On September 16, 2022, shortly after 7:30pm, I was in the kitchen and glanced outside. In the rapidly fading light I saw a bird crossing the ground between some bushes and our watercourse. My sense of curiosity was piqued because it seemed too late (in terms of darkness) for any of our local birds to be active and approaching the watercourse. 

I was unable to see any distinguishing markings on the bird due to the darkness so I picked up my binoculars knowing they would give me better vision. There, at the bottom of the watercourse was a Hermit thrush!  

The Hermit thrush is a fall migrant to our area and will spend the winter in the greater area. Interestingly, we have a bird very similar in appearance (the Swainson’s thrush) which is on an opposite schedule… it arrhves in the spring, spends the summers here and departs by the fall. 

As I excitedly watched the thrush it was soon joined by yet another!  I believe this is the first time I have ever seen two at the same time, perhaps a reference to its name. In a moment the two thrushes were joined by yet another!  We now had three thrushes in or around our watercourse, and there wasn’t nearly enough light for photos!  

Since I had seen the thrushes so late in the day I thought there was a chance they might spend the night in the immediate area and return to the yard or watercourse in the morning. I wasn’t able to go outside and monitor the watercourse the next morning, but periodic checking revealed no thrushes. 

That afternoon (September 17), shortly after 3:30pm, I had a brief period to monitor the yard before meeting friends for an early dinner. I glanced out the kitchen window and saw a single American goldfinch in the watercourse and a few chickadees around the yard. I took my camera outside and noted the goldfinch had flown, but there, sitting on one of my staging sticks at the head of the watercourse was a Hermit thrush!  

I quickly positioned my chair but when I looked back at the watercourse the thrush had gone. I sat quietly and a moment or two later the thrush reappeared and I was able to get several good photos, some of which are displayed below. 

In processing the photos I realized the bird I photographed was a juvenile born this season and was probably on its first migration. I have no way of knowing if it was part of what was probably a family group I had observed the previous evening. 

Aptly named for its retiring ways, the Hermit Thrush is a bird of dense forest understory and thicket that is often heard before it’s seen.

Fall Migration 

Sunday, September 4, 2022, dawned cloudy, providing me an opportunity for some bird photography in the yard.  We had had a long run of sunny days and although I spent considerable time in the yard over the past several weeks my photos weren’t all that good due to colors being somewhat washed out in the sunlight and images exhibiting the high contrast between sun and shadows.  For birding photography, sunlight usually causes problems! I could go on, but this isn’t a birding photography lesson.  

Sometime just before what I would consider midmorning I looked out the window and spied an Orange-crowned warbler in the yard.  By the time I could get outside with my camera the bird was gone, but this was the second omen of the day (the cloudy weather having been the first).  By midmorning I was outside with my camera ready for a little birding action!  

Things were at first a little slow… but another Orange-crowned warbler visit gave me hope!  I birded until about mid-afternoon and over the course of 4-5 hours I had at least 8-10 Orange-crowned warbler visits from at least two different birds.  (One of the birds was crippled so I knew I had at least two.)  Soon thereafter we had a visit from a Black-headed grosbeak, either a female or a juvenile.  There were two more visits from grosbeaks during that time, including one that descended to the watercourse and gave me the opportunity for many good photographs.  During my birding time I had the following visitors… 

a Yellow warbler, 

a female Rufous hummingbird (time to get migration underway!), 

three visits from a very shy female Western tanager (no photos), 

a visit from an Empidonax flycatcher, possibly a Pacific Slope flycatcher, 

and visits from some of this year’s juveniles (House sparrows, a Spotted towhee, American goldfinches, a White-crowned sparrow, a Dark-eyed junco and American robins).  (Gone from the landscape were several of the juvenile Brown-headed cowbirds that were raised by some of these same species this year.)   

Total photos for the day: 468/(259), which entails hours of processing, editing and organizing using Adobe Lightroom.  

So here are some of my photos for the day… 

This little friend (a native Townsend’s chipmunk) provides my entertainment during long periods of bird inactivity in the yard. Earlier this spring we had as many as four in the yard, but now I’m down to one, or uncommonly two. They hibernate during the winter so it probably won’t be around too much longer.

This was one of my earlier visitors during the day. It’s a Black-headed grosbeak which I judge to be either a female or a juvenile.

Warblers are notoriously difficult to identify, and fall warblers, when dealing with non-breeding plumage, end-of-season plumage, females and juveniles are the most difficult to identify. I’m going out on a proverbial limb (pun intended) to identify this as a Yellow warbler. (As always, in the name of accuracy, I welcome feedback regarding identifications.)

And another photo of the same bird…

I believe this to be a juvenile Orange-crowned warbler, by far the most numerous warbler of the day. (Note the tumor on the bird’s left leg.)

Another Orange-crowned warbler, this one probably an adult. In the spring/summer my standards for this species’ identification is more or less uniform coloring with a slightly darker green back and pale yellow breast. It has a broken eye ring with a dark line running through it, but the overall impression (as you can see) is that of an undistinguished, pale yellow-green bird.

Another Orange-crowned warbler image…

Finally.. an image of a bird on which we should all be able to agree… a juvenile American robin! lt seems rather late for juveniles, but they have been dribbling in over the past month or so.

