This morning did not start well. I was watching the morning news and doing some electronic banking when I noticed some strange charges to my debit card. Apparently, some person has been joining on-line dating services and has been charging the costs to me. Luckily, I caught it just one day after the charges hit my account and have been able to cancel the card.
I decided to head over to Fish Park once I got off the phone with my credit union. I thought a little birding might help me to relax and lighten up what was becoming a dark mood. Unfortunately, the opposite happened on the drive to the park. Poulsbo is still going through some maddening road construction and I got caught up in three backups within about 1/2 mile. My mood was even worse by the time I made the turn at the new salmon sculpture and pulled into the parking lot. I quickly grabbed my binos and field guide and walked up a small hill while waiting for Nancy to make her way through the construction zones. She pulled in after a few minutes and we walked our way into the park.
There is a line of trees about halfway into the park that sort of divides it into two separate areas. One side is a bit like open scrub land while the other is more wooded wetlands. I usually pause at the tree line to see if anything interesting is sitting out in the open. This time that quick pause really paid off. There was a Red-tailed Hawk perched on one of the snags that sits over the pond. I was just bringing my binos up when it took flight. I have not seen a Red-tailed Hawk in the park before so the day was starting to look up.
We continued to walk through the park and out through the back on a wooded trail. We saw the usual birds until the trail makes a little left-hand bend and heads up a slight slope. Nancy had walked ahead and was almost out of sight. I had stopped at a point where I could scan a sea of berry vines for anything that may be perching up on top. I noticed some movement and saw a bird I did not recognize. I observed it for several seconds and then pished to get Nancy's attention and waved for her to come down the trail. By the time I looked back at the vines the bird was gone. I tried to make a mental note of the field marks I had seen and decided to sit down with the field guides back at the shop and figure out the identification. As it turns out, I am fairly positive that the bird was a Townsend's Solitaire. That was my guess from looking through my field guides but it is also what Thayer's eBird software spit out when I used their bird ID Wizard. Another new species for me, Fish Park and a fairly rare sighting for Kitsap County according to our local Audubon group.
At this point I was running out of time and needed to get to the shop and open for the day. Nancy and I were hurrying back to our trucks and passing the usual collection of park birds. We stopped a little short of the parking lot and were looking at some birds that I can't even remember. I noticed some movement closer to us and right on the trail so I refocused my binos for one last quick look. And what do I see? A Chipping Sparrow! Another new species for me, the park and an unusal sighting for the county. I'm still upset about the whole debit card thing but am in a much better mood now.
Here is our list for the morning:
Location: Fish Park Observation date: 4/16/08 Number of species: 15
Mallard 2 Red-tailed Hawk 1 gull sp. X Northern Flicker 1 American Crow X Black-capped Chickadee X Ruby-crowned Kinglet 1 Townsend's Solitaire 1 American Robin X Spotted Towhee 1 Chipping Sparrow 1 Song Sparrow X Red-winged Blackbird 1 Pine Siskin X American Goldfinch X
