A marsh wren pulls nesting material from a cattail, soaked on a wet spring afternoon.
Category: Birds
Yellow-rump (Myrtle)
A yellow-rumped warbler (Myrtle) gets pelted by the rain on a spring afternoon.
Yellow-rump (Audubon’s)
A yellow-rumped warbler pauses at the edge of South Quigley Lake on a spring afternoon.
Preening
A great blue heron preens its neck feathers by running them through the tip of its bill.
Song of the Blackbird
A male red-winged blackbird sings at the edge of the marsh on a winter morning. This section of South Quigley Lake is lined with cattails where the blackbirds sing (and in the spring, raise their young).
Bushtit
A bushtit perches in one of our dogwoods while waiting her turn at the suet feeder. Female bushtits, like this one of the Pacific race, have yellow eyes.
Self-portrait
Late in 2012, I used the pupil of a cooperative red-tailed hawk to take a self-portrait in my new car. To avoid spooking it, I setup the camera before I drove up, adding a 36mm extension tube to my telephoto and extender to make sure I could focus even up close.
The Small Diver
Bufflehead are one of our smallest ducks and fairly shy so it’s always a treat when they swim in close. This male swam across the smooth surface of Rest Lake with his tail splayed flat, as a diving duck he can use his tail to push down against the surface of the water when he dives either in search of food or to flee from one of the resident bald eagles.
Juvenile Attention
A juvenile great blue heron hunts in the meadow beside Bull Lake late on a sunny Christmas afternoon, one of the last shots I took after spending all day at the refuge. Initially it was farther off but as I sat quietly in the car (with the car shut off) it came quite close as it listened for voles moving beneath the grass.
Rest Lake
On a sunny Christmas afternoon, an adult great blue heron hunts for voles along the edge of Rest Lake while tundra swans swim near the far shoreline.
Boolie 