Nature Where I Live: San Francisco: Purple Finch

Purple Finch Near Elk Glen Lake

This finch is purple the way some prose is purple: both are elaborately ornamented. I wasn't very familiar with purple finches, and when this one, so much bigger than a typical house finch, flew into some nearby bushes to feed on the seeds of scarlet hummingbird flowers, I wondered if it was something exotic. It is definitely a handsome bird.

Brown Creeper at Mallard Lake

This lesser goldfinch was singing up a storm, so I tried to record some of it on video. Unfortunately, there was a lot of background noise from traffic and, in the distance, a wood-chipper....

Struggling to be Heard

The red-winged blackbirds are still very active at Elk Glen Lake.

Red-tailed Hawk at Elk Glen Lake

This Allen's hummingbird was the king of a big patch of scarlet, tube-shaped flowers -- garden ornamentals that I'm not familiar with.

I only saw a hummer actually nectaring on the flowers for a fraction of a second before it was chased off. It's such a bounty that it's guarded more than it's used, like a miser's wealth.

While I was watching the hummers chase each other off the flowers, the purple finch winged in and took advantage of the seeds.

The seeds are down in the bottom of those calyxes, but presumably the finch is able to eat more than just the chaff.

Purple Finch

Something darted low to the ground in front of me, moving so fast I wasn't sure I'd really seen anything. I went to look for it, thinking it was probably a sparrow or maybe a speedy California towhee, and was pleasantly surprised to see it was a Nuttall's woodpecker.

I was surprised again when it landed on some nearby poison hemlock to hunt for more insects to stuff into its beak.

Another surprise was catching this mourning dove on a branch instead of pecking around for seeds in a patch of dirt. Unfortunately, it was very skittish and quickly turned around and took off.

I wondered if the gulls were in any way harassing the black oystercatcher, which continues to brood its eggs on the side of Seal Rocks, but I never saw any sign of it.

A couple of times the oystercatcher even got up off its eggs (circled in red) to stretch out and preen its feathers.

Meanwhile, very near the oystercatcher nest, this gull also had a nest. I wonder how that will go if both species have chicks at the same time in such close proximity.

The gull's nest, the oystercatcher's eggs, and the oystercatcher.

There were ten snowy egrets hunting on the beach near the Cliff House, where they got to enjoy a brief period of time with no dog-walkers in the area (and I do mean brief; they were soon disturbed by dogs and flew away).