Blackbirds, Bushtits and Bluebirds???

Another nice day…

The clear blue skies of the morning had given way to a high haze by the time we headed out for our walk.

at the log bay there was the usual activity for this time of the year…

a Black Cap Chickadee…

That decided to be even more co-operative….before joining it’s mate (impossible to tell by just looking at them whether a male or a female)…over in the area of the fallen weeping willow I mentioned yesterday.

a pair of Song Sparrows in the same spot…

and up in one of the Poplar trees…House Finch.  The pair of Canada Geese were out swimming and there were 8 Green Wing Teal along the far shore, the only ducks of the day!  Brewer’s Blackbirds were hanging about and there were 16 or so Tree Swallows…

Red-Wing Blackbirds as well….this one had been scuttling around on the forest floor before climbing up to challenge another male calling from a near by area, no females sighted today, they must all be busy nest building

Speaking of nests…the Bushtits were back working on theirs today.  There is one in the entrance and one in the lower right….

By the viewing platform I spotted the first Yellow Rump Warbler of the season….and since the photo I took didn’t turn out….

here is a file photo one…the guy I saw today was just like this one…a male ‘Audubon’ (yellow chin as opposed to a ‘Myrtle’ that has a white chin) Yellow Rump Warbler.

and now for the puzzler of the day…while I was at the viewing platform I noticed 5 birds up in the top of one of the ‘eagle’ trees….in silhouette against the light, I couldn’t really make them out, even with my good binoculars…

and I know a while back I said not to look for Mountain Bluebirds up in the tops of trees…but I have a feeling that is exactly what they were.  The 5 are in this picture…

This picture only shows 3 but you can make out the peach color on the breast of the lower bird…like a female Mountain Bluebird has…and I think the top bird is a male but of course you are looking at the gray under parts…not at the brilliant blue ‘top’.  They certainly acted like Mountain Bluebirds…flying out ‘bug catching’…they eventually flew off across the estuary…

For interest’s sake this is a file photo of a male Mountain Bluebird…

and this a female although taken from such an angle that you can’t see the coloration on the breast…

This is a male that hung around the log bay for a couple of weeks a couple of years ago.