Blog of the Plague Year(s)

 eBird Data: https://ebird.org/checklist/S82387866 Weather:  8 am 4C wind WNW 11, 1pm 9C wind NW 24, gusts 35 Tide:  11 am 3.2 m, turning Another fine day.  A strong wind out of the north, clearing the air to alpine quality.     My knee behaving much better. The wind keeps the little birds down in the shrubbery much of the time, so less to see and report than yesterday, particularly early in the morning. Eagles, however, seem to ride the wind with aplomb.  I’d always felt they were somewhat over-rated.  (Me and Benjamin Franklin, I guess, but as I spend more time around them, they start to—um—grow on me?  They are quite magnificent in their way.) I’m told the BC Ferry service shut down this morning due to the wind. I’d heard the surf in the night, louder than I can recall, and when I reached the shore, the Straits were decidedly “gnarly,” to use a term that one of my fellow Estuary walkers uses for wild weather. My coffee and duck-counti...

 eBird Data: https://ebird.org/checklist/S82329773 Weather:  8 am, 1C wind SSE 2;  12m 9C wind WNW 14 gust 27 Tide:  10:30 3.4m, rising After 9 days with a gimpy knee, I finally made it back to the Estuary this morning.  Didn't quite manage the full circuit, thinking I should likely take it a bit easy, but it was a fine walk, and the weather was lovely.  It rained heavily last night, but by the time I set out it was sunny.   The fields and paths were wet at first with glistening shrubbery. Trees are budding out. The merganser pond is free of ice (there were still frosty patches here and there along the way) and reflected the day. Near the pond, I met up with a mystery.   This is a perfectly ordinary junco, I think: But it was singing something very strange:  "Tweet, tweet, tweet, whiss-KEY!"  over and over.  Never heard that from any bird before.  It was definitely the junco--no other bird nearby.  I wonder ...

  12 February eBird Data: https://ebird.org/checklist/S80987941 Weather:  8am -3C wind SSE 8, 1pm -1C wind ESE 12 Tide:  11 am 3.4m, turning 13 February eBird Data:  https://ebird.org/checklist/S81258634 Weather:  10 am -2C wind WNW 2,  2pm 0C wind calm, light snow throughout the morning, after heavy snowfall during night Tide:  12 noon 3.1m, turning to rise 12 February A cold morning.  Light overcast.  The paths are frozen hard, which makes walking much easier than dealing with mud.   The other day I met a guy here who said he worked in forestry but who seemed to have a good sense of weather.  He explained this kind of cloud formation in a way that makes sense to me. I often see this kind of wrinkled cloud over Parksville.  It's not something I remember seeing a lot elsewhere.  He says the air mass gets "piled up" between the Coast Range to the east and the mountains on Vancouver Island, and especially here, whe...

 eBird data: https://ebird.org/checklist/S81766682 Weather:  8:30 am 3C wind W 8; 2pm 8C, wind WNW 5 Tide:  10:30 AM 4.1m, falling A relatively quiet morning, birdwise.  Much warmer than it's been lately, and sunny, with stratus clouds. At the beginning of the walk, the snow was crunchy and crusty and rather difficult underfoot, but beautiful.   By the end of the walk the snow had almost all converted to slush and mud. The path leading to the trailhead was, as usual, rich in LBBs.   The snow showed tracks from various creatures--deer, raccoon, and quail. I hadn't realised that quail were so abundant on Vancouver Island.  They're scarce on the Lower Mainland, but there are lots of them here and to the south as well. The merganser pond was still frozen over.  The morning light in the alders was lovely. The tide was falling, and the duck population must have been elsewhere.  There were a few Canada geese, and a flock of dunlin. Th...

10 February eBird data:  https://ebird.org/checklist/S80768939 Weather:  8 am 0C, wind W5,  12 m 1C, wind NW4,  light dry snow Tide:  10:30 3.6M 11 February eBird data: https://ebird.org/checklist/S80824729 Weather:  8 am -2C wind SE 8, 12 m 0C wind SE 6, cloudy Tide:  10:30 3.6m falling Funny, eh?  Last couple of weeks I've been writing about the onset of spring and now!  We get this arctic influx, and although so far it's not been as cold as was forecast (thank goodness) it's been decidedly wintry. Yesterday (the 10th) the snowfall was the little efficient flakes I used to see in the Interior and Alberta--nothing big and wet, cold, and steady.  I went out for my walk, expecting the big sloppy flakes, but no, just cold.  Not very birdy, either.  From what I saw, the shorebirds were well offshore, and the LBBs sensibly hunkered down into the shrubbery. It was beautiful, though,  in a chilly and rather austere way:...

  8 February eBird data: https://ebird.org/checklist/S80668045 Weather:  8 am 0C, wind WSW7, clear,  1 pm,  3C wind NNW 13, partly cloudy Tide:  11 AM, 4m, rising 9 February eBird data:  https://ebird.org/checklist/S80718428 Weather:  8 am -1C, wind W5, cloudy;  1pm 2C wind NNE4 cloudy, clearing Tide:  10:30 am 3.7m turning 8 February The weather is definitely cooling down this week, but at least it isn't raining.  The morning of the 8th started brilliantly clear, but clouded over as time passed.  The merganser pond has shrunk to its usual dimensions, but as of today, it's frozen over, nearly at the stage where one could tour on ice-skates.   By the time I reached the shore yesterday it was growing dark and rather windy--I'd never had quite this view of the Straits and Texada Island.  There was more of a surf than I'm used to seeing. The river is clearing and subsiding.  No telling what it will do after this...

eBird data:  https://ebird.org/checklist/S80608955 Weather:  8 am 3C wind WNW 6, 1 pm 7C, wind NW 13  initially clear, gradually increasing clouds, patchy frost Tide:  11 am 4.2m, rising The Weather Office tells us that an arctic front is moving in for this week, resulting in temperatures 5 to 10 degrees Celsius below the seasonal average.  It hadn't arrived this morning, although it was crisp and a bit frosty.   Parenthetically --I went out for a turn along the beach last night.  The tide was out and the light was fading but fine. The beach seems to attract walkers as evening falls, not without cause. ... End of parenthesis and back to this morning-- It was so lovely that I found it hard to think of moving away from my bench. The fields and paths are drying somewhat, but still pretty sloppy.   There were four eagles shrieking at one another, and at one point a peregrine falcon glided over, then stooped into the forest, to be seen no mor...

 eBird data: https://ebird.org/checklist/S80476240 Weather:  8am 5C, wind WNW 13  (cloudy, gradual clearing),  1 pm 7C wind NW 13  scattered cloud Tide:  10:30 4.6m (peak tide, falling) The forecast was for sunny, but the early morning was dark and threatening.  Paths remain boggy.  I'm kind of startled to see how many walkers are still wearing running shoes--icky wet feet! The merganser pond (I wonder if it has a real name?  Must ask someone...) has come back down to normal size, even though much of the fields are still flooded. The weather cleared gradually, starting in the northwest, and showing Arrowsmith at its most spectacular. A group of twitchers (not birders--twitchers) joined me on the lookout over the fields.  They were carrying very up-market spotting scopes and wearing very up-market gumboots and outdoor gear.  This seems to be a part of being a twitcher--the pricy stuff is part of the collection mentality.  T...