I glanced out our kitchen window this morning (12/15/2013) and saw something red moving behind some twigs at the base of the largest fir tree in our yard.  Upon closer examination I discovered that it was a female Pileated woodpecker, the first reliable sighting in the Cap Sante neighborhood of which I am aware!  (I’ve lived and birded in the neighborhood for almost 13 years and am aware of no other reports, despite having several neighbors who are birders.)

Pileated woodpecker photographed in the Cap Sante Neighborhood!

I managed to sneak out of the house for some photos, but the day was heavily overcast and I was unable to obtain really good photos.  The bird was in the yard at least 30 minutes from the time I saw it, but I couldn’t continually observe the bird during that entire time because it went around to the opposite side of the tree.  Here’s hoping the bird will find a mate in the neighborhood and raise a family this next breeding season!

I spent time in the yard with my camera on 12/14/2013, but the photography was disappointing due to the lack of light.  I have to jump through some technical hoops to get anything at all, and the photos are quite grainy.  But I’m posting some of them anyway.  Perhaps in order of descending photo quality, a male Northern flicker, a Song sparrow and a Dark-eyed junco of the Oregon race.  (For about the sixth winter in a row we’ve had a single Slate-colored race in the yard but I have yet to document it this year.)

Dark-eyed junco of the Oregon race

Song sparrow

Male Northern flicker

We’ve also been receiving several daily visits by an apparent pair of Varied thrushes, fairly reliable winter visitors, especially if it snows.  Thrushes are generally considered to be berry and insect eaters (like their look-alike cousins, the American robins) but the Varied thrushes seem to be quite content eating hulled sunflower seed scattered on the ground… or as we perfer to refer to the seed locally, “habitat enhancer”!

Male Varied thrush

Presumably a female Varied thrush

And while I’m on the subject of dietary vagaries, here’s one final photo… of a Bewick’s wren supplementing its diet with a little suet!

Bewick’s wren on a suet feeder!

Last week I managed a couple of excursions around the area. I visited some of my usual haunts… March’s Point, the West-90, Fir Island and many areas in between. I was a little disappointed in the sharpness of my camera/lens on both days, but I got some of what I consider acceptable photos.

The highlight of the trips was when I was driving in the Bayview area and a Wilson’s snipe flew towards the car and dived into the roadside ditch almost beside me. Unfortunately there were no nearby parking places and I had difficulty shooting into the ditch from my vehicle, but I did get a few photos, this probably being the best.

Wison’s Snipe

The low point of the trip was when I saw this female Mallard bobbing up and down about ten feet offshore at March’s Point. Something didn’t look right about its movement. Upon closer examination I discovered that it was a decoy!

Female Mallard – decoy!

As for the rest of the photos…

Song Sparrow

Female Red-Winged Blackbird on a cattail stalk

Bewick’s Wren

Ruby-Crowned Kinglet

This last photo of a Song sparrow on a dried yarrow head is one I consider more artistic than technically correct.

Song Sparrow on dried yarrow head

On my recent trip to New Mexico, and while at the Bosque del Apache NWR south of Socorro, I encountered a Green-tailed towhee.  I’ve probably only seen one of these birds less than half a dozen times, with all sightings having been in Texas before I was seriously into birding photography.  While I’m sure there are places where the birds can be reliably seen, I just haven’t discovered those places yet. I consider myself lucky to have seen and photographed this bird.  I first encountered it where the habitat had been seriously altered by the erection of a large tent which was to be used in the Festival of the Cranes, an annual celebration that was to take place the following week.  This bird was backlit and with a lot of sparrows, but as I find often happens, it separated itself from the rest of the group and garnered my interest by its behavior.  I managed a few photos in bad light (see below) and managed to follow the bird for a couple of hundred feet before it disappeared over a fence in the headquarters complex.