Jack London State Park and the hunt for the pileated woodpecker

I read online that there might be pileated woodpeckers at Jack London State Park. A woodpecker the size of a crow: it should be easy to find, right? I imagined I'd see it in the parking lot, stomping on tiny sparrows like an avian Godzilla. Hey, they're related to dinosaurs, right?

Anyway, it turns out that although I did see a dark blob in the distance that MIGHT have been a pileated, that was the best view I ever got. On the other hand, I did see a coyote chasing a rabbit through a grape field.

Also some scrub jays:

And plenty of nature's comedians, the acorn woodpeckers. People say that hyenas and kookaburras sound like they are laughing... I say the laughing animal of California is the acorn woodpecker.

Probably, they're laughing at squirrels who can't pry out their acorns and steal them. That's because acorn woodpeckers use their pecking powers to make holes in dead trees to wedge food for the winter. Just TRY to pull that out, squirrel...

What was interesting about this particular population of acorn woodpeckers is that they had made several of their granary trees out of eucalyptus. Normally they use oak trees, but in this area that has a lot of vinyard and few oaks, the eucalyptic remnants of a failed timber speculation apparently make a pretty good substitute.

Night Time

Last night, walking home in the dark, I noticed that there were tons of pigeons huddled together on the streetlights. Since they're normally on the ground during the day, this got me wondering about how else the landscape of the lake might change at night. Would I find birds in different locations, or doing different things?

I decided to check it out. I also put the high ISO and flash powers of my camera to some serious testing.

The first, obvious answer was that, yes, the night herons really are active at night. They leave the freshwater duck pond and spread out to various perches overlooking the water. The storm drain outlets are usually claimed, as are the shallow water areas:

I wonder if they fish all night, or only early evening? These pictures were taken between 8 and 9 pm.
More surprising, perhaps, was the number of other birds that are awake and active at night. I spotted some scaups swimming around. I was surprised at first, but then remembered that a lot of scaups seem to be resting and floating with heads under wing for a lot of the day. Maybe they are somewhat nocturnal?



I also found some insomni-ducks:

A lot of mallards and some Canada geese were standing around on Swedish beach, in the shallows. They grunt-quacked begrudgingly at being woken up and forced to move into deeper water. You can see their eyes shining. At the Exploratorium, when you see the cow-eye dissection, one of the things they show you is a part of the eye called the tapetum. It's basically a bonus reflector in the eye that helps animals see in low light; it's also what causes the eyeshine in the photos. I noticed that the mallards' eye shine looks greener, and the geese eyes look redder. This could be a result of the flash color, too, or the angle of the light...

I found some more pigeons sleeping in a tree; seagulls were conspicuously absent. The highlight of the walk was two raccoons washing their paws and drinking from the duck pond:

While taking this picture, I was aiming at a completely dark area, hoping I found the right spot and that the flash would illuminate the racoon. I guessed right, but the camera focus wasn't cooperating... Check out the raccoon's eyeshine:

There is a raccoon inside of this thing. I didn't quite get the camera in time to capture its descent. What is it doing in there? Unknown. I'm guessing it's studying all the legal 3-letter Scrabble words.


I was surprised how much ambient light there was, allowing for a few nice shots.

Eastshore Park

New Year's day, first birdwatching of the year! Both Tom and I were getting over colds, so we opted for an easy trip that turned out surprisingly fruitful.

Where: Eastshore Park (you may know this location as "behind the Emeryville Chevy's" or "that area you can see as you approach the Bay Bridge but how the heck do you get over there?")


When: High Tide. The sandpiper buffet is all covered up with water, so they have nowhere to go but the narrow strip of rocks lining the water's edge: conveniently, less than three feet from the paved path. Easy pickins!


Tom's getting good at digi-binoc-ing; can you believe I didn't even crop these photos? Nice work Tom! We saw three main kinds of shorebirds here:

1) Willets (not pictured here, but whenever I say their name, I say it like the witch in Willow...)
2) Marbled Godwits:

It certainly looks like it has all its marbles.


3) Whimbrels: They have a cool skunky striped head and a "whimbrsical" name.

We found a kingfisher acting like a hummingbird, flying from high perch to high perch:

Yesterday I was contemplating what birds I would like to look for in 2010, and the first thing I thought was, "it would be nice to see another loon." And the very next day, BAM. Looney Tunes.
A super sweet look at what I think is a juvenile Pacific Loon. Looking at the Sibley illustration, the stripey back seems to indicate a young bird.

The loon was paddling along, and periodically it would dip its face underwater, while continuing to swim forward.

(It dipped a bit more under than this photo shows.) We concluded that maybe it was looking for fish before committing to a longer dive. In other words, a lazy loon.

