As we turn up Pine Canyon, Amanda says, “The weather looks a little ‘iffy’ up ahead.”

“Looks like heavy clouds up towards Waterville,” I answer.

“Yep!”

I pull over to the side of the road saying, “I didn’t look at the road cams this morning.  Let me take a look.”

“No! No! No! Let’s let it remain a mystery!  We know we are going anyway.”

We both laugh and say, “On to the mystery!” and head up the hill.  As we clear the top of the canyon, there is heavy, heavy fog.  Not good.  But, in less than a mile, it is gone and we can see clearly in all directions.  Mystery solved!

At our survey starting point on North Oil Rd., it is 21° and there is snow everywhere. In the top of a popular tree across the road is a Bald Eagle, surveying his kingdom. We head over the hills, dropping down toward Mansfield.  We disturb a coyote feasting on the remains of a deer carcass.  As we approach, the coyote takes off, and the twenty Common Ravens circling above decide it’s safe to descend.

Heading east from Mansfield, we head north on Rd. H NE.  We see another Bald Eagle fly over the road and land on a rock about a half mile away. As we look, we see there are two BAEAs there, and one is eating a kill.  We watch them for a while.  They aren’t concerned with us, we’re too far away.

Our survey two days ago had an abundance of Northern Harriers.  Today they are a scarcity. Instead, we find an abundance of Rough-legged Hawks (RLHAs).  You can never predict! We saw several hunting in the fields, and also sitting on power poles on Highway 17 running south from Leahy Junction. 

That section of Highway 17 is hard to survey because there are very few places to pull off and observe, and the traffic rolls through like there is no tomorrow. You might be crawling along trying to watch some activity in the field and your rear-view mirror reveals a semi plowing toward you at 70 mph. Usually, along that road, I drive and Amanda birds.

When we reach Sims Corner (intersection of Highway 17 and Highway 172), we turn west and, once again, head toward Mansfield.  There are many boulders called glacial erratics in this area.  They are so named because glacial ice carried them hundreds of miles during the series of ice age floods that occurred here some 14-16,000 years ago. As we approach one situated right along the road, we notice a RLHA sitting on a power pole.  He lifts off and flies to the erratic.  Amanda has her camera out and is trying to follow him.  He lands on the side of the bolder and totally disappears from sight.  She can see him, because she has followed him there.  I have pulled over to the side of the road and am trying to find him but don’t succeed.  She has him in her sight and snaps some images.  Talk about camouflage! 

We decide it’s about time to eat lunch.  We head north on Rd K NE and decide to stop four miles up, at a turn in the route, and eat there. On the way we spot what looks like a RLHA flying above the ridge, just next to a farm house.  We watch it for a bit and also scan the trees around the house.   Continuing north we stop and eat lunch, scanning the area while we do.  In a bit, a big pickup truck approaches us, pulls up and the driver rolls down her window.  We assume that she is wondering what we are doing out here in the middle of nowhere with our binoculars and cameras, and we are right. We explain about the Audubon Winter Raptor surveys and I ask her if she lives in the farmhouse just south, the one we were scanning.  She replies, “Yes,” and I tell her that I think we spoke with her last year when she was out fixing fence.  She remembers, and we have a nice chat for a few minutes.  We can’t blame her for being cautious, and tell her that we will be back once a month, through March.  We have met a couple other folks the same way on our route-driving, and now they know who we are.

We head into Mansfield again.  A very skilled Audubon board member once told me that every small town in Eastern Washington probably has a resident Merlin. In our surveys over the past three years, we have traveled through this little town of Mansfield a total of 33 times, as well as visiting it several times just birding on our own. Every time we pass through we look for, and have never seen, a Merlin. Well, today made up for it!  Today we saw a “Hot Pursuit in Mansfield!” As we passed through the main part of town, I spot a bird sitting in the top of a tall evergreen.  We stop and look with the binoculars.  Sure enough!  A Merlin!  We pull our cameras out and I snap off a few frames.  Suddenly, he lifts off and pivots away down towards a dove that is flying by.  They fly up and around and back like trapeze artists without the trapeze. Suffice to say, we spent the next fifteen minutes watching this Merlin dive and cavort and perform all types of aerial acrobatics trying to get some dinner.  We drove all over town trying to keep him in our sights.  We finally gave up trying to photograph him, as he was just too quick.  Talk about turning on a dime!  He turned on a pinhead! We didn’t have to worry about alarming him.  He was too involved in the chase.  Mansfield has some huge grain bins and a very large population of doves, pigeons, and starlings.  That Merlin really worked!  I hope he got some dinner, because he was using up a lot of calories trying to get it. We could have stayed there for a long time watching him, but we were losing light and still had several miles of survey route ahead. But, at least, now we know.  There IS a Merlin in Mansfield!

