We ended the day yesterday, with a small count of birds, but a very nice surprise at the end. Around 2:30 PM we saw a brown creeper going up and down a couple of the spruces. I thought, wonder if we'll see a golden-crowned kinglet. The two birds have been together in our yard, not truly "together" but - several times, we've seen a brown creeper and then a few minutes later, we'll see a golden-crowned kinglet. And of course, I did see a gck about three weeks ago or so. Totally surprising to me, as it was bitterly cold and had been for several weeks. So I kept a close watch out the window. About 45 minutes later, a golden-crowned kinglet hopped thru the branches of the spruce tree near one of our feeders. He disappeared and reappeared several times. I held my breath for some unknown reason, not that my movements or breathing would have disturbed him. Tom came into the room and I said, quick quick grab some binoculars. The kinglet reappeared and sat on the end of a spruce branch, his golden crown displaying so clearly and vividly. We just exclaimed, ohmygod, at the same time. He was so beautiful. Then he was gone. I wonder if he and the brown creeper come thru our yard every day, and we just happened to be watching yesterday for the bird count. So we will try to be a little more watchful these next days during the holiday vacation.
Our final count for the day: 7 Black-capped Chickadees, 5 Boreal Chickadees, 6 Red-breasted Nuthatches, 1 Raven, 1 Magpie, 1 Stellar Jay, 1 Hairy Woodpecker (female), 1 Brown Creeper, 1 Golden-Crowned Kinglet. We heard that someone had seen and photographed a Townsends' Solitaire somewhere in the Kenai area. Very cool.
No comments:
Post a Comment