Field, Forest, Seashore & Pond

 

Western Gull Hunting Below Cliff House

I didn't think I was going to post anything today since it was so ordinary, with the lone exception being the sighting of a female violet-green swallow gathering nest material. My only other post with a violet-green swallow (a male) is from last year's trip to see long-tailed weasels. Anyway, today's birds frequent fields (the swallow), forests (the woodpecker), the seashore (gull, pelicans, oystercatchers), and a pond (grebes).

Violet-green Swallow, Golden Gate Heights Park

The swallow would zip through the air in an arc across the street, then land and seem to peck at something on the ground, then take off again and repeat the whole round. I finally got my camera out and managed to get this one shot where it picked up a bit of cut grass, presumably for its nest. I waited a while to see if she would come back for more to no avail.

Hairy Woodpecker, GGH Park

The main gathering of brown pelicans today was out at the farthest offshore of the Seal Rocks.

This second-year Western gull was industriously working the shoreline below the Cliff House, at one point (before I got my camera out) nabbing something stringy, wiggly, silvery-clear, and about five inches long. 

Here's another highly-cropped view of the black oystercatcher with two eggs.

An uncropped view.

The nest was empty when I first checked it out. The grebelets were floating at the edge of the willows, sweetly cheeping. Only when mama returned and climbed aboard the nest did the two chicks also return.

I don't think any feeding happened before mama jumped back in the water and swam away.

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Paired Hawks

 

Red-shouldered Hawk Near North Lake

I saw two more pairs of hawks sort of hanging out together today, just a day after catching Bando and a pal perched on the same streetlight down by the beach. One pair was red-tails near Elk Glen Lake. The other was a pair of red-shouldered hawks near North Lake. Although Bando and pal appeared to be different ages, I couldn't say the same for the two pairs I saw today.

A day after the rain, a slime mold (Fuligo septica) sees its chance to sporulate in mulch beneath a pine tree on the Sunset Parkway.

Limb-dancing Red-tail

Skulking Red-tail

Ruffled Red-tail

Red-shouldered Hawk

Red-shouldered Hawk Leaping to a New Perch

Yesterday it was all whimbrels down on the beach, where today I saw none. This willet was all by itself below the Cliff House.

A lone wandering tattler was hunting on the beach between waves.

This is super-cropped, but you can just make out a couple of stone-colored black oystercatcher eggs on its cliffside "nest" on Seal Rocks.

Mating Pair of Black Oystercatchers

This is the one that was off the nest in the previous shot. It briefly poked around for a bite to eat near shore, then flew back and replaced the other bird on the nest.

Video clips of wandering tattler and black oystercatcher.

After seeing great blue herons hunting almost every day for a recent, brief period of time, it's now been quite a while since I've seen one. Their youngsters must be hungrier than ever, yet the adults appear to have become more secretive about hunting.

A red-shouldered hawk feather was on the ground at Blue Heron Lake.

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Lively Lake

 

Raccoon ("Sally") in Blue Heron Lake

Blue Heron Lake is in a class by itself as far as lakes in Golden Gate Park go. Other lakes come close in some regards, and in some seasons, but they are often kind of sleepy, whereas you can always count on some kind of activity going on at Blue Heron Lake. 

The pair of raccoons I call Burt & Sally were making their rounds today, turning up just as I was about to head home for lunch. Sally caught a crayfish, and Burt caught what I suspect was a baby bird, maybe a duckling. At one point, Burt ambled right into the feet of a guy reading his newspaper on a bench; the guy casually flicked his foot to get the raccoon to move on. 

The two pied-billed grebelets were sitting in their nest while mom did her own thing nearby. Several great blue heron not-so-little ones were patiently waiting in their giant nest for ma and pa to return with lunch.

It turned out to be a pretty nice day after the morning rain. San Francisco picked up 0.15 inches officially, but it seemed like we got more than that in our neighborhood, where a fairly steady light rain suddenly came down in buckets for a minute or so.

The 33-year-old American-flagged RJ Pfeiffer container ship was heading to the Port of Oakland this morning. I wondered if its cargo was American-made goods not subject to the steep tariffs that have been slowing international trade (at least until this weekend's big announcement regarding tariff reductions with China).

