Easter egg hunt - from hell!

My job: enter a marsh, find every bird nest below 4 meters.

Spa in mineral-rich bog mud is just one of the many perks of being a nest searcher

Only problem is, I suck at finding bird nests. Why shouldn't I? Birds evolved ways to make their nests flipping hard to find. Like, they build them in very hidden places, like under grass tussocks and such. And they evolved sneaky behaviour to prevent guys from finding them. In this case me.

Virginia Rail nest, which Dom found

Then there's Michal, a nest finding machine. Some say when he was a child in Slovakia he was a victim of a nuclear meltdown near his village, which mutated his eyes giving him heat-sensing vision. At least that's the only explanation I can think of.

I fell to my knees and said a prayer. I had a suspicion it was one of the times when you need to really word your request carefully, or else God might play a cruel joke on you. So I prayed "Dear God, [the usual intro, I know I haven't been the best Christian, etc...], please guide my senses, and let me find at least one nest today, preferably two." Within 5 minutes I looked down, and there it was, a duck nest!

Wait, what's that orange tape? Damn it's been found already.

DAAAAAAAAMMMMNN!

Return of the Sinister Soarers

It began one sunny morning. I lifted mine eyes unto the mountains, as I do each day, whence I spied four black sorcerers on a morning breeze. First they were tiny specks, indistinguishable swift spp., but with a distinctive aura, like that of a beautiful dark-haired woman who both captivates you with her beauty while at the same time intoxicating you with a dark poison, enslaving you in her aura, clouding out all virtuous thought. I could sense it from a great distance as they approached ever nearer...

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!! I thought, the dark passenger has returned from that fateful day three years ago when, with my trusty comrade Neil we were cursed upon the sea cliffs of Big Sur, California (see Big Sur post from 2010).

"It pains me that, despite our best attempts to extinguish these sinister soarers, these scimitar-winged devils still scream unbridled around the wilderness mountains that they have reclaimed as their own."

- Neil Gilbert

Then two days later, 46 Black Swifts. Yesterday, 63.

God have mercy on our pathetic souls, free us from the clutch of these black devils!

Greetings from Mackenzie, BC

When Harry I battled a savage hailstorm on Mt. Morfee on a quest for Ptarmigan, the goblets of ice pounded our faces, like being *assaulted in a humiliating way* by mother nature. 

Our reward: 

The male Willow Ptarmigan - STUNNING

Summer adventures have returned: Okanagan

When Russ Cannings says he'll give you tips on a couple of birds, he gives you an itinerary. Thus we raged the sage scrub, cliffs, pine and larch forests of the Okanagan.

Day 1: Battle of the Williamson's

For the less bird-inclined, the Williamson's Sapsucker (or Willy, as we call him) is a badass woodpecker that's elusive and challenging to find (our speciality). And as you may have speculated it does indeed suck sap. We started in the Ponderosa forest where Dom got an absolutely EPIC lifer: PYGMY NUTHATCH!

Lewis's Woodpecker: sentinel of the snag

Anybody home?

Two of five moose we saw

A logging road where we saw Gray Flycatchers

Over the course of that day we calculated we had spent 9 hours searching for the Willy. Playing his call on the mountain had produced nothing.  Then a brief, distant view of a female by Dom, leaving me scratching my head. We checked an old boreal owl box that Dick Cannings had told us about, but there was no one home. 

In the evening, we quested to a woodland where a nest of my favourite bird was said to be located. Stalking the woodlands, ever vigilant, we found the nest. Then we heard a sound like a yelping baby, answered by a hoarse yiiiup. It was a Daddy Great Grey Owl, telling his female it was dinner time. He presented her with a vole, which she took in her bill and carried to her hungry chicks. 

The female Great Gray Owl

Then I epically spotted a pair of Williamson's Sapsuckers. I heard their call, turned around, and was just in time to see the male book it out of his nest hole and trade places with the female. Dick said they swap incubation duties in this fashion a few times a day and