Week of FIRE, Part 2

Ok, so Friday. Not as many birds, and certainly nothing as exciting as a Yellowlegs... there was another Solitary Sandpiper though, and those are always cool. Friday was also our first rainy day. We delayed opening until 7:00, and by then it had mostly stopped. Unfortunately, it got windy later and we had to close nets 7 and 11 at 10:00.

Blackpoll Warbler female.

Also my hip-waders flooded. Not leaked, like the chest-waders. Flooded. Luckily, there was an extra pair of XtraTuffs in the tent that I appropriated. They were huge. I had Gabriel of the non-leaky-waders check the deep nets (23, 13, and 11), and it worked out alright.

 Also, this lovely Northern Waterthrush (see photo below) has the trashy-est feathers ever. No self-respecting After Second Year bird would be caught dead in feathers like that! For SHAME. Those central tail feathers aren't even feathers anymore!

Northern Waterthrush with Trash Feathers.

Cool birds of the day: Yellow Warbler male who was exceptionally pretty, and a Blackpoll Warbler female. When I pulled her out of the net, I didn't know what she was. I had 2 scenarios in my head: a) she was something very cool and very lost, or b) she was something silly that I wasn't thinking of and I'd feel stupid later. Turned out that she was cool and not-lost, because Blackpoll females look nothing like the males.

(Friday 20 May) Banding Summary: 24 birds, 10 species (OCWA, MYWA, SCJU, HAFL, NOWA, SOSA, CORE, AMRO, BLPW, YWAR).

NOWA Trash Tail.

I called in sick on Saturday. I woke up at 4:30 as usual, and started to sit up... physically started to sit up, not just thought about it... and woke up at 5:25 with a lot of confusion and absolutely no voice.This was the start of what Dayna and I are now lovingly calling the Gully Water Plague.

I might also mention that Friday afternoon was the start of Alaska-Is-Burning season. It was windy on Friday (as I mentioned), and the wind only got worse as the afternoon progressed. Partway through my shift at Barnes & Noble (I was zoning, so I was tucked away in between 2 shelves where nobody could see me), I started smelling smoke coming through the doors. I assumed that it was left-overs from the proscribed burn on the Creamer's front field. Finally, when I'd clocked out and was leaving, I overheard someone saying that there was actually a wildfire up on Goldstream hill near Ivory Jack's. This got me worried because not only is my cabin on that side of town, The Boy's cabin is actually about a mile from Ivory Jack's and that was a bit too close for comfort. I spent the night with one ear and eye open in case he knocked on my door needing a place to stay for the night. He didn't (they got the fire contained and under control sometime around midnight), but I slept rather badly anyway. And woke up very sick.

(Saturday 21 May) Banding Summary: 20 birds, 10 species (MYWA, SWTH, SCJU, HAFL, GCTH, OCWA, NOWA, SAVS, WCSP, LISP)