Pecker Envy

It Begins Here, But First A Story

Listen to the Marsh Birds Sing in the Pines

Honk! Honk! Traffic Increases

Yellow Rumped Warbler with Other Yellow Patches

Pink & Streaked Cassin's Finch

Lady Cassin Sports No Colors

Osprey & Falcon Country

Talkative Osprey on Nest

Silent Hay Bales in Field

American Kestrel Watching Us Watch Him

Portapotty is Not That Portable

American Kestrel on an Idaho Fencepost

My Miserable Missed Shot of a Downy Wood Pecker

Perfectly Posed Pecker, Photo by Mr. Mills...Grrr...

There is a purpose to the title beyond shock value.

In part, it gives an opening to my opinion on media titles these days. Titles attract attention, but have you noticed the popular ones online follow the formula of arousing curiosity? Titles like, "What She Found Was Shocking" or "He Opened the Door and Then Did This." We're suckers for satisfying our curiosity. Stick with me and I'll satisfy yours with a photo.

Curiosity gets me up in the mornings. What's all that ruckus?

I step outside and hear bird chatter louder than it has been since the robins returned to the 'hood in February. It's commuter traffic -- the avian migration has begun. Geese honk on the pond, red-winged blackbirds zip around one another to race through pine boughs and new birds turn my head as if they were show cars.

I snap shots and post some on a bird group online to ask, "What's this?" My favorite game with geologists has evolved into a new version with the backyard bird-watching experts. With suggestions I go to my field guides or ones online like the Cornell Lab of Ornithology's All About Birds.

Last Saturday a group of cedar waxwings arrived and left before I could grab photo evidence. Two days ago the chickadees showed up with yellow-patched friends. I got good shots and a woman online suggested it was a yellow-rumped warbler. I never did see his rump, but turns out the yellow patches, streaks and white eye ring are indicative of the western version -- Audubon's warbler.

It sounds so prestigious around here during fall migration.

I'm sitting in my lawn chair, properly perched upon my lawn, staring at the blue spruce that towers above my garden. Coffee in one hand, camera in the other, I'm waiting to see the finch I saw from my upstairs window. The bird that got me curious enough to drink outside this morning.

Bootsy meows all the way from the garage kitty door to my side. Shhh...

And he lands. It must be male because he has color. In the spring all the migrating male ducks are easy to tell apart and when they leave I struggle to identify their ladies who all wear similar attire as if they are part of some commune. Beaks and size help, and I can tell dabblers from divers, but those ladies all like to wear nondescript browns. This fella has pink.

He's definitely a finch -- look at that beak. He's not dark red like a purple finch or house finch. His pink hues and streaking mark him a Cassin's finch. His crown is no longer prominent. That's one way males differ in the fall from the spring. When it's mating season they plump up their best colors and chirp, "Hey, Baby..." By fall, they're trying to look incognito, "That wasn't me, Baby, I don't have any fledglings..."

Migrations bring all sorts together. Different birds of different genders and ages all gather. There's safety in numbers. In between cup number one and cup number two, a white breasted hawk attempts to grab at a bird in the pines. Incensed male red-wings chase him off. By the time I get the cup set aside and the cat off my lap, the predator has flapped away.

Before the migration began, Todd wanted to show me...no, we aren't at the title yet!

What he wanted to show me was the valley that had osprey and his favorite falcons, American kestrels. He delivered a new route for Fed Ex before they unceremoniously texted him last Saturday that they had no more work for him. Work has a way of migrating from small western towns this time of year, too.

We drove along the south flank of Pend Oreille River before it turns north at Newport, Washington. The drive was full of osprey nests and we found kestrels where he had regularly seen them. In between old ranches and modern hay fields, we snapped photos, both of us armed with Nikons.

He took me to a small lake with a portapotty chained to a tree. It must be the seasonal bathroom for those coming to the lake to fish. No birds were around, but mid-day is not the best viewing time on waterways. We peed, we looked, we left.

Further down the road Todd drove me through an interesting outcrop of houses. Each one was fenced with "Beware of Dog" signs. Unsettling when you are a delivery driver. His short time on that route he got nipped twice, once even breaking the skin. He wanted to show me some mules. They don't bite.

As we were admiring the mules, a flash of red caught our attention. Todd is just as curious as I am when it comes to critters and birds and we often tease the other if only one of us has a sighting, "I didn't see it, so it didn't exist." Tops on our list of things that didn't exist was the wolverine that crossed the road as I drove and he slept.

This day it was a downy wood pecker.

Excited we both aimed our cameras. My fussy telephoto took time to focus. The bird hopped in and out of view, such an elusive bird to capture in pixels. He snapped his shot, set the camera down and drove off. In losing my focus, I lost my shot. He still gloats that HE got the good picture.

And all I got was an attitude of pecker envy.