Vancouver Jan-Apr 2017

Jan 7,2017
White Rock Pier
Some Long-tailed Duck photos would be nice, but they didn't come close to shore even at high tide. So a few diving substitutes are

Common Loon

 Pied-billed Grebe

Not always a sea-dweller

 Harlequin Duck

An antenna for remote-control? no, it's a GPS tracker. I did not find out which organization is studying this one.

 American Wigeon

 Eurasian Wigeon and American Wigeon in the back.

The males look very different, but the females are much harder to identify.

 Eurasian Wigeon

Brunswick Point
Two Bald Eagles chasing dinner, they didn't catch the gull.

Jan 21

Boundary Bay

Bald Eagle

not chasing breakfast

 Northern Harrier

this male caught a vole and landed on the dyke to avoid being harassed by other raptors.

 A female Northern Harrier trying to steal a Red-tailed Hawk's food.

 Short-eared Owl

Feb 13

Ambleside

Just before breeding season is a good time to see ducks in parks because they have freshly-molted feathers.

Bufflehead

 Wigeon hybrid

 Mallard

 Grouse Mountain without grouse

Mar 19

Reifel

Mallard

the patch on the secondaries may be different on different individuals.

blue

 Purple

 Ring-necked Duck

a ring necked male

the shared characterist between male and female is the ring bill.

 Wood Duck

male wood ducks do not take care of their ducklings

 a female looking out from her nest box

wigeon hybrid

Sandhill Crane

 Fox Sparrow

 White-throated Sparrow

Boundary Bay

Long-eared Owl

Iona

Only some caged starlings

Mount Baker

 Mar 20
Delta

Snow Goose

When the geese first arrived in the fall, they were mostly white. By the end of each winter season, their head would have turned brown from the iron-containing soil around here. These two seemed to have enjoyed a mud bath.

 Great-horned Owl

They are big, but they still need to be alert, regardless if they have grown up because there are two nests of Bald Eagles near this tree, and eagles have been documented taking down great-horns.

Apr 9

The migrants are on the move and passing by Vancouver.

Iona

These two female Mountain Bluebirds are among the many at Iona this spring.

Apr 16

Iona

Mountain Bluebird

here's a male blue bird

Yellow-headed Blackbird

male

 Tree Swallow

unlike Pacific, Barn and Bank swallow, Tree swallow exhibits sexual dimorphism. The male is much brighter in color as shown below

 Golden-crowned Sprrow

Apr 23

Queen Elizabeth Park

Orange-crowned Warbler

White Rock pier and Rusty Blackbird

Jan. 11, 2015
I went to White Rock pier again for the Long-tailed Ducks Sunday morning, but this time the I was pretty luck to see them flying and add two lifers this place- Black Scoter and Pacific Loon.
A few of the ten Long-tailed Ducks that were closer to shore showed their tails quite well every time they dived.

Long-tailed Duck

Here's a good view of a male's tail. I can see why they get their current name which replaced another common name(Oldsquaw) that was previously used.

but the female's tail is not so impressively long

Female

 Two males were displaying their tails

and some fly shots of the two males

My lifer #1

Black Scoter

this one was in a flock of Surf and White-winged Scoters half-way to the boat launch of the pier

 Lifer #2

Pacific Loon

I did not get very close views of the loon and there were about 50 more farther out on the sea.

Note the narrow beak separates this bird from Common Loon and the huge flock made me belief this is not a Red-throated Loon.

 Also at White Rock were

Bald Eagle

 and 

Sanderling

In the afternoon at Boundary Bay--112th St and Hornby Drive

My third lifer was surprisingly easy to pick out from the blackbird,starling cowbird mixed flock

Lifer #3

Rusty Blackbird

It was alone on the lowest wire when I was there, while other birds stood on the top two power lines.

Maybe it knows it does not have any relative in this flock.