I spent 3-4 hours in the yard on 7/19/2018, our first cloudy day in a week or more. Cloudy days are a lot more favorable for birding photography in many ways, and I am still learning relative nuances of light with respect to birding photography, but it’s a subject too complicated to address here.
As it turned out, the day was also a great day for birding in the yard with a lot of the common species visiting and one special visitor. By the end of my time in the yard, and when I offloaded my photos from my camera, I found that I had taken a total of 330 photos for the day, far surpassing my old record of something over 200 photos. I keep far too may of my photos but a four terabyte hard drive facilitates the storage. At the end of my processing I found I had retained 179 photos, all of which had to be cropped and the light adjusted. It was several hours of processing.
During the slower times I decided to keep an inventory of what I had seen, and here, with notes, is the inventory:
Tanager, Western (f)
This was our special visitor, only the second tanager and the first female we’ve seen in the yard this year!
Bushtits (5-6)
Robins, American (2a, 2j)
Creeper, Brown
Hummingbird, Rufous (f)
Hummingbird, Anna’s (m)
Quail, California (m&f)
On this day I saw no chicks, but we apparently have an unpaired male, a male and female without any chicks, a male and female with 10-12 palm-sized chicks and a male and female with 8-10 small chicken egg-sized chicks. Interestingly enough, the two groups of chicks don’t mingle thanks to the aggression between the two males. However, The group of larger-sized chicks has one chick that is a much smaller size, the runt of the litter if you will. I don’t know if it just hatched later or the small chick just found its way to the flock of larger chicks.
Cowbirds, Brown-headed (2j)
Neither of these two juveniles were being bed by any other species, but we can probably assume that their parents didn’t raise them and that they weren’t nest mates.
Sparrows, White-crowned (2)
This was obviously a pair and they were feeding young somewhere around the north side of the house. They made repeated trips (which as of this writing are still occurring) gathering seed spilled from hanging bird feeders and flying with it around the alley side of the house.
Sparrows, House
For awhile it seemed like many of our sparrows had disappeared, but now they are back with a vengeance!
Junco, Dark-eyed – Oregon (j)
I only saw one junco (a juvenile) in the yard this day, but we have had at least a pair around the yard this spring.
Finches, House
Several apparent families visit the feeders and watercourse during the day.
Nuthatch, Red-breasted
I’ve seen as many as four nuthatches on a very crowded vertical peanut feeder at one time, so a breeding pair had a successfu; breeding season somewhere in the area.
Chickadees, Black-capped
Chickadees, Chestnut-backed
Flicker, Northern (f + 1)
We’ve had as many as five in the yard this summer, with at least two being juveniles.
Woodpecker, Downy (f)
Starling, European
Goldfinches, American
Siskin, Pine
Blackbird, Red-winged (m&f)
I took many photos of a males Red-winged blackbird feeding a juvenile. The juvenile flew in with the adult and was apparently self-sufficient, but you wouldn’t know it when the male was in the yard. The adult apparently was leaving the yard to fly food back to other juveniles (possibly all the way back to the sewage treatment ponds). While the adult was gone the juvenile would explore the yard and watercourse and after about a ten-minute absence the male would return and feed the juvenile again.
