• Breakfast with Towhees, Lunch with Finches

    By Kseniya Tuchinskaya

     

    The world is upside down but the House Finches outside my window don’t know this. Every morning, I eat breakfast in our kitchen nook, which looks onto my neighbors’ overgrown fence. And every morning, the finches show up to keep me company. I love seeing their bright red heads bob between the purple flowers and fresh green leaves. I love their cheerful song. My binoculars stay at the ready on the empty chair next to me as I sip my tea.

    I worry that one day, my neighbors will catch me with my leopard-print bathrobe and binoculars, staring intently through the window. It’s a strange time, so I hope they’ll allow me this eccentricity. 

    House Finch by Rocky T.

    Now that I am working from home, I have become very familiar with the rhythms of our local birds. In fact, I know them better than any neighbors I’ve ever had. Because there’s no need to catch a train to the city, I wake up without an alarm. Instead, the first sound I hear is the Bewick’s Wren chittering in the yard over. Sometimes, the resident Scrub Jay joins in as well, which is a clear sign it’s time to get up and make my morning tea. 

    Bewick’s Wren by Aurora Santiago

    There’s the pair of resident California Towhees, rummaging around our cars in the driveway (I see them every day, and I am convinced that soon I’ll be able to recognize them by face alone).

    There’s the female Anna’s Hummingbird who comes around in the morning, without fail, and sits on her favorite skinny branch, preening. She visits at sunset, too. I like to think she’s enjoying the pink sky after a long day of flying and foraging.  I see this hummingbird so frequently that I have asked my husband to help me brainstorm a name for her (suggestions, readers?).

    Female Anna’s Hummingbird by Aurora Santiago

    Sometimes, I’ll catch a glimpse of the Bushtits as they bounce around on their morning rounds. White-crowned and very round Golden-crowned Sparrows take their turn as well, if the finches are away.

    I am not used to spending this much time inside my house, or within 2 miles of it. I’ve known my neighborhood only in relation to myself as a human, but I’ve been discovering that it’s a bird neighborhood, too. If I pass a certain tree on my block near sunset, there is sure to be a an American Robin in it, singing its evening notes.…

  • Goodbye Until an Unknown Time

    By Marjorie Powell

     

    I felt a pang of disappointment as I canceled the hotel reservation for the Sage Grouse three-day trip that I signed up for the first day that the Birdathon trips were announced. I was really looking forward to seeing the males perform at the Lek, even after I heard about the slog through the snow and mud in the dark last year, when it was uniquely cold and wet. 

    To console myself, I went across the street to the platform at Elsie Roemer Bird Sanctuary on the southeastern corner of Alameda, then walked along the path between homes and the edge of the Bay. As I walked, I realized that I was also missing the American Avocets that had so recently fed and rested along the shoreline.

    American Avocet Photo by Marjorie

    During the last weeks in February I routinely counted 100 or more of the Avocets in the equivalent of a city block of shoreline. I had noticed that many of these striking, black-and-white birds were molting into their Alternate, or breeding, plumage, with the coffee-brown head, neck and upper belly, a sign that they will leave soon for their nesting sites. I am comforted to know that some of them do not go far, but nest at the Alameda Wildlife Reserve on the old Naval Base at the west end of Alameda as well as at Martin Luther King Jr, Regional Seashore in Oakland. I am also comforted to know that they will be back, although now I can’t remember which month they return. Is it December, or do I only see the larger flocks of them in February and early March?

    I’ve watched, and learned about, American Avocets during the six years that I’ve lived across from the Sanctuary in Alameda.

    American Avocet in breeding plumage by Marjorie

    They are tall enough and their black-and-white winter coloring is distinctive enough that even non-birders can identify them easily without binoculars. When they leave Elsie Roemer to breed, they lay their eggs in a scrape in the bare ground lined with vegetation and, sometimes, with down from the female’s breast. They lay 3-4 eggs, which are incubated for three to four weeks. The babies can walk and swim within a day of hatching. Avocets feed on small invertebrates as well as seeds from aquatic plants. They find their food by scything their bills back and forth on the surface of the water.…

  • Birds Don’t Know About Social Distancing

    By Britta Shoot

     

     

    Cheep cheep cheep!

    The sparrows and finches are here. I don’t know what time it is—I still haven’t opened my eyes, let alone turned off my white noise machine or opened the shades—but I know the regulars have arrived because they are chirping noisily right outside.

    As I shuffle into the kitchen to make coffee, I squint out the window to see dainty House Finches, puffy Mourning Doves, and agile sparrows foraging peaceably together.

    House Finch by Deb Shoning

    I live in a downtown San Francisco apartment building, where these types of charming encounters are constant. There’s a little yard along the walkway up to the building, and in addition, I’m absurdly fortunate to have a small roof deck right outside my flat. It’s just big enough for a few chairs and a container garden of varied succulents and cacti, perennials including snapdragons and lilies, and woody geraniums I inherited from former neighbors. 

    No doubt due to the abundance of plant life and stately street trees in the immediate vicinity, most days, energetic robins and lively hummingbirds visit my porch on their rounds. Every afternoon, a few members of the local Red-masked Parakeet colony fly shrieking past—if they don’t land directly on my fire escape or roof, of course. Between so much bird activity and expansive views into numerous downtown office, apartment, and hotel buildings, I feel intensely connected to the city and its rhythms, even when I’m in my home, physically removed from it all.

