2016 Sep-Dec

It's been more than half a year into the new year, but I just finished deleting unwanted photos from 2016. As I don't remember much about last year, this post will be more of a picture album than I want it to be.

Sep 10, 2016
Boundary Bay
Mid-August to mid-September is always a good time to see different species of shorebirds migrating south along the shorelines. Many of them will not be bothered by the presence of a photographer if you are willing to wait for the tide to push them closer to shore.
Baird's Sandpiper and American Pipit walked toward me to as close as 3 meters while I sat on a log.

Baird's Sandpiper

Baird's Sandpiper

Pectoral Sandpiper 

Pectoral Sandpiper

 American Golden-plover

The closest one. Smaller than the Black-bellied Plovers behind it.

American Golden-Plover

in the same flock of plovers is another Golden-plover with wing tips shorter than the tail. Not sure if this indicates this is a Pacific Golden-plover.

 American Pipit

American Pipit

Sep 21, 2016

Mountain Seymour

Lincoln's Sparrow

Lincoln's Sparrow

Sep 24

Vancouver

Lewis' Woodpecker

A rare woodpecker visitor from the interior. I think this is a weirdo woodpecker as it prefers fly catching insects over drumming the trees. It spends most of its time sitting on this perch and hawking different winged insects. I was happy to tick off two lifers on the same day, the first was the Rock Wren which I got even better looks on the next day.

Lewis's Woodpecker

 caught a bee this time

 Berries are welcome too.

Sep 25

Maplewood Conservation Area

Rock Wren

Another interior bird showed up near my place in North Vancouver.

Rock Wren

 Anna's Hummingbird female

 Black-tailed deer

A fawn crossing the trail. Deer are seen here almost every week.  

Oct 30

Boundary Bay

Snow Goose

Geese flocks are coming in at large numbers. Most of them are White morph but a few are Blue morph. The second one from the left is a blue morph immature.

 Barred Owl

Only opened one and a half sleepy eyes, a good sign that I did not stress it out.

Blackie Spit

Eurasian Wigeon is almost as common as American Wigeon here, there are so many of the that 3 males are in the background.

Long-billed Curlew

Nov 6

Reifel

First bird is not a bird. A wooden duck is not a wood duck.

 Mallard male

Neither a wooden duck nor a wood duck

 Black-crowned Night-Heron

Reifel is the only place around Vancouver that you can regularly see night-herons.

Great-horned Owl

 is also pretty reliable here.

Boundary Bay

Northern Harrier

you probably won't find this many of them anywhere else in Vancouver and Fraser Valley.

male

females

 Cooper's Hawk

 Barn Owl

 Northern Saw-whet Owl

Nov 11

Vancouver

California Scrub-Jay

This was at least the third location I had tried to get this bird in the past few years. Lucky it was still in the same general area after I ran back to the car to grab my camera.

Terra Nova

Pied-billed Grebe

 Mink

This one is whiter than all of the other minks I've seen so I wasn't sure what I was looking at when it poked its head out.

 Coyote

Looks just like and seen almost as often as a regular dog here.

Nov 14

Jericho

Clay-colored Sparrow

not your average sparrow along the Pacific Northwest.

 Palm Warbler

Also a pretty good bird to have at the same location.

 Northwestern Crow

Nov 27

Stanley Park

Canada Goose

this small individual is probably an Aleutian.

Dec 4

Boundary Bay

Hundreds of Bald Eagles gather around the mouth of Fraser River during winter every year. Not all Bald Eagles have white heads and not all raptors with white heads are Bald Eagles.

Bald Eagle

adult with white head and tail

Great Blue Heron

Having a rodent snack

Red-tailed Hawk

this juvenile hasn't obtained its red tail yet.

Trumpeter Swans

Quiet July and August

Jul 7 Queen Elizabeth Park

Merlin

the two first-year birds hung around their nest the first few weeks after they fledged. They chased each other and a crow for some times before they rested in some shades at noon. The adults were still around, but not watching them anymore.

Merlins

Jul 29-31 Osoyoos

I spent three nights in a ski lodge on Mt. Apex and for the first time in many years was I able to see the night sky in little light pollution. The Milky Way galaxy was clearly visible from the door of the lodge.

We visisted Dominion Radio Astrophysical Observatory or DRAO for short during one of the afternoons. This observatory captures some waves outside of our visible spectrum and process them into informations scientists can study. They chose the valley around White Lake in mid 1900s because there is relatively little precipitation and ground interferance, yet it is not in the middle of nowhere. The mountains nearby isolate the site from waves from the cities, but the families of the people who work there can move to towns within an hour of drive. They are continuing to build new radio telescopes in this valley.

At the entrance, there are severas signs, with drawings of cell phones, that instructs visitors to ''turn off'' their electronics. So I turned off my cellphone and never got any photos of the antennae. I did, however, bring my 400 along and did not regret it.

A few hundred meters down the road, there are signs that indicate the area is an IBA, Importan Bird Area, that means there are birds around.

 Eastern Kingbird

probably saw a hundred of them in Osoyoos during the three days.

Eastern Kingbird

 Say's Phoebe

Say's Phoebe

 Osprey

Ospreys

Aug 11 North Vancouver
I almost always bring my camera with me when I leave the door, even if it's just a walk in the neighborhood. Sometimes the insects on other people's front lawns are just more cooperative.
Guessing this is an European Skipper.

 Bee

Aug 14 Iona
Lots of shorebirds are arriving, but I only got decent photos of a few species

Lesser Yellowlegs

Lesser Yellowlegs

 Solitary Sandpiper and Lesser Yellowlegs

The Solitary Sandpiper, a lifer for me, flew into my view finder when I was photo graphing the Lesser Yellowlegs.

Solitary Sandpiper and Lesser Yellowlegs

 Garter Snakes are common at Iona too.

Garter Snakes

Aug 22 Maplewood
It had been a few months since I went out looking for non-birds or humans, and I was a bit rusty at handling the flashes and micro lens, but the photos turned out alright.

Pacific Tree Frog

Pacific Tree Frog

 jumping spiders 

are called ''flytiger蠅虎'' in Chinese and it is not difficult to agree with the name. These spiders look for their preys with their keen eyes and jump on to them. Few spider genera have very developed eyes; most of them just weave a web and wait.

 This other spider has much smaller eyes even though it is about 3 times as big as the jumping spider.

Aug 24 Iona

Wandering Tattler

the only other time that I have seen tattlers was last year on St. Paul island, so I was excited to see the two tattlers today.

Wandering Tattler

Wandering Tattler

River Otter

other animals also use the man-made jetties.