When we arrive at the final 2.2 mile segment of the route, we find we can only drive .9 of a mile.  The snowplow stopped there and the rest of the route is unplowed.  Looking at the snow, I decide that I really don’t want to get stuck in it out there in the middle of nowhere.  We turn around and end our survey there.

Here is a summary of what we saw:

Red-tailed Hawk 3
American Kestrel 1
Northern Harrier 3
Bald Eagle 3
Rough-legged Hawk 18
Merlin 1

Would you like to inquire about participating in ECAS Winter Raptor Surveys?  Contact Jeff Fleischer at raptorrunner97321@yahoo.com

Today’s survey got started a little late.  The tire pressure light on my car told me that the air in one of my tires was low.  I didn’t think it was a very good idea to take off on a more than 200 mile trip to the middle of nowhere, with the possibility of a flat tire.  So, I went into town to take care of it.

After that, we took off to drive our survey route on what was an absolutely beautiful day.  It had snowed the day before, and with the blue skies today, the landscape sparkled and glistened! 

We headed up Pine Canyon, went through Waterville (making the obligatory stop at the Highway 2 Brew for Chai Tea and a Mocha) and on through Moses Coulee. As we climbed out of the coulee and headed south of the Highland Schoolhouse, we could look back to the west. It’s amazing to see the expanse of the plateau, the cut of the coulee, and the Cascade Mountains in the distance.

We continued on east, eventually arriving at Atkins Lake, a non-lake because of a couple past dry summers. We took a look at the rock piles in the vicinity.  There are many rock piles scattered across the landscape, and in years past this is where we have seen the Snowy Owls.  It is a little early yet for them to arrive, although last year we did see one in December. The year before we didn’t see any until February, but then we saw seven!  We looked over the rock piles, but no SNOWs.  Maybe next month!

Continuing on, we turned on Rd 4 NE and saw an adult Bald Eagle in a stand of trees.  We don’t usually see BAEAs up here. 

As we pulled off the road to watch him, out of nowhere came a NOHA (Northern Harrier) chasing an AMKE (American Kestrel).  They put on quite an acrobatic show as the NOHA turned and dived and the AMKE evaded. Eventually the AMKE flew deep into the center of the trees and the NOHA departed. As we watched, we observed a second AMKE also in the trees.

Our survey this month revealed a large number of Northern Harriers, with the majority being males.  The large numbers of Rough-legged Hawks (RLHAs) we have seen in the past were nonexistent today.  We only saw three. The NOHAs were very active in the first three quarters of our route, bouncing along just above the ground or hovering above the fields as they hunted.

Often, we will look in the distance and see a little bump on a rock pile. The binoculars will sometimes reveal that it is a raptor and sometimes it’s just another rock. There is one place on this route which has a rock that has been the subject of debate more than once. But that’s a story for another time. 

As we passed the little area named Mold, we spotted a bump sitting in the field. When we stopped to look with our binoculars, we could see it was a NOHA.  We watched, hoping that it would lift off and fly. As it sat there, another NOHA came along and hovered right over it.  We wondered if we were going to see some territorial displays, but then they both flew off together.

Here is a summary of what we saw:

Red-tailed Hawk   1
American Kestrel   4
Northern Harrier   13
Bald Eagle 1
Rough-legged Hawk   3

It is snowing at home as we prepare to take off for our survey. Not a good sign! However, upon checking the WSDOT road cams, the weather looks relatively clear where we are headed. So we decide to set off and hope for the best.

We arrive at the beginning point of today’s route at approximately 9:15 AM. There are very high clouds and it’s 32°F outside. But, it’s not snowing!  And the visibility is not bad.

As we drive each survey, we enter information on a survey form that was created by Jeff Fleischer, the project developer. This form records the date, time, weather, survey miles, and route segments. The Coulee City route of 80 miles is divided into 15 separate segments. On each segment we mark down the number of each raptor species that we observe. 

Today, as we head up the coulee, driving north from Soap Lake, we observe Red-tail hawks and one, lone hawk flying high above us, too high to identify, other than the fact that it’s a member of the genus Buteo.

