On the water....

As planned we headed out in the canoe for the first time this year....

here we are in our boat launch....note the nice calm waters....

we quickly headed straight across to the partially submerged shrubs and were greeted by singing Yellow Warblers, like this one.  Red-wing Blackbirds were also evident, in fact lots of 'twittering' but not much visible.

wove our way up channels between the vegetation until reaching this dead end.  I had seen something moving on those logs, but nothing there by the time we reached them.

there was a family of Black-capped Chickadees busy going over the bushes beside the log jam...

One thing I was thrilled to see were the numbers of swallows...mainly Tree's, but also saw some Violet-greens, Northern Rough Wing and even a pair of Barn Swallows...

at one spot there was a lot of activity and saw these 3 youngsters perched on a branch, the two outside ones are Tree Swallows and I'm not sure about the middle one...they were in the worst possible location light wise and I really had to play with this to get it even this clear!

headed back out and to a branch of the Chehalis River...notice the water is getting more 'rippled'..

a juvenile Great-Blue Heron was there, one of 6 we saw, although some of them might have been the same as they were very skitterish....

a little further along we came to Swallow city!  there were Swallows all over the place!

more, including one at a nesting site towards the bottom of the tree trunk...

and some more, these all being young ones....

Also in the same area were....

Cedar Waxwings.  Now, I want you to go back and look at all the bird pictures I've posted so far and with the exception of the Chickadee, what do they all have in common?  Every bird is perched on DEAD branches in DEAD trees.  It became very clear...how many times have I mentioned this spring about the lack of Swallows?  Well there isn't a lack of swallows, it is just that we along the shore of the estuary have made it so inhospitable to them that they are found in the only place that has been untouched by human hands.  Anytime a tree dies along the foreshore (except in the protected park), it is removed because it is deemed either 'ugly' or 'dangerous'.  In actual fact for most wildlife including many bird species trees are more valuable once they have died and research has shown that a standing 'dead' tree will stand as long as it stood as a live tree and even when it does fall it is still invaluable to the eco-system!  So there, I've had my rant - now I'll continue on the canoe trip.

further up the river I could see 3 'somethings' over by the shore.  I thought they might be young Wood Duck because we have seen them here before, but now I am totally confused as to their identify...they appear to be Grebe and will probably turn out to be young Pied-bill Grebe although I'm waiting for confirmation on that as they just don't seem quite right.

with water levels high we were able to get further up the river than we normally can...

a small flock of Canada Geese were on this gravel bar but fled as we approached, although not very far...

there had been several Spotted Sandpiper along the river, here is one fleeing through the grass (it was a common theme!)

Several Grey Catbirds were seen and heard along the way as well, secretive at the best of times, this was the best photo I could manage.

Went ashore to stretch legs and spotted this male American Goldfinch eating grass seeds.... 

several American Robins were spotted too, including this juvenile.

time to head back....

only to find the pleasant breeze had turned into a stiff wind creating white caps on the open water...so instead of further exploring we headed back home, but we've left the canoe in an accessible spot and plan to head back out there for as many times as we can while the water remains high.