Birding in the yard has been generally uninteresting this summer. We have had a Black-headed grosbeak or two that have stopped by the yard, but they don’t come often and they are extremely wary… any movement on my part sends them out of the yard. The most interesting birds in the yard have been the various juveniles that have appeared. The Brown-headed cowbirds have done their damage despite the adults being almost entirely absent from the yard. Spotted towhee and White-crowned sparrow nests have both been parasitized and we’ve had several juvenile Brown-headed cowbirds show up in the yard.

European starlings have fledged and are showing up at the suet feeder and watercourse. The juveniles pictured here are transitioning into their adult plumage.

As long and I’m into the ‘rogues gallery’, I’ll include these photos of male House sparrows, a couple of too many visiting the yard. We’re overrun with House sparrows, the result of neighborhood residents allowing them to propagate and then the birds coming to our yard for better habitat with more nutritious foods and running water.

One of the bright spots (pun intended) are the male House finches coming to the yard. We’ve had several interesting males, including bright ones and those with an orange color.

But the primary reason for this post is a pair of visitors I had on August 13, the day that all of the photos in this post were taken. I was encouraged in that the day began overcast, the first such day in several weeks. The overcast provides much better light for birding photography than bright sunlight.

I’ve been hoping for several weeks for visits from Cedar waxwings. A couple of weeks ago I got a glimpse of at lest one in the watercourse but it left before I could get outside with my camera. On this day I saw one of the waxwings on one of our Golden Chain trees just above the watercourse and was able to photograph it and a presumed mate extensively as the birds made two separate trips to the watercourse to bathe.

I had a good day of photography on July 22. The day began overcast (perfect for birding photography) and I spent about two hours photographing birds in the yard before the sun broke out around noon. In about two hours I spent in the yard I took almost 300 photos. I had only one somewhat unusual visitor (a juvenile Black-headed grosbeak) but our usual visitors were unusually amenable to photos, posing on staging objects placed strategically around the yard.

This photo is of a juvenile Red-breasted nuthatch. We’ve had at least two families visit the yard this spring/summer.

We’ve had several successful Black-capped chickadee families visit the yard. This is another juvenile.

This Chestnut-backed chickadee has been in the yard for several months now. As you can see, it has a severely deformed right leg which sticks backwards at an angle and is totally useless for perching and across-the-ground mobility. It flies well but is somewhat shaky on perches and standing. It even manages to access the inverted suet feeder and seems to be dealing with its handicap very well!

One or two Eurasian Collared doves have returned to the yard after a several month absence. Last fall/winter we had as many as six (too many!) but a neighbor saw a Peregrine falcon thin the ranks by a couple of birds almost in our yard.

We’ve been almost overrun with Northern flickers in the neighborhood. I monitored a nest in the neighborhood for several weeks which netted many photos. The adults of more than one family are now visiting the yard and juveniles are abundant! This juvenile was very cute with it’s feathers ruffed up… it and a sibling were being fed suet by an adult male.

We’ve had a good many hummingbirds this season but I haven’t been able to get as many photos as in past seasons. We rather severely pruned our salivas last season and the cold weather this spring probably didn’t help… they seem to be rather late blooming. The adult male Rufous hummingbirds have apparently already migrated. This Rufous hummingbird is feeding on one of my favorite salvias.

Saving the best for last, I noticed this apparent juvenile American goldfinch on staging sticks near the watercourse. Its breast (only) appears wet although I didn’t actually see it in the water. The interesting thing about this bird is that in 20+ years of birding and in taking hundreds of American goldfinch photos (both wet and dry), I can never remember having seen or photographed one with black underlying feathers on the breast.

It’s been a few weeks since I last posted, but it’s not because I haven’t been taking bird photos. The May influx of migrants has definitely slowed… I don’t believe I’ve seen a warbler since very early June. I’ve mainly had to content myself with photos of juveniles visiting the yard.

I spent the afternoon of July 15, 2022, in the yard. We had a small flock of Bushtits arrive, the first I have seen in a couple of months. Bushtits usually visit the yard several times a day, but at the beginning of breeding season the birds paired up and we were left with one pair visiting the yard. But the pair eventually disappeared and we have seen none until this day.

We’ve had several families of chickadees visiting the yard, apparently indicating a successful breeding season in the area. We have both Black-capped chickadees and Chestnut-sided chickadees, and this photo is one of the former.

This is a photo of one of our Chestnut-sided chickadees.

This is a bright male House finch. There’s a large range in color on the males, and this is one of the brighter ones. We’ve also had a few that ranged to a faded orange which are less common.

This is a juvenile White-crowned sparrow, a species that has nested near our property but been paraticized by Brown-headed cowbirds in past years. This year the species has managed to raise a single chick which visits our yard on a regular basis. (Unfortunately since this date I’ve seen juvenile cowbirds being fed by both Dark-eyed (Oregon) juncos and a White-crowned sparrow.)

At the end of the winter we had about 17 adult California quail visiting the yard. They paired up during the breeding season and all but about two pair disappeared. Some of them are now returning with chicks, one pair with eight juveniles and one pair with about a dozen juveniles. 

And finally, my featured visitor of the day, a juvenile Black-headed grosbeak! We’ve had occasional visits from adult grosbeaks this summer, but not the stream of grosbeaks we’ve had in past years.