As we approach Park Lake, which is on the south end of Sun Lakes State Park, we observe two Golden Eagles soaring above the basalt. We stop and watch them for a while. They are magnificent!

Arriving at the conjunction with State Highway 2, we head east, go past the town of Coulee City, and on east to the town of Hartline. 

Going south from Hartline we make a big, angular, figure 8, driving through miles of farmland, back through Coulee City, and down along Pinto Ridge. Even though we have the route form and our route map, we miss the turn off for two segments. After driving past terrain that we don’t remember from last month, we realize we’ve gone too far, and have to turn around. We backtrack and get on the right road again.

This is a new route for us, the second time we’ve driven it. I think next month we’ll have it down… Unless it snows 3 feet and we find that we have to change things! One advantage of the other two routes we drive is that we have driven them for the past two years, so we are familiar with whether the roads are actually plowed (like the county map says) when it snows. We know where we can go. This route, being new, still has opportunity for discoveries after it snows.

Here is a summary of what we saw:

Red-tailed Hawk   5
American Kestrel   9
Northern Harrier   1
Golden Eagle  2
Rough-legged Hawk   5
Unidentified Buteo 1
Great-horned Owl  1

Would you like to inquire about participating in ECAS Winter Raptor Surveys?  Contact Jeff Fleischer at raptorrunner97321@yahoo.com

This was a day for sighting Falcons!

My house was engulfed in fog this morning, but a look at the WADOT cameras showed clear skies up on the plateau. Sure enough, as we headed up Pine Canyon, the skies cleared and it turned into a beautiful day. This morning, we are three.  A friend, Joanne,  wanted to ride along, as she is interested in learning more about birding, and we were glad to have an extra pair of eyes.

We arrived in Waterville and, or course, had to make a stop at the Highway 2 Brew for a Chai tea before we headed east on highway 2. Our route begins at the Highland School House, which is 64 miles from home.  The total drive miles on the survey route are 112. We stop to record the time and weather, zero out the odometer to check the miles and turn on the tracking app on my iPhone. We are using a tracking app to record the route, in the hopes of helping to create a database of digital maps for all of the routes in the project. Here’s a photo of our beautiful, clear, day at the school house.

The first part of the route goes south from the Highland School and makes a large loop which ends up back on Highway 2.  Usually this segment doesn’t yield a great number of birds, but today we see three American Kestrels and one Northern Harrier.

Back on Highway 2, we head east to Atkins Lake.  This is the area where we usually see the Snowy Owls after the first of the year.  Atkins Lake is kind of a misnomer – at least, this year.  In years past there has been water in the lake bed – teaming with waterfowl in the spring through fall.  But this past year was so dry and hot, it all evaporated and there is no water at all.  Likewise with the Vernal Ponds which are a little ways north, and further along on the route, there are no ponds this year.  We are hoping for LOTS of snow this winter.

About halfway through the route, I take a look at the tracking app on my phone and discover that it is not turned on.  I would swear in a court of law that I had turned it on at the beginning, but it’s not on now.  So, I guess we won’t track this route until we drive it again in December.

Our route winds around east and then north to Saint Andrews, which was almost totally destroyed in the fires last September.  St. Andrews Lake is not much of a lake this winter.  We keep winding around up to the Vernal Ponds on Heritage Rd (Rd. L NE), and, there are no ponds.  This year we decided to change the place where we eat our lunch.  In the past we have stopped and eaten SE of Sims Corner.  But in the 10 lunches we have eaten at that spot in the past two years, we have never seen any raptors. So, we decided to stop at the Vernal Ponds and eat, hoping we might spot something.  And, we did!  We saw a male and female Northern Harrier and a Rough-legged Hawk.  I don’t think we would have spotted any of them, if we were just driving through.

We encountered a surprising number of raptors today, I think the highest count we have ever seen on this route.  We saw 11 American Kestrels, 15 Rough-legged Hawks and FOUR Prairie Falcons! That’s a good count! Besides the raptors, we saw multiple Ravens, a Northern Shrike, three pheasants and 61 mule deer.

 

Here is a summary of what we saw:

Red-tailed Hawk   2
American Kestrel   11
Northern Harrier   6
Rough-legged Hawk   15
Prairie Falcon   4

Would you like to inquire about participating in ECAS Winter Raptor Surveys?  Contact Jeff Fleischer at raptorrunner97321@yahoo.com