Finally, near a series of saint-candles someone left lit among the rocks, we found a little group of least sandpipers. At least I think that's what they are. Tiny and yellow legs... small enough to fit in your mouth.


Apparently in the birdwatching world, these little dudes all look alike, and as a group they are just called "peeps." Unlike the marshmallow peeps though, these probably wouldn't look very dramatic when microwaved.

Birds of 2009

Here's a list of birds I saw (or recognized) for the first time in 2009. It's kind of nice to look back on them, because most of them were spotted during a fun trip. It's a cool way to reminisce on the year's adventures:

Red-Throated Loon: April, Lake Merritt
Back in April, my sister and James called my attention to this bird--the first loon I'd ever seen. After evading our attempts to capture it in a laundry basket, the loon went on to nurse its illness under the storm drain.

Tundra Swan: December, Columnes
The swans also came with a quite juicy look at some Sandhill Cranes. I'm hoping this can be a yearly pilgrimage.

Spotted Sandpiper: June, South Lake Tahoe
A honeymoon bird!

California Gull: Lake Merrit
I've probably been seeing them for years, but my gull IDs are finally improving

Least Tern: September, Middle Harbor Park (Oakland Port)


Common Murre: August, Tennessee Valley Beach
Another bird that I may have seen before but couldn't ID until now.

Clark's Nutcracker: June, South Lake Tahoe
The way Tom tells this story, it goes, "Lisa heard a bird calling, and she said, 'that sounds like a corvid, but not one I know,' and we walked over to the tree and there it was. Clark's Nutcracker."

Pygmy Nuthatch: April, Presidio
A side benefit of working out there is a quick chance to look for these every day. When I saw one for the first time, I thought, "what IS that? It's like a nuthatch, but TINY!"

Wrentit: August, Tennessee Valley Beach
I remember thinking, "It's like a giant bushtit." I'm proud of IDing this bird because it shows I am paying better attention to small, dull-colored birds that hide in bushes.

American Pipit: December, Sweetwater Reservoir, San Diego
Another steaky brown bird which I would have formerly ignored as a hopeless case.

Townsend's Warbler: February, my apartment
Tom spotted the yellow and black football helmet of this bird through our window. Considering that our view is of a parking lot with a single scrawny oak, this was a remarkable find.



Wilson's Warbler: August, Tennessee Valley Beach

Song Sparrow: June, South Lake Tahoe
Another candidate for "brown streaky birds that formerly all looked the same to me."

Then there's all the birds I saw in Sicily this fall:
Cormorant, Little Egret, Great White Egret, Grey Heron, Shelduck, Sparrowhawk, Golden Eagle, Kestrel, Oystercatcher, Redshank, Crag Martin, Pied Wagtail, (European) Robin, (European) Blackbird, Blackcap, Coal Tit, Great Tit, Nuthatch, Magpie, Jackdaw, Hooded Crow



Next year, I'd like to add some more firsts! A few candidates:

Pileated Woodpecker
I have a lead on a park in Sonoma.



Green Jay
If I go to SE Texas on Vacation like I want to...

Grey Jay
Another mountain trip sometime?

Roadrunner
Will this be the year?

Any Thrasher
Next on the "Brown Bird" list

Any new Warbler
Maybe I'll have better luck if I go to NY again...

All images came from the NY Public Library Digital Archive, where I have taken years off my life just browsing the cigarette cards alone...

La Jolla

One last stop on the San Diego birdwatching tour: La Jolla, the Children's Pool at Casa beach. This spot has been nominated by a bunch of harbor seals as "best place to scratch your butt while humans watch."

These lazy, slug-like seals recover from the freezing clutches of the Pacific by lolling (and LOLing) in the sand where there was once a kiddie pool. They rudely sleep, scratch, and even have their babies right where HUMAN babies could be swimming. Apparently some people got mad about the seals acting all "Seal Privilege" and wanted to make the seals leave, or perhaps dress them up like toddlers, and there is a big controversy. So far the seals get to stay.

Like most of the animals I get to photograph, they're habituated to people, looking up longingly in the hope that you'll drop your halibut-flavored ice cream cone.


In addition to the adorable waddling of these Sea Fatties, there were a few birds at the beach. First, a Black Phoebe. Now, these things like water, but this is the first time I've seen one actually on the beach, foraging amidst the kelp.

Lots of brown pelicans do their part to keep the beach stinky and poo-covered:

And I also got some shots of a Heerman's gull. E-bird lists them as appearing in Alameda county (with many sightings at Eastshore park, not too far from Lake Merritt), but I don't think I've ever seen one there. Anyway, like the ring-billed gull, it's something of a gull freebie: the only one with a red beak and greyish body. They have this streaky looking head during winter, and a white head when trying to get a date.