BLUETAIL HOURS FULL

Then someone said, “look, there’s another one!” She murderously eyed us before returning to sleepy cuteness.

With a dead vole gripped underneath! Awesome. Then we looked under another nearby tree and found a Northern Saw-whet Owl! Not too much farther we arrived at the park and tromped through the snow to check under conifers. We continued, and realized we were driving farther into Idaho, the opposite direction of our return route adding more time to get home, and increasing our chances of meeting the storm.

BLUETAIL HOURS FULL

Our first stop to look for a recent Lesser Black-backed Gull turned up empty, but the stream was full of Barrow’s Goldeneye, a nice yearbird. Two other birder parties also joined the caravan and off we went. Apparently we will follow strangers to random parks if they offer up owls. This was when we we met Kas Dumroese, a birder on scene who offered to lead us to a nearby park with “fairly reliable” Saw-whet Owls. Kayla looked up, is that snow? Nope that’s a Barn Owl! Found!

While checking the conifers, a friendly birder pulled up and told us which tree they’d seen the owl in the day before. Thus began the Bluetail Crazy Train adventure.Īll smilesWe said goodbye to the bluetail and left to look for the icing, a nearby reported Barn Owl. But it was bright and sunny on Friday and we calculated we could get there late Friday, stay overnight, find the bird early Saturday morning, then make a quick getaway and return to Portland before impending doom. The Pacific Northwest was under attack of a winter storm scheduled for late Saturday. I don’t know if it was the vacation hangover from Hawaii, the long winter, or because it’s a new year, but I was craving adventure and when another friend showed even more enthusiasm to chase the bird and a second friend opted to drive? – I’m in, let’s go! “That’s too far to drive for one bird” someone told me. Lewiston is a mere 5 hour 40 minute drive from Portland and the bird was still being seen into January. This is the first sighting in Idaho and there have only been a handful of other U.S. The Red-flanked Buetail breeds mainly in Siberia and winters in southeast Asia. In December 2016, a rare vagrant called a Red-flanked Bluetail showed up in Lewiston, Idaho.

Bluetail hours