The day was supposed to be bad. They predicted 70% chance of rain for the day and, in the early morning, it appeared that they would be right. That's why we waffled before finally heading out the door this morning for a 0900 meet-up with the local Audubon Society for a Bird Walk.
At 0730, the wind was blowing hard and there was rain coming down. It was not a pretty scene. But by 0800 the weather had taken a turn for the better. The sun was breaking through, in places, and the wind had died down considerably.
So off we went. Because we were early, we decided to stop by Taft Beach and see what was happening. The weather was holding although in places the skies looked ominous.
I like this little beach. It sits just off a trendy little Tourista Town full of shops and restaurants...just what every Tourista needs for a good vacation experience. As you walk up, it opens to a large beach area on the north side of Siletz Bay. Plenty of drift wood and plenty of room.
And plenty of wildlife. Like this Bufflehead duck.
And then as we were getting ready to leave, Ol' Eagle-Eye spotted this...Eagle!!
Woo, hoo!! Our first eagle in Oregon!! Hahaha, and right there at Siletz Bay just a couple miles from our place.
Sorry for the poor picture quality. I was caught flat-footed. But I do have proof!! Our very first eagle in Oregon!!
And, since I had the camera out and I am a total Camera Nerd, I took a shot of the looming clouds over the nearby hills.
OK, I admit it, I am a total Camera Nerd. Hahaha, and I saw this on the Internet and I thought it was pretty good so I grabbed it.
He's hit it on the head, don't you think?
Pretty much, Ansel. Pretty much.
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| Internet |
And then we took off for the Meet-Up. We met at the Salishan Spa and Golf Resort for the walk. There were about 16 folks there this morning.
And it was fun seeing those we had met on the previous outing and meeting some new people.
And we were off!! Hahaha, OK, there it is; I know I take waaaaaay too many pictures of ducks but, honestly, I can't help myself. It's like shooting at...uh...sitting ducks.
Oh, geez, I am really sorry for that one. I won't erase it but I am sorry. Honest.
Mr. and Mrs. Mallard were taking the air.
Looking out over the Southeastern part of Siletz Bay.
Fun Facts: They established a National Wildlife Refuge here in 1991 and this one has within it some of the most striking estuarine habitat along the Pacific Coast Scenic Highway, aka Highway 101. On either side of the highway there are starched skeleton trees jutting forth from the estuary. They're reminders of a time when the salt marsh was diked to provide pasture for dairy cows.
Red-tailed hawks, bald eagles and other raptors can often be seen roosting at the top of these snags and a variety of estuarine dependent birds including great blue heron, great egret and many species of waterfowl can be seen foraging in the tidally influenced waters.
The tide was in when we arrived.
Birders. It's fun going on their walks. There's no real rules; you get there and you're on your own in that you can either participate or not. You can get involved and share glasses as some did with their large scopes or you can sorta stand back and enjoy, as I did, all the interaction and camaraderie within the group.
And the skills here covered the whole range of the scale from the most accomplished to the rankest amateur, me. And everyone is friendly. That's a BIG plus!!
We arrived shortly after 0900 and we weren't the first to visit that particular area today. The little pock-marked lines were, evidently, made by clammers walking through the mudflats looking for some likely place to dig for their clams.
There are times when I am extremely grateful that I do not like clams. OK, maybe if they're fried. With a good sauce. Maybe.
As I mentioned earlier, we started our walk at the Salesian Spa & Resort. Oh, they have a golf course there, too.
So here we are, walking on a thin bar of land about 8-10 feet wide with the mudflats and NWR on the right and a beautiful golf course on our left.
But we had a great seat for the show. And it was a good show, too. We got to see this Great Blue Heron out for a morning walk.
This gives you an idea of the bar of land that we were on between the golf course and the Refuge.
Hahaha, it just struck me that birders probably have a pretty high personal injury rate given that they habitually walk around looking up...always looking up.
See!
I was having a good time just seeing. Like this view of Siletz Bay when the tide is in.
A Song Sparrow letting loose with another song.
And then he turned around so the other side could get an earful, too.
The Bay.
Someone had spotted this fellow, sitting up on a branch, but when I raised my camera to get this shot he took off.
Hahaha, it look's like he's diving, doesn't it?
The trail ends, all too soon, unfortunately, and we turned around.
Another failed shot. I have to learn how to get better exposures shooting against backlit subjects. Still, you can see the potential.
