I had an exciting day on September 11, 2018.  I’ll start with the migrants…

An Orange-crowned warbler, some of which actually overwinter in the PacNW.  I had two visits, and one of the visits consisted of two birds which were interacting.  .

This is one of my favorite visitors, rare and always appreciated.  This is a male Black-throated Gray warbler.

Not a great photo, but since this is only the third visit by a female Western tanager this season I’m posting it anyway.  These birds are in the neighborhood but this season they just haven’t frequented the yard.  This bird will soon be on its way south.

This Black-headed grosbeak will also be on the way south soon.  While grosbeaks were fairly frequent visitors earlier in the spring/summer, this is the first one I’ve seen in the yard in over a month and it made what is a rare visit for its species to our watercourse where I was able to take numerous photos.

This is a female Bushtit, as evidenced by the yellow of the bird’s iris.  Bushtits are now combining families into larger groups and will be here year-round.

This is a juvenile Spotted towhee, which wins my award for looking least like the adult it will eventually become.  I noticed that this one is beginning to develop spots on its wing (hence its name) and in processing the photo I noticed that the area under the bird’s wing is developing into the adult’s reddish plumage.  Another indication of a juvenile bird is the yellow area at the corner of the bird’s mouth, common in many species.

Most of our American goldfinches will also be headed south soon, although some do stay the winter.  This is a juvenile male changing to its adult plumage.  The bird’s body plumage is that of a juvenile whereas its upper body is revealing its sex.  (Note the dark patch on the bird’s crown.)

This Townsend’s chipmunk is usually content to scrounge the yard searching for bird seed, but I noticed this one having a supplement… eating Snowberries.

On September 10, 2018, we had dinner guests due at 5:30pm.  I was finishing up a salad in the kitchen as our guests arrived.  I glanced out the window and as I did so several birds flew out of the watercourse and scattered around the yard.  One that was slightly larger than most of the others caught my attention.  I grabbed my binoculars and after a brief study concluded that it was a female Western tanager, only the second one I had seen in the yard this season.

I apologized to our guests as I rushed for my camera and made a quick exit into the yard.  The bird had been preening and I had high hopes that it would return to the watercourse,  but of course that was not to be.  But as I sat waiting I managed to separate another bird out of the crowd based on its behavior.  I quickly determined the bird was a Warbling vireo, only the second appearance of one for the season.  (The prior appearance for one was at least two months previously.)

I watched as the vireo few all around the watercourse, periodically “dip-bathing” as is the vireos’ habit.  (Instead of standing in the water and bathing the vireos fly quickly into and out of the water, a habit shared by at least the White-eyed vireo I see in Texas.)  I managed to take at least a dozen photos, two of which I share with you now.

Just as I was ready to give up on the tanager I noticed a female House finch sitting atop the only cluster of ripe madrone berries in the yard.  I knew I needed to get back to our guests and only managed a few shots of the finch eating madrone berries, but the photos were taken hand-held with my camera without the aid of my monopod, so the quality wasn’t up to my usual standards.  But since the photo is somewhat interesting I’m including it here.

Sunday  (9/9/2018) morning, I looked out our kitchen window towards the watercourse and spied what I thought was an Orange-crowned warbler. I grabbed my camera and sneaked into the yard and the bird, which had actually been a Yellow warbler, returned.  Over the next hour or so our yard filled with birds, including at least 30 House sparrows that are living in the neighborhood and I obtained many ‘better than most’ photos.  So here were some of our visitors which don’t include a male Wilson’s warbler that I wasn’t able to photograph.

The Yellow warbler…

The Orange-crowned warbler…

A Brown creeper…

A male Spotted towhee…

A Pine siskin with an unusually large patch of yellow…

A Chestnut-sided chickadee…

A Black-capped chickadee…

A male Anna’s hummingbird…

And a Red-breasted nuthatch…

And I want to mention a special visitor that we had on 9/6/2018… a Warbling vireo, our second visit during this fall migration…

I had a nice weekend for warbler migration.  Not great numbers but three different species on 9/1/2018 and two species on 9/2/2018.

The first warbler I saw on Saturday was an Orange-crowned...

Followed by a male Wilson’s warbler…

Finally, I had a visit from a Yellow warbler…

Only a Yellow warbler visited more than once, so it was a lot of time spent for only a little photography.  From my photos there seem to have been two different Yellow warblers.

On Sunday, 9/2, I had a rare visit from a male Black-throated Gray warbler, I think only the third visit I’ve had from that species this year.  As I believe I’ve previously said, this species was virtually unknown to me until two or three years ago when one was a frequent visitor for several weeks.

Late in the afternoon, almost too late for photos, I had visit from an Orange-crowned warbler.  These photos are both of the same bird.  If you look closely at the second photo, you can see some orange in the bird’s crown, something difficult to discern in the field.