Look up! Wildlife is where you find it
When you spend as much time looking up as I do, you tend to trip
frequently. But the occasional stumble is a small price to pay for
looking around, because there’s always something to see.
Look up! Wildlife is where you find it
When you spend as much time looking up as I do, you tend to trip frequently. But the occasional stumble is a small price to pay for looking around, because there’s always something to see.
Two weeks ago, while waiting outside of city offices on Park Hill, Sparky the wonder dog and I took a quick lap. We watched three red-shouldered hawks in aerial combat, two apparently sparring for the attention of a female. The trill – think of the sound the flying saucers made in old episodes of “The Jetsons” – of an Allen’s hummingbird sounded near a bottlebrush hedge. Allens are seasonal visitors, and unlike the familiar Anna’s hummers that are here year-round, their appearance and aggressiveness may come as a surprise to some. Painted in shades of rust, orange and green, the tiny birds flash around the landscape at startling speed.
Goldfinches sang in the trees nearby, but looking up, way up, produced two red-tailed hawks, and even higher, a dark smudge that grew steadily larger. It was a golden eagle, soaring over downtown Hollister.
Last weekend meant a trip to the San Francisco area. Even there, looking up pays dividends. We missed the spectacular hunting dives of any of the city’s peregrine falcons. But just the same, we spotted deer along BART tracks and logged a surprising number of bird species.
Sharp staccato call of a Wilson’s warbler – the first I’d heard this spring – sounded from a tree at the U.C. Berkeley arboretum. A wild turkey yodeled nearby. Countless voices, mostly familiar, sang from the lush growth of Strawberry Canyon.
It all added up to a fresh reminder of how strange the notion of “going birding” is. Birding need not be something anyone needs to “go” to do. It’s not like going to a football game or an art gallery. Birding can happen anywhere, and it can be particularly rewarding right here in our small communities.
One of my favorite spots is the hillside next to Mission San Juan Bautista. The concrete risers are all that’s left of the old Fiesta-Rodeo grounds, but they make a perfect perch to survey the valley. Nearby is a flock of Eurasian collared doves, not native to North America (don’t tell them) but now naturalized and breeding locally.
Many mornings, I’ll spend a few minutes lying in bed, delaying the start of the day. Frequently, I’ll listen for something besides the sound of my neighbors starting their cars, and tick off the bird species that I’m hearing. This time of year, I can count on white-crowned sparrows, lesser goldfinches, bushtits, scrub jays, mourning doves and the less welcomed rock pigeons and starlings. Seven species before fully opening my eyes – not bad.
Like any activity, it comes easier with practice, and the best place to practice is one that is familiar, filled with familiar distractions that always seem to offer a few new surprises for those who take the time to look up.
