geese are brown above and white below with yellowish sides and a large lump on their foreheads and are native to Asia.)  Domesticated geese and ducks can almost always be told apart from native ones by their deep bellies.  I don't know if they are breeding or if people just keep releasing more, but no-one seems to be doing anything about them.  Below is a feral swan goose stretching its wings. 

Domesticated Swan Goose

The feral geese, coots, and ducks all hung around together near the shore, though the shovelers do not take hand-outs like the others (though bread shouldn't be given to any of them).  Below is a group of shovelers, coots, and geese.

Geese, Ducks, and Coots

There were also some great-tailed grackles looking for food (sometimes they'll join the waterfowl along the shore looking for bread).  Below is a female great-tailed grackle taking a bath.

Great-tailed Grackle

There were tons of common yellowthroats flitting about in the reeds and bushes.  Below is a male.

Common Yellowthroat

We saw one Townsend's warbler high up in a tree.  Townsend's warblers summer in western Canada, southern Alaska, and the northwestern United States.  They winter along the Pacific coast, southern Mexico, and Central America.  They have yellow faces with blacks caps, cheeks, and throats.  They have yellow chests and white bellies with black streaks on their sides.  Their backs are greenish-gray, and they have two white wing-bars.  Their boldly-marked faces are probably their most distinctive feature.  They are often found high up in coniferous trees, like the one below.

Townsend's Warbler

There were many beautiful views along the trails.  Below are a few of them.

We saw a couple of downy woodpeckers around.  Below are two photos of one of them.  The top photo shows it from the side (no spots on its sides; as opposed to a Nuttall's, which does have spots).  The bottom one shows its back and the large white patch (only downy and hairy have it).  There seem to be more downy woodpeckers at Guajome than Nuttall's, though I'm not sure why.

Downy Woodpecker

Downy Woodpecker

There was one greater roadrunner.  I think it was trying to startle some little animals to catch, because it was fluffing up its crest and tail as it hurried along.  Greater roadrunners are found year-round in the southwestern United States and Mexico.  They are large and streaked brown.  They are paler below and have a small crest.  They are often seen on the ground or on wooden posts or rocks.  They hunt lizards, snakes, small mammals and birds, and large insects.  They are related to cuckoos.  Below is a photo of the roadrunner.

Greater Roadrunner

There was a small group of killdeer running around on a hill.  There were about five of them and they were making little "ki" noises.  Below are photos of three of them.

Killdeer

Killdeer

There were a few butterflies flying around.  Below is a photo of a mourning cloak butterfly.  Two of them were fluttering around over the grass and seem to like landing on this tree stump.

Mourning Cloak Butterfly

One exciting bird for us was a red-breasted sapsucker.  Neither of us had seen one before.  Red-breasted sapsuckers summer along the western coast of Canada and winter in California.  In between along the coast, they are found year-round.  They have almost entirely red heads and chests (except for some white on their faces) and are yellowish below.  They have black and white backs and black wings with a bold white patch.  Sapsuckers, as their name suggests, eat sap.  They also eat insects and fruit like other woodpeckers.  Below are two photos of the sapsucker.  The top photo shows its back, wings, and some of its red head.  The bottom one (sorry, it's a bit blurry) shows its side and some of its head.

Red-breasted Sapsucker

Red-breasted Sapsucker

Christmas Bird Count

Saturday was the Christmas Bird Count at the Buena Vista Lagoon!  It is a large event where, from mid-December to early January, people all across North America get together and count birds.  It's managed by the National Audubon Society, and they gather up all the checklists.  It is very fun and helps us see how different bird populations are doing.  All together we saw over seventy species, and this year, like every year, the people at the nature center served free (and very tasty) chili.

There were quite a few people at the Buena Vista Lagoon.  My dad and I went there early to look for birds in the eucalyptus forest.  It was very beautiful.

We didn't see many birds there, though we saw about a hundred crows.  They sat in the trees and were very, very noisy.  They didn't like us being there and followed us, trying to drive us away.  Below is a photo of part of the group.

American Crows

We didn't think we'd see any hawks there because of the crows, but we saw two red-shouldered hawks sitting together on the other side of a hill.  Below is a photo of them.

Red-shouldered Hawks

After walking through the eucalyptus, we went to the nature center.  It was very beautiful there, too.  The sky was quite clear and bright.  It was great lighting for birdwatching.

One of the first birds I saw there was an osprey sitting in a tree.  It was looking down at us.  Below is a photo of it.

Osprey

We also saw a few more American crows.  Below is one of them.

American Crow

A mourning dove trying to keep very still on the ground so I wouldn't see it.  Because it stayed still, I was able to take a pretty good photo.  They are very pretty birds.  Below is the mourning dove.

Mourning Dove

There were many, many hummingbirds (both Anna's and Allen's) zipping around and fighting with each other.  Below is a photo of an Anna's hummingbird.

Anna's Hummingbird

There were at least four red-tailed hawks flying around the lagoon.  Below are photos of two of them.

Red-tailed Hawk

Red-tailed Hawk

There weren't many Cassin's kingbirds around.  I only saw a few.  Below is one of them sitting on a telephone wire.

Cassin's Kingbird

There were a surprisingly large number of white-throated swifts flying around.  Normally, we only see two or three, if any, but Saturday there was a whole flock of them flying around and around above us.  White-throated swifts summer in the western United States and winter in South America.  They are found all year round in the southwest and Mexico.  They have white sides and throats and the rest is black.  Swifts are similar in appearance to swallows, but are, in fact, more closely related to hummingbirds.  They can be told apart from swallows by their scythe-shaped wings and stiffer movements.  Below is one of the swifts.

White-throated Swift

We don't usually see turkey vultures, but Saturday one flew right over us.  Below is a photo of it.

Turkey Vulture

There were hundreds of seagulls flying around.  Below is a photo of part of a large flock.  I'm not positive what species they are, but they might be California gulls.

Seagulls

There were quite few black phoebes around.  Below is one of them in a tree.

Black Phoebe

There was a little ruby-crowned kinglet hopping around in a tree.  It came right out in the open, though it moved much to quickly to take many photos.  Below is the one clear photo I took of it.

Ruby-crowned Kinglet

One exciting bird we saw was a least bittern.  It was hiding in the reeds, but came out for us before flying away.  Least bitterns summer in most of the eastern United States and in parts of the southwest.  They winter in South America and are found all year in southern California and Florida and parts of Mexico.  They are very small and very shy.  They are reddish-brown all over and have black on their wings, backs, and heads.  They are paler and streaked on their chests.  Below are two photos of the least bittern.

Least Bittern

Least Bittern

We went down to the beach and it was beautiful there, as it was everywhere else.

There was one lone Heermann's gull standing on the beach.  Below is a photo of it.

Heermann's Gull

There were not nearly as many sanderlings around as last time.  There were only a few.  Below is a photo of three of them.  They all seemed to be resting.

Sanderlings

There was a little eared grebe diving and popping up again right in front of us.  It also took a little bath.  It was very fluffy and small.  Below is a photo of it.

Eared Grebe

There was a single Say's phoebe down by the beach.  There always seems to be one around there.  Below is a photo of it sitting on a fence.

Say's Phoebe

There were a couple of American kestrels around.  Below are two photos of the same male kestrel sitting on a telephone wire and a chimney.

American Kestrel

American Kestrel

Until we went to the beach, we didn't see any brown pelicans.  When we went there, though, there were suddenly tons of pelicans.  Below is a flock of nine flying in a V.

Brown Pelicans

There were only a couple whimbrels at the beach.  Only one let me get very close.  Below is a photo of it.

Whimbrel