Bando and Pal hanging out together while overlooking Sutro Dunes (aka Balboa Natural Area). I stopped to photograph a half-dozen or so turkey vultures that were circling above Sutro Heights (along with the usual ravens and gulls), but they drifted out of sight before I could get my camera out.

The two hatched grebelets still have the nest to themselves.

Mama hangs out close by.

The two grebelets seem to think mom is going to feed them.

Unfortunately, she appears to be doing a little housekeeping on the nest instead.

Burt tours a patch of English daisies.

Raccoon & Iris Patch

After bumping into the feet of a guy sitting at the bench, Burt sidles along the path toward a pair of mallards who are about to jump in the lake, taking no chances with the raccoon.

Sally munches a crayfish (whose reddish claw you can just make out in her paws).

Can't resist trying to get a shot of them near their sign.

Big Nest with Big Babies

Burt pulled something out from under a big log. A couple of us onlookers thought it might be a root or something until we saw its stringy guts being stretched out.

Sally came to check out what Burt was eating, but it was too late.

Back to the hunt.

A brief timelapse of clearing weather this afternoon.

Mt. Shasta Sunrise Yesterday

And then a little later in the morning.

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Squash Bug

 

Squash Bug, Golden Gate Heights

I saw what I thought was a spider ambling across my pillow this morning. The pillow was naked on the floor since the sheets and pillowcases were in the wash. I went to the kitchen for something to catch the spider in, and I grabbed a pair of glasses to put on while I was at it. Instead of a spider, which we do occasionally see in the house, the creature turned out to be a true bug.

I didn't know what kind of bug it was, but I immediately set out to photograph it, first indoors on a white background, then on a selfheal plant in the back yard, where I set it free. I kicked myself when I finally looked up the bug and found that it is a denizen of squash plants. My neighbor has a wild cucumber slithering its green tendrils all over the place, and I'd love to have photographed it on that actual member of the squash family. (I did look for the bug in our yard to no avail.)

The little fuzzies you see on the bug were no doubt picked up during its journey into our home. 

Glacier Point Road re-opened today.

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Sunbathing Red-tailed Hawk

 

Sunning Red-tailed Hawk, Golden Gate Park

It was probably in a journalism class that I first heard the saying about sunlight being the best disinfectant, used in the context of California's open-meeting laws under the Brown Act. But the saying came along much earlier and is attributed to the early 20th-century Supreme Court Associate Justice Louis Brandeis.

In any event, birds have been onto sunshine as a kind of disinfectant since long before our proto-human ancestors climbed down out of the trees. Although sunning does help a bird warm up, according to Audubon, "[A] growing body of research now points to one largely understudied purpose: to rid themselves of pesky parasites living on their skin and feathers." 

Today's sighting of a sunning red-tail was my second in less than a week, with the first one being at the Cliff House. This one occurred in the Horseshoe Courts within the Oak Woodlands of Golden Gate Park. I first saw the hawk perched in a pine tree, having been alerted to its presence by nearby bird alarms. While I was admiring the hawk it suddenly dove off its branch, whizzed right by me, and landed on a railing. I figured it had spotted a gopher, but then it jumped to the ground and waddled over to a flat, sandy, open area and lay flat as a pancake.

Banded Red-tailed Hawk in Pine Tree

Dive!

The red-tail didn't go immediately to the ground.

But it didn't take long before doing so.

Video clips of the red-tail sunning itself (with a brief clip from Lily Lake at the end, where some little fish are glad the green heron is gone).

Woodland Skipper at Lily Lake

Grebelet in the Water

The other little chick was sitting on the nearby nest with its mother.

I found a crow feather in the yard and stuck it in the ground, but it kept getting plucked out and dropped nearby. I wondered who was doing the plucking. Today I couldn't find the feather at all. Incidentally, the other day I found pieces of flour tortilla in the water bowl. In one of the clips above, a raven (or is it a big crow?) appears to be eating some small plants it pulled out by their roots.

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