    Red-masked Parakeets by Andreas Haugstrup

    In How to Do Nothing: Resisting the Attention Economy, Jenny Odell notes that when she visits Oakland’s Rose Garden, she isn’t “alone in nature,” even when she is the only person around. 

    “When the garden is empty of people,” she writes, “I still consider it a social place where I spend time with jays, ravens, Dark-eyed Juncos, hawks, turkeys, dragonflies, and butterflies, not to mention the oaks, the redwoods, the buckeyes, and the roses themselves.” 

    Because I live in a densely populated area, I never expect to be fully alone, even when tourists aren’t waving at me from a nearby hotel window or perching birds aren’t right outside the window next my desk. Without even moving from my office chair, I can watch hawk pairs catch updrafts over the Financial District. Some magic of acoustics and my specific location means I often hear them first, a signal to peer out my east-facing windows, or a midday excuse to rush onto the deck to look for them soaring over SoMa (and stretch a little before I sit back down).…

  • Dreaming of Birds While Sheltered-in-Place

    By Paloma MacKenzie

     

    Two Mondays ago, I showed up to work expecting the usual commotion that comes with tasks piling up over the weekend. But early in the afternoon, a colleague alerted me that six Bay Area counties were ordering denizens to shelter-in-place. I can’t say I was shocked. I’d already spent the last couple of weeks following the news closely on the developments of Covid-19 infection in the state. Later that afternoon, the CFO let everyone know that we were shutting down for the foreseeable future.

    My husband and I were planning to go on vacation for the first time since we got married last year at the end of the week. Months back, I planned for us to go to Palm Springs to see the place where I grew up, where I hadn’t been in over 8 years. Since my husband started doing school remotely almost two weeks before, he had been adamant that we go despite the escalating situation.

    Although I was looking forward to getting some designated “us” time, the shelter-in-place order gave me an out. My anxiety eased for a moment, but I wish I could have shown my husband my hometown. He was less concerned about traveling while coronavirus cases ballooned because we were going to be spending time outdoors anyway. 

    Paloma’s childhood memories of Flamingos. Photo courtesy of palmspringslife.com

    At the top of our agenda was visiting the American Flamingo population at the Desert Springs Marriot—a fixture in the Coachella Valley with an opulent indoor tropical plant and bird selection and a manmade lagoon complete with Flamingos. My mom worked there as a waitress when I was little, so some of my most vivid childhood memories are of those Flamingos. 

    Flock of American Flamingos by Perl Photography

    I also would have loved to have spotted some roadrunners.

    A Roadrunner (far more elegant than Loony Tunes). Photo by Jim Powers

     

     

     

    My first impression of the species was through Wile E Coyote on Looney Tunes. I soon realized they didn’t have such long necks and were somewhat stocky (in comparison, mostly), yet sleek, like little dinosaurs with frilled crowns. And I’ll never forget when I found a hummingbird nest in my backyard and reveled at the miniature eggs.

    Instead, life resumes indoors. Being glued to social media more than usual this last week, I noticed that many people I know are including outdoor activity as part of their self-isolation agenda.…

  • Lessons From A Tree

    By Carree M.

     

    Nature is always presenting us with opportunities to learn if we take a moment to fully absorb these gifts. While the Bay Area and many communities are under shelter in place directives, it may seem that we have been completely cut off from nature. That being said, as an avid nature lover and photographer, making a concerted effort to remain indoors is taking a lot of adjustment.

    I live in a building with limited outdoor space, save a small patch of grass and one magnificent tree which someone with a whole lot more knowledge helped me identify as a Brush Cherry (Syzygium paniculatum). What is so magnificent about this tree? It attracts multiple species of birds and produces beautiful red berries. It is through this tree that I’ve honed my knowledge of visual and audio bird identification. I appreciate the education even when the birds come calling early in the morning before I had planned to wake up.

    Bushtit

     

    Bird Journaling

    A few months back, I started a bird journal to take notes on the birds that visit the tree and their behavior. Coincidentally, the pattern on the journal cover resembles tree rings in an abstract way, so that worked out nicely. I also use this journal to record sightings of birds, mammals, etc. when out on trails and walking around my neighborhood. I find this to be a therapeutic tactile experience in this digital world. I now have a record of resident birds and those that stop in for a rest on their seasonal migration. I’ve gotten to “know” the Anna’s Hummingbird who has taken ownership of the window feeder and the House Finch that enjoys stopping by to test out his songs.

    Anna’s Hummingbird

    Due to the relatively small sample size of the birds who stop in I’ve gotten good at identifying calls and songs to the point of not needing to look outside to see who is out there. I still look though because I can’t say no to that. I know when the Bushtits and Ruby-crowned Kinglet are out there being their spazzy insect-hunting selves. I know when the Cedar Waxwings make their seasonal appearance via flash mobbing the tree as their soft seesaw noise is distinct as well as hearing the telltale “plopping” sounds of dropped berries hitting the ground. Other visitors include: Townsend’s Warblers, Dark-eyed Juncos, Yellow-rumped Warblers, Robins, California Towhees, Scrub Jays, Black Phoebes, Chestnut-backed Chickadees, Mourning Doves, one hawk that I failed to identify that was on the roof of the building next door (major fail on my part and still kicking myself for not looking in time).…