Wildflower o'clock.

It's that magical time:  wildflower season in the Columbia River Gorge but also spring migration! Time to see all the things outside all the time.  Scattered dry days have been great for heading out to Catherine Creek for flowers, and rainy days have been the standard for birding locally.  Here I will combine the flowers from a recent day in the gorge with the birds I've been seeing recently.

Sunrise at Catherine Creek

 Dutchman's breeches (Dicentra cucullaria)

 Yellow-headed Blackbird, Shillapoo Lake

 Upland larkspur (Delphinium nutallianum)

 Checker lily (or Mission bells) (Fritillaria affinis)

 Fingers crossed this will be a Red-breasted Sapsucker nest, Meadowbrook Marsh


Pacific Hound's tongue (Cynoglossum grande)

 Camas field with Mount Hood

Acorn Woodpecker, Catherine Creek (Klickitat County bird!)

 What is this??

 Chickweed monkeyflower (Erythanthe alsinoides)

 Wilson's Snipe, Meadowbrook Marsh

Naked broomrape (Orobanche uniflora) with monkeyflower and miniature lupine (I think)

 Meadow death camas (Toxicoscordion venenosum)

 Shooting stars (need to learn to differentiate these guys)

 Hermit Thrush, Meadowbrook Marsh Park (Clark County year bird!)



 Jacob getting nerdy with his iPad


 Mount Hood


White camas!


Bushtit working on her nest, Meadowbrook Marsh

That's it for birds and flowers.  In other news the couple of recent warm days were enough to wake up my mason bees!


Unfortunately I noticed that at least one of the bees has some pollen mites.


Not sure there's anything I can do about it at this point.  That's what I get for never cleaning my cocoons.


Lastly, if you enjoy cuteness and dead stuff and need to kill your phone battery quick, it's a great time to watch the Barred Owl nest box web cam on the Cornell website.  Three little white monkeys are being sat on and fed fish (I had no idea) and dead rodents.  A couple screenshots from last night:


Happy spring!!!

Comments

  1. Wow there's a lot of gorgeousness here and so well-rounded! It's the complete nature blog package.
    Sneaky snipe is my fave.
    A person who has a bead on nesting Sapsuckers is a very lucky person.

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    1. I am really hoping for some ragged sapsucker children this spring!

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  2. Great wildflower shots! And the birds aren't bad, either. No idea what that mystery flower is. It looks a bit like a Clematis tanguica flower, but wrong time of year and wrong location. Plus I assume it wasn't on a vine. I'm intrigued, so I'll do a little research...

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    1. When we were out there Jacob kept saying "We gotta bring Jane out here sometime!" Glad you liked the flowers!

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  3. Your curling tri-split plant thing looks like an Ionic column. Perhaps your mason bees are reviving classical architecture?

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    1. If my mason bees start branching out in their masonry like that I will be very excited.

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  4. Magnificent wildflowers and Landscape shots some pretty cool Birds to hope you get that sapsucker nest

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    Replies
    1. Thanks, Sondra! Small potatoes compared to everything you've been seeing lately!!

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