I’m still working on getting rid of a cold, so I was not too inclined to go for a substantial walk today.

Weather: Skies cleared throughout the day. Temperatures in the low 30s.

Birds: There were lots of Ravens and a few Eagles around this morning. When I came out of Fraser at one point this morning there were 7 or so Ravens on a snow berm across from Stratton Library. It wasn’t clear to me what they were doing there.

There was a report of a Snowy Owl over on Alice Island this afternoon, but I wasn’t able to get over there to look for it.

Other Notes: There was at least one deer that wandered through the neighborhood recently. I saw its tracks going down the trail from the top of the hill to Lincoln Street by Sage Building.

I did manage to get in a short walk through the park today early in the afternoon and a more leisurely walk through later in the evening.

Weather: It was fairly wet today with a little bit of wind.

Birds: I saw quite a few birds today. There were lots of sparrows around the neighborhood, including Fox Sparrows, Song Sparrows, several Golden-crowned Sparrows, and Savannah Sparrows.

As I was leaving home after a mid-morning snack/brunch, I happened to hear an odd call. I decided to investigate and eventually figured out that it was a Sharp-shinned Hawk. I spent half an hour or so watching it and the Steller’s Jay that has been coming for peanuts.

Later in the afternoon, when I went to the park for the second time, I stopped to look at a Northern Flicker in the alders near the battle site when I caught some motion out of the corner of my eye. I looked up to see a Sharp-shinned Hawk land in the alders. It flew off toward the beach before I could get a photo. However, I did go out to the beach and got there just after a flock of Black Turnstones flushed and flew down the shoreline. I think the hawk may have made an attempt at them. A little later, while I was looking at ducks in the estuary, I saw the hawk chasing a Kingfisher. It also chased after a small bird, probably a Savannah Sparrow. I never did see it catch anything. I think it was the same bird that was around our neighborhood earlier in the day.

There was a Marbled Godwit out on the flats during my first walk through the park, but I did not see it the second trip.

There were several Green-winged Teal and American Wigeons in the estuary along with the Mallards and lots of gulls.

Other birds I saw today included several Fork-tailed Storm-petrels still out in Crescent Bay, an Oragne-crowned Warbler in front of Stratton Library, Harlequin Ducks and both Double-crested and Pelagic Cormorants out off of Sage Beach and some Winter Wrens in the park.

Other Notes: It looks like a deer nibbled on the leaves of my carrots.

On my second trip through the park, I saw a seal up in the river. The tide was in fairly far, so the water was deep, but it was definitely in the river channel.

I saw at least one squirrel that looked like it was eating alder cones. They are pretty green still, but maybe that’s the best time for the squirrels to get the seeds out.

Weather: It’s been pretty wet for the last few days. Today we had a record rainfall for the day, almost 3 inches fell, with much of it coming before noon. Winds were pretty stiff this afternoon.

Birds: There have been lots of birds around. I’ve seen Townsend’s Warblers, Orange-crowned Warblers, Hermit Thrushes, Varied Thrushes, Robins, Steller’s Jays, Golden-crowned Sparrows, Savannah Sparrows, Song Sparrows, and possibly Lincoln’s Sparrows.

Today when we went for a drive and checked out the birds from the ramp on Japonski Island there were lots of sparrows in the grass and shrubs between the ramp and the beach. I’m sure I saw Savannah, Song, and Golden-crowned Sparrows, but am less confident about whether I saw a Lincoln’s Sparrow. There were also several Black-legged Kittiwakes out in the channel and at least one storm-petrel (which I was unable to identify at the time due to the distance and unfamiliarity with the species).

Other Notes: I saw a deer track a couple of days ago in the mud on the shortcut to Sage Building. It’s the first track I have seen around the neighborhood since spring. A student told me about seeing a deer somewhere near the dorms as well.

There was a clump of Inky Cap mushrooms growing in the grass not far from the road up to DSH on campus.

I had one tour this morning and went for a walk to Totem Park this evening.  The tour was a Captain’s Choice, and we stopped at the Nadezhda Islands in Krestof Sound and returned through Nawkwasina Passage.

Weather:  Overcast with some light rain.  This evening there were a few breaks in the clouds, but I did not see the sun, only the rays filtering through in the distance.

Birds:  At the park there were more gulls than I had seen in recent days.  The balance of numbers seems to have shifted to Glaucous-winged Gulls, though there were still quite a few Mew Gulls.

I started seeing quite a few small sandpipers flying around between the large tidepools and the river mouth.  I would guess there were several dozen all together, though it was difficult to say for sure, since they can be pretty difficult to see.  There were a couple of interesting things I noticed about these birds.  They were far more spread out than I am used to seeing.  At most 4 or 5 birds would fly together and when they were on the ground they would spread out quite a bit.  Also, most of the ones I saw well enough to identify were Least Sandpipers.  I only saw one Western Sandpiper.  This is the opposite of what I have seen the last couple of springs.  I’m uncertain whether this is just random variation, this year was a good year for Least Sandpipers, or Fall and Spring have different distributions of birds (with Least Sandpipers stopping here more in the Fall and Western Sandpipers stopping here more in the Spring).

Other Notes:  There was a doe and a fawn along the shore in Nawkwasina Passage.  We also saw between 6 and 9 deer on the beach near Inner Point when we were stopped to look at Sea Otters.

Some of the passengers got saw a bear, but it took off and ran before I had a chance to see it.