2 November 2020

 see eBird data at:  https://ebird.org/checklist/S75752233

Weather:  8 am, 2C,  wind SW 2 kph,  12m  13C wind E 9 kph

Tide:  8 am 4.4m, falling

First day out after "falling back" from daylight saving time.  Morning started clear, but grew cloudy as the day progressed.  There was patchy frost.

 I realise I haven't shown pictures of the path from my home to the way into the estuary, which runs through blackberry bushes and other shrubbery between homes and a drainage channel.  

Strange to relate there seems to be more mammalian wildlife apparent on the path then within the estuary. This morning it started with rabbit droppings on my front porch (could it be that the rabbits could smell the carrots I keep in my storeroom?).  There are deer in the mobile home park-and this morning, they too left evidence of their visit on my lawn.  

Further along the path:

And what I take to be raccoon tracks along a makeshift bridge.  The bridge was frosty this morning and the posts although tied together tend to shift a bit underfoot.  It requires a bit of caution to navigate.

It wasn't the most birdy morning.  The pond which has usually had hooded mergansers and mallards was unoccupied.  I wonder if the high tide draws them elsewhere.  Actually I saw no hoodies and wonder if they've moved on...

There were the usual juncos.  They're so common that I usually don't bother photographing them, but they are rather engaging.

 

The shore at high tide:

 I usually sit for a while overlooking the shore--there are now flocks of gulls and ducks--mostly mallards and wigeons, but careful scanning shows buffleheads, goldeneyes, shovelers and northern pintails.  Most are too distant to photograph well, but can be identified.  There are also eagles terrorising the flocks--the strategy is to keep the ducks from resting so they can be picked off easily.  It works, too.  O ne of the popular eagle trees had a mallard wing lying beneath it this morning.

The view changes every day, depending on the tide and the weather and the flocks.  

Making my way back along the river, I counted at least 50 red-breasted mergansers in the stream.  Most seemed to be headed downstream.

The river and the gravel bar about a kilometre inland was full of salmon making for the spawning area upstream.  I gather this is the attractant for gulls, mergansers, mallards, and eagles.

 

The dipper was there again.  From what I read in the Cornell Birds of the World website, dippers often settle in one area for the winter.  I hope this little creature will do so.  Today I couldn't get good photos--there was simply never a clear shot--but he sang quite wonderfully.   Once again, the area is an attractant for humans watching the salmon, who don't begin to understand about the "chunky little songbird."  

 

"[H]is music is that of the streams refined and spiritualized. The deep booming notes of the falls are in it, the trills of the rapids, the gurgling of margin eddies, the low whispering of level reaches, and the sweet tinkle of separate drops oozing from the ends of mosses and falling into tranquil ponds." —John Muir, 1894 (1: 283).  (From the Cornell Birds of the World website.)

 

A longish morning, but a good one.