Freezing Rain bears NO SCHOOL!!

This morning I was awoke to my mom telling me to get up for school, but to turn the radio on, as she already heard that many other schools were closed. I got up, and got the radio, and started getting ready, when the radio announced every single school in the valley, some I never heard of. It said that Columbia Falls has not responded yet. Hopes were still high. Five minutes later, the announcer said they have finally heard from Columbia Falls, and they...are...now...offically...CLOSED!! WOO HOO!!! No school!!! - What happened was, it was freezing rain, and it coated the road in about an inch of ice. So, with bad weather, brings no school which gives me a free day to bird, but because of bad weather, my mom wont drive me around, because the schools are closed, because the roads are terrible. That was about how it went.

I got out and walked around the yard, and my local (really local) patch, and saw about no birds, but the ones at my feeders. I did get to take many cool ice-on-stuff pictures.

This is at my local patch, which actually is my neighbors yard. In the spring-summer-fall it is the most amazing place I have birded. There is so many birds there. I actually got a lifer here. Tennessee Warbler last fall. This section of the yard is the sparrow paradise. I have seen Song, Lincoln's, Fox, Chipping, Clay-colored, White-crowned, White-throated, and Harris's Sparrow in there. Right now, nothing is stirring, not even an American Tree Sparrow...or mouse.

Eagles, Eagles and more sparrows??

Saturday (I know I am always late with my blogposts) Dan Casey and I did a little birding, trying to beat Dan's previous record for the most year birds in the state of MT in the month of January. His record was 78, and I was at 79 with my lifer/yearbird Hoary Redpoll. We now needed to find him one more yearbird.

We started our search at the landfill (Gullery) to find a California Gull or other nice gull to add to our yearlists. Upon arriveing, we found NO gulls, but 50 or so Common Ravens and American Crow, and several Bald Eagles. I photographed the Ravens and Eagles until we spent plenty of time waiting for gulls, as we watched them in the distance, leave a secret hang out, and go to another. Sadly, many of my eagle pictures didn't come out just right, as the settings and shutterspeed was off.

Nest we toured what is locally called the West Valley. It is the western section of the Flathead Valley, and riddled with pot-hole marshes in the nice prairie-farmland kinda habitiat. We crossed a spring, and a pair of Bald Eagles put one a nice show, but the best of my pictures aren't very good. I will show you some. One of the birds had a very interesting molf pattern. You can clearly see the old and new wing feathers. the bird must have undergone many molt cycles, but they were cut short by some trematic event, and later started over again, I am not sure. Any help unterstanding this odd occurance would be greatly appreciated!

He checked all the hotspots, then headed to a stacked-out Harris's Sparrow near my house. It showed up at one of the best feeds in the valley. On our way there, we slowly drove by this stand of trees that might of had White-winged Crossbills in it. I looked foreward, and saw this bird flying towards us. The flight pattern said Flicker, but the colors didn't. As it banked to the left, we both was that it was a YELLOW-SHAFTED Flicker, not RED-shafted! That is was very cool!!!! I have only see one Yellow-shafted in this part of MT and that was at my house last year. To me, that was almost cooler then the Harris's Sparrow we saw at the ladies feeder after the Flicker sighting. I got one shot of the sparrow, but is was very distant.

After an attempt at sneeking up on the sparrow for closer, better pictures, we headed on down the road to the next extremely active feeders. Over there, we saw many Black-capped Chickadees, and a very cool Downy Woodpecker that let me get some great pictures. On the way there we saw a very good looking juvenile Rough-legged Hawk.

The sun came up, and brought with it birds of the north - PART 2

Today, my mom ans I took advantage of the amazing sunshine, and ventured into town (Columbia Falls) to photograph Pine Grosbeaks and Bohemian Waxwings, and we found quite a few American Robins too. It is always great to view these birds in the blaring sun!!

The sun came up, and brought with it birds of the north

Sunday, the sun desided to show its self here in Columbia Falls, and the birds are here in large numbers. My dad and I chase Pine Grosbeaks and Waxwings all over town. We saw many hundreds, even a few thousand waxwings, and almots a hundred grosbeaks. We even saw a couple hundred Bohemain Waxwings frenzying in the middle of the road, gobbling up little rocks and snow. It was amazing!!

More on Pine Grosbeaks!!!!

Today I got some great looks at a fairly large flock of Pine Grosbeaks right in Columbia Falls today around 11:30am mountain time. It was pretty cool, even though they are everywhere!! I can't EVER get enough of those birds. They are my favorite winter finch by far. I don't know how I'll cope with them gone in the following years, if they leave. Also, I saw a Merlin in Kalispell, chaseing the masses of Bohemian Waxwings.

Birds, birds, birds, BIRDS!!!

Well, where do I start!?!? It was a great day!! First Pete Smith (a good birding friend of mine) picked me up at about 10:00-ish. We stopped by a little bog-like thing, where Northern Saw-whet Owls breed. We stepped out, and had almost no birds of any kind at all!!!! Then, BLAMMERS!!! We saw a large flock of little white-ish birds frenzying around a birch tree. REDPOLLS!!! Woo hoo!! We blared up the road and wow!! About 80 redpolls were freaking out on this birch tree. I grabbed the scope, and for some reason, I started searching for a Hoary Redpoll candidate. Scanning, Pete and I, found a few good candidates, and one concrete for sure Hoary Redpoll. LIFER!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

After that amazing encounter, we went into town, and wandered Columbia Falls, looking for Pine Grosbeaks, and waxwings. We, of course, saw TONS of birds!! Over the course of the day, we tally about 65 PINE GROSBEAKS!! That is the most I have seen at one time, then all the birds I have seen in my entire life combined!!!! I have seen many since Monday, but not 65 in one day!!

Then we went to check out the local Gullery, or called Flathead County Landfill. Upon arriving, there was only 20+ gulls, and soon after we got there, they left us. In the flock was one juvenile Thayer's Gull, among the Herring and Ring-billed Gulls.

(* SPECIAL NOTE - If anyone wants to visit the gullery, please park on the same level as the active dumping, and no where else, but park out of the way of the machines!! THANK YOU!!!*)

Juvenile Thayer's Gull

After the run at the dump, we went back to Pete Smith's house to photograph Chestnut-backed Chickadees. It was great!! There was a total of 4 birds coming to his feeder continuously. They put on quite a show!!