Sunny Day, Bird Observations

Sun was once again the order of the day, though today the winds started to pick up a bit more than they had. The forecast is for an arctic outflow event heading into the weekend, and this seemed like a precursor.

I helped a friend move a shelving unit out to her island house (and got a more intimate experience with the sharp waves the wind was pulling up). Out over the island, the wind was more steady, and I was interested to see several eagles soaring nearly in place on the breeze.

As we returned to the harbor, there was a Marbled Murrelet right at the mouth of Crescent Harbor. It was quite cooperative, though with both of us wanting to take pictures, the limited space afforded by the breakwaters and shoreline made it more difficult. What would have been my best winter Marbled Murrelet picture was not to be when I discovered the camera had focused on the water just behind the bird. This is not an infrequent occurrence, but it still leaves me with that minor frustration about what could have been.

I had intended to get all my species for the day during this outing, but ended up having a phone call for work start just after getting back to shore, so I went home instead. 

By the time the call was done, I had limited daylight and time, and decided to go for a walk around the neighborhood to pick up a junco or one of the wintering birds I have not yet photographed. A walk down to Etolin Street revealed reasonably cooperative White-crowned and Golden-crowned Sparrow, as well as junco. So today was one of the few so far this year where all my observations have been birds. 

My iNaturalist Observations for Today

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