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Wednesday, December 15, 2010

C.B.C. Day

Today was the day for the annual Christmas Bird Count to be done in this area.  This is a count I have not yet been able to participate in, but I will be watching with interest to see what the numbers for this area were – particularly of Bald Eagles.  At least they had a fairly pleasant day for it – there was even a bit of sunshine!

Viewed from the highway

This morning I had an appointment in Chilliwack, on my way home…stopped to take a few shots of the Bald Eagles I had been hearing about at the sides of highway 7…..that tree is an example…..

another section

Here is another…

Some of the eagles

and another…this is taken from the east side of the bridge…these few trees, when we had left this morning were absolutely covered in eagles..

The other side of the river

This is a view up the Harrison River towards the estuary, from the west side of the bridge…this area had been covered in eagles in the morning as well.

log bay

Our afternoon walk and you can see that water levels are back down to almost ‘pre deluge’ levels…

Gulls

This pair of gulls (could that be a Western cross on the left?) were being extremely vocal – I don’t know what the one on the left had – perhaps a piece of salmon skin, but whatever it was it was obviously very good.

Dark Eyed Junco

There was a flock of at least 50 Dark Eyed Junco in the bushes near the viewing platform….we often forget to focus on the more common little birds so thought I’d feature them today…

Dark Eyed Junco eating Hardhack seeds

Numbers of them were eating seeds out of the Hardhack flower heads.  I’ve noticed before that this native shrub is an important winter food source for some of our seed eating birds.

Towhee

another common area bird is the Spotted Towhee – this was one of a pair spotted towards the end of my walk.

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