This walk, like the walk we were on the week before, was a collection of folks moving along in the same direction with the same purpose. After that, the group became more of an individual meander. We all moved in the same direction more or less at the same time. And people moved easily in and out of smaller groups as we walked along. And these smaller groups were constantly changing.
For example, we met a painter and talked with her about her upcoming art show. Carol then found a guy whose wife is a Blue Hen, a proud graduate of the University of Delaware like Carol's daughter. Then we met a woman who lives in our neighborhood just up the hill a block away from us.
We think this guy is a Redwing Blackbird.
Canada geese. It still amazes me to see these wide-body birds take flight. They look so clumsy and ungainly on the ground but they quickly achieve grace while in flight.
And the weather? You remember we almost didn't go this morning because we thought the day would be wet and wetter all day long? Well, we wuz wrong.
It was a little chilly but other than that it was a pretty good day. And by that I mean it didn't rain. Oh, we had cloudy skies but, and this is the key point, it didn't rain!!
And we saw, at a good distance, a Giant Egret.
I was told this is a Caspian Tern...and notable because it is the first one sighted in the Lincoln City area this year.
A strong and graceful bird.
Next we drove over to another side of the Bay to get a different view.
And then to another place near Cutler, a bit further in.
This stop was in a neighborhood that sits alongside the bay. While we there one of the group spotted this guy flitting around when, all of a sudden, he lit on a branch.
I was able to get several shots of him.
What was really cool about this Anna's Hummingbird was that when he looked one way he had an iridescent crimson-red crown and gorget.
And as he turned another way, and the light wasn't reflecting off him, his crown looked a dull brown
And then he turned his head and lit up again.
Hahaha, amazing. A natural light show.
It's a beautiful bay.
There's always some action going on...like these guys coming in for a landing.
And, even though it hadn't rained, the threat was still there.
For our fourth and final stop, we went over to the beach in the Taft neighborhood. This neighborhood is at the southern end of Lincoln City's 7.5 miles of beach.
They have a pier, you've seen it before in previous blogs, where you can get a good view of the Refuge.
And it was here that my polarizing filter fell off and rolled around until it dropped through a crack in the pier into the bay below.
Hahaha, never a dull moment with Ol' Smilin' Jack.
Fortunately, a group of passing teens retrieved it for me. A little wet and a bit muddy. It's back where it should be now. For the while.
Looking up the beach towards the entrance to the Bay.
Loads of driftwood and plenty of beach for everyone.
There are several different kinds of seagulls here.
Fun Facts: There are at least 28 types of gull species here in North America. They're fairly well distributed across the nation along the coastlines and at sea.
They're among some of the hardest birds to easily identify. For example, it takes juveniles from some species 3 to 4 years to get their adult plumage. Others have a non-breeding and a breeding plumage that changes throughout the seasons. Finally, to make it even more challenging, gulls cross-breed with other types of gulls, making hybrids that reflect the looks and characteristics of each of the parent birds.
Oh, by the way, although most people call them 'seagulls', they're called 'gulls' in birding society. I know I'm on the outer fringe of birding but I'm gonna be calling them gulls from now on.
Cuz I'm cool.
And while we were there we saw an juvenile eagle. He was flying high across the Bay. We could tell he was an immature eagle because of his color, a chocolate brown with just a little white mottling.
Then, as we were oohing and aahing over him, someone saw this fellow in a tree-top sitting up high on a hill. He may have been the same one that Carol and I saw earlier in the day.
Hahaha, what a great day, eh? Eagles all over the place!!
And seals. Harbor Seals to be exact.
Fun Facts: These pudgy little lumps can get as long as 6 feet and weight around 290 lbs. Yikes!! Just like us, the females outlive the males...life is sooooo unfair. Females bear a single pup after a nine month gestation and then they care for it alone. The pups are able to swim and dive, kinda good for their survival, within hours of birth.
These seals have hauled-out. Hauling-out is where the seals temporarily leave the water between periods of hunting for food. Hauling-out is necessary in seals for mating and giving birth.
Hmmmm, I sorta like this 'hauling-out' thing. Oh, right!! I've been hauling-out on the couch several times a day since I retired!! Hahaha, I thought it looked familiar!!
Looks like someone will be eating good tonight.
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| A Western Gull. |
And now we come to the highlight of the day...for me. Oh, sure, it was fun seeing all that we saw and taking pictures but then we got together in Mo's for a couple of beers afterward.
Now that was fun!!
From right to left, that's Jack, talking with his hands. Laura is next to him, watching. Then Mike and finally Dee, our friendly and very efficient waitress.
And, still going from right to left, there's Mike and Dee again. Then, partly hidden by Carol, is Mark.
We had a great view of the Bay from our table.
Mike had shown an interest in my Cannon SX60 camera so I invited him to look it over and play with it for a while.
He was fiddling with the zoom and the macro feature on the camera and when I got home and down-loaded the pictures, I found these. I'm guessing it was Mike.
Hahaha, camera guys are alike all the world over. Give'em a camera and you never know what you'll get.
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| Mike |
More Mike.
This was on the harness Mark had.
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| Mike |
After some good conversation and cold beer, Carol and I left for home. As I was heading through town on the 101 I saw the Prehistoric Store was open and so we stopped and went in for a look-see. Oh, this is the 'something old' part of the title for this blog.
What an idea. A store that specializes in authentic fossils that date back to when dinosaurs roamed the earth. Oh, and they sell manufactured fossils, too. Hahaha, they sell plastic fossils.
Oh, they also have a good selection of gemstones, art and sculptures, too.
And just as you go in is an animatronic Baby T-Rex. He is loud, too. Very loud.
And he never, ever shuts up. Never.
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| Kitchy-kitchy-koo |
They have all kinds of stuff there.
From big doggie chew toys...
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| CB |
...to little critters.
And some nightmares, too.
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| CB |
Some of the things for sale were real. Like this piece of a meteorite.
I thought this was particularly good.
And then I saw this. It's real. It's a Camarasauras tail. It's real. Go ahead, take a guess at how much they're asking for this. Go ahead.
Hahaha, were you close?
Yeah, $200,000!! I was lifting my jaw up off the floor when I saw this.
Seriously?
Number One - They shouldn't be selling it in a store and,
Number Two - Who has $200,000 laying around with which to buy it anyway?
Hahaha, I'd love to get the commission on that sale.
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| CB |
Here, this gives you an idea of what the Ol' Camarasaurus looked like when he was whole.
The Camarasaurus is among the most common and frequently well-preserved sauropod dinosaurs. The maximum size of the the most common species, C. Lentus, was about 50 feet in length. The largest species, C. Supremus, reached a max length of 75 feet and an estimated weight of 51 tons.
This tooth is only 65-68 million years old, give or take a century or two.
Uh, another subject for a good nightmare.
A long view of the store towards the Baby T-Rex.
They had an awful lot of stuff here.
And I don't know where these fit in, prehistoric-wise. The Sand Dollar had been around for a while, they date back to the Paleocene period, a geologic epoch that lasted from about 56 to 66 million years ago.
I did not know that.
Fun Facts: The name Sand Dollar refers to a species of extremely flattened, burrowing sea urchins. They're also commonly known as Sea Cookies, too. In New Zealand they're called Snapper Biscuits. Haha, those silly Kiwis. In South Africa they call them Pansy Shells.
They're commonly known as Sand Dollars due to their size which approximates the size of an old silver dollar.
See?
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| Internet |
Can you guess what the biggest draw is in this store?
Hahaha, you're right!! The Baby T-Rex. He's a real tourist magnet.
Hahaha, all the kids want to pose with the Baby T-Rex.
All of them.
Haha, Carol's always had a thing for geodes.
Finally, a selfie of Carol and I.
We visited the WindDriven Kite Store and caught this picture of our whimsical side. It should be pretty easy to figure out which one is Carol and which one is me.
I thoroughly enjoyed the time we spent with the Audubon group. A lot of fun and, at the end of the day, the group got to see over 30 birds. There was a discussion on whether they could count the Belted Kingfisher or not because only one person had seen it. Then another member of the group said they'd seen it, too and so, it counted!! BAM!! We hit the Big 30!!
That's some pretty rigorous accounting just to add another bird to the list. I was impressed that they are so meticulous in their count.
It was a good morning. We got to meet some new folks, had an enjoyable walk, learned something new and got to visit new places here in Lincoln City.
Life is good.
Hooah!!
P.S. If you spot an error we've made in naming something please let us know. Carol does a lot of research to keep us straight because we want to make sure, as much as we can, what we've posted is right. You can contact me at jackseagrove@yahoo.com and let me know any concerns you may have. Thanks!!
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