Valdez for my birding friends

It’s the end of migration for many of the little birds around here. The hardy water birds are still hanging out a bit.

 

We saw in the bay at the mouth of Solomon Gulch a tremendous number of black-legged kittiwakes  Not many hatch year birds, but many 2nd and up birds. Only saw 3 or 4 hatch year birds that were ID able.

 

 

We also observed on the fishing weir at Solomon Gulch adult herring gull and I assume 1st and 2nd year birds.

 

 

 

 

On the way back to the highway, we saw a black bear feeding on fish that weren’t making it up the creek! Liz got a photo while I was stopped in the ‘do not stop’ area. We also got some great shots of the Trumpeter Swans. There were 3 of them and I don’t know if one was a ‘young’ or not.

 

 

 

We drove out to Robe Lake and saw Red-Necked Grebe. A lot of them way out on the lake. It was a City Recreation and float plane area. They were doing maintenance by cutting the water weeds and piling them at the end of the lake. While watching the guy, we saw two apparent Trumpeter Swans as two white dots, down at the far end of the lake. Good find!

 

We stopped at the Fish and Wildlife Visitor Center at the edge of ‘town proper’ and they showed us the bald eagle and eaglets across the bay. They were exercising their wings. Looks like they will fledge soon. We saw a parent sitting nearby. Not sure if it was encouraging them to fly or watching that someone didn’t come and get them.

 

 

 

Also on the bay, were a number of mallards. At least that was all that was left after I did a ‘rule out’ ID session. I didn’t have my scope with me and it was too far out to get a really good visual.

 

There were Northwestern Crows in the area, too. What a noisy bunch they are. I didn’t seen any ravens. They would land on my roof and run from the front to the back and then go back to the front and they’d be yelling the whole time.

 

On our Friday morning walk we saw Stellar Jay and Black-billed Magpie. I missed hearing the crossbills and chickadees calling. They just may not live here or move thru this area. Or they may have been visiting over the mountain.

 

 

You can see a few other birds on the Lu-Lu Belle trip that we took on Friday.

Travel Day - headed south in Alaska

We left Byers Lake this morning. What a nice location. Put it on you list of places to stay at. We headed to Girdwood to pan for gold. Another cloudless day.

We made the stop at the South View point.

Had our photo taken by a professional photographer from Talkeetna, Dora Miller. She has photos for sale in one of the nice shops in town. Nice lady!

I saw these Trumpeter Swans as we were flying by. We decided we needed a better view, so at a business down the road, we turned around and came back. What a nice looking couple.

The required Butt shot.

We needed to make a stop to dump and get some fresh water. Liz found a place in the town of Houston. They have a city park and it looks like an okay place to stay. So Liz dumped and took on water while I went down to the campground to turn around. It was a great place to dump and they had potable water down in the park as well as at the dump station. So I stopped at the water place in the campground and took on water.

The fix for the fresh water siphon that the dealership had completed a month ago broke. The water started pouring out of the overflow. So I called and made an appointment to right down to the dealership and get it fixed again. Got that completed about 5 p.m. Just in time for going home traffic. So I asked if I could stay overnight in the parking lot. So it was a nice spot in place of looking for pullout on a heavily traveled road.