i used to hate birds.

Last week I took the dogs on a long walk around one of my favorite clearcuts on Larch Mountain.  Not many bird photo ops, but heard lots of good birds and saw lots of wildflowers.  One bird I did manage to photograph was my county Townsend's Solitaire (finally!):


As you know, I took the dogs on a walk along the Marine Drive bike path last week also.  Obviously the weasel was the highlight, but a lone foxglove was cool too...


On Saturday my friend and I went for a hike on Silver Star Mountain up in Washington.   The hike begins with lovely views and they only get better as you go up!


Even with all the cloud cover we could pick out Mount St Helens, Mount Rainier, Mount Adams, and Mount Hood.  On a clear day I imagine you can see even more.


Of course there were flowers...

Ok, so far not many birds in this post.  Let's change that!  Yesterday I decided to head back to Wasco County to hunt down the Grasshopper Sparrows I missed on my previous visit.  I drove directly to a spot on …

On this morning's dog walk on the Marine Drive bike path I noticed a little animal up ahead, running towards us.  What is that?  A squirrel?  A squirrel carrying a baby squirrel?  Nope.







Holy crap!  I think it's a long-tailed weasel but not sure.  How freakin awesome.  Made my week!   Maybe even my month!  Good times!!

I spent Saturday hitting up some new and some old spots in Wasco County.  Not much to say today so I'll just skip to the goods...

This week has been all about the motorless birding.  Mays Lake, Mason Wetlands, the Columbia River, random Columbia Slough spots, secret lakes and ponds... 

Baby...blackbird? Starling?  Mays Lake

From Wednesday's dogwalk out to Mason Wetlands...

Mason Wetlands has become one of my regular patches- I've had 71 species there this year alone.  I tend to stay out of the actual wetlands part to avoid disrupting all the birds and animals.  It's not that large of an area so it's easy enough to scan the place with bins from various spots around the wetlands.  But on Wednesday I watched two goobers with binoculars walk right on through, flushing birds left and right...


There are no signs prohibiting this behavior, but still... disheartening.  You don't need to trample everything to see the birds there, and you'd probably see more by not doing this.  Ugh.  Anyway. 

It's officially Mallard duckling season...


From yesterday's walks...

Along one part of the slough …