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Week Forty-seven, February 4-10, 2002

Sunday, February 10, 2002

This was another off-day in the bird research department, but while Natalie and I joined friends on a trip to Seattle, with a stop in Tukwila for dim-sum on the way, we did see a few hawks in the Auburn and Kent valleys. And after eating dim-sum, as we walked out to the car we saw the red-tailed hawk that is in the photo above. It flew over closer to us just as we went to get in the car, so I walked around for a decent view and tried to squeeze off a shot before it launched back into the air, but the hawk beat me by a second.

While we haven't accomplished much birding or research this weekend, we will make up for it next weekend. Our trip to Eastern Washington that was snowed out last month is scheduled to take place next weekend. We should be able to scout out some sites for inclusion in our book while seeing a lot of birds that we have never seen on the three-day trip. We are both looking forward to it!

Saturday, February 9, 2002

Our plans to get out for birding research today fell through when I woke up feeling under the weather with a sore throat and fighting a cold. We had planned to head over to the Hood Canal area for book research and photos. But we still had a dose of birding related activity tonight. Last week we finally joined the local Tahoma Audubon Society, and tonight was the annual banquet. So we had food, bought some old issues of National Geographic magazine in the auction (about birds and butterflies, of course), and then listened to a talk about crows and ravens by a professor at the University of Washington.

An interesting thing about the speaker at tonight's dinner is that Natalie is reading a book about a research project he did on ravens in winter in Maine, and we had no idea that he was the same person who was speaking tonight.

Friday, February 8, 2002

I got on the bike and ventured over to visit M this morning, and on the way home, even though I have taken photos like it before, I couldn't resist taking another photo of the Tacoma Narrows Bridge with the Olympic Mountains looming in the distance. Taking this shot made me think about this summer. There are plans that could result in construction of a second Narrows Bridge starting this summer, and I have toyed with the idea of taking weekly or even more frequent photos from the same location all the way through the construction. That could be a monotonous project to shoot, but the end result could be interesting.

Tonight I settled in to watch the opening ceremonies of the Winter Olympics in Utah, first watching it live on Canadian TV and then watching the tape delayed version on NBC here in the U.S.

Thursday, February 7, 2002

Yep...another closeup of a very common bird. This time the shot is a house sparrow feeding in our side yard, taken in better lighting conditions than yesterday's house finch shot. I have seen some great photos taken using gear similar to this, but I seriously need practice. Somehow, I think that in the process of researching and writing Birding Washington over the next nine months that I will have plenty of chances for practice.

Wednesday, February 6, 2002

I started experimenting today with creating a template to make it easier to center the lens of our Nikon CoolPix 950 on the eye piece of our Swift Nighthawk spotting scope that we use for birding. I took the cap from a bottle and carved a hole large enough to fit the Nikon lens through, then I nestle the cap and lens inside the eye relief on the Swift scope and carefully hold the whole mess together while focusing on a bird for a close up shot.

I need some practice at this, and this afternoon it was pretty dark outside when I snapped the shot above of a house finch at one of our feeders. Not a great bird, but this is practice...

Tuesday, February 5, 2002

A dark and damp day kept me indoors once again, for the most part today. But there was an exception. This morning I ventured down to the fish incubator in Puget Creek to check on the water flow through the unit as I am doing on every Tuesday right now. And after checking the incubator, M and I took Rhia and walked her in the pouring rain along Ruston Way, while cormorants and common goldeneyes watched us from a few yards off the shoreline during the high tide.

I had the camera as well as binoculars with me as we walked, but it was raining so hard that I didn't feel like taking the camera out for a damp photo. Instead, today I post a photo taken of one of the cactus plants that Natalie and I have blooming right now in the living room. We have four cactus blooming at the same time - a first to be sure - and the shot of color is just what the doctor ordered at this dark time of year, when the weeks of gray and wet wear upon us the hardest...

Monday, February 4, 2002

This was a glorious day in the weather department. Temperatures rose to above 45 degrees after a brisk morning low of 26, and I wandered out into the front yard with thoughts of gardening in mind. It is about time to do some heavy-duty weeding and go out to plant things like peas and lettuce and spinach.

While I was contemplating the garden, I startled a pair of robins from the yard and then glanced up to view the clouds swirling overhead - precursors to the next storm system that is supposed to hit tomorrow. I snapped my daily photo of those swirling clouds and spent time watching the pine siskins eating at our feeders.

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