Friday, November 2, 2007

Birds - so far - Day 11

I've had a few inquiries about what birds have been out here, so I thought I'd give a list of some of the more exciting ones. Some of these birds may seem common, but even common birds can be rare out here. In total I've seen 97 species of birds on or around the island.

Horned Grebe
Western Grebe
Flesh-footed Shearwater
Short-tailed Shearwater
Brown Booby
White-winged Scoter
White-tailed Kite
Osprey
Wilson's Snipe
Parasitic Jaeger
Bonaparte's Gull
Mew Gull
Northern Saw-whet Owl
Townsend's Solitaire
Northern Mockingbird
Sage Trasher
Nashville Warbler
Sage Sparrow
Lapland Longspur
Baltimore Oriole

The rarest bird for the island was the Sage Sparrow, only a handful have been seen on the island. Here are a few pictures, nothing too exciting.

Burrowing Owl

Palm Warbler

Western Meadowlark

3 comments:

amanda said...

Right now I'm working for Oakland County in their tiny Natural Resources department - randomly Jon, one of the guys I work with, builds SEFI's burrowing owl bow nets . He was tickled to see your pictures - he's never been out that way, and he's never seen a burrowing owl outside of a zoo!

Andy Dettling said...

Bird on! Keep posting your sightings and more pictures. I can't even hardly leave the house. You know you are living out my dream, so keep me updated.

Your goal should be to find #401 for the island. Is there a list somewhere? I'll pick out 401 for you and then all you have to do is find it!

Your Bro Andy

koko said...

Mark- it sounds amazing! We all miss you here at Palo. The boys have been whining about "Mr.D"...
"BLUEBIRDS!!!!!"
p.s. do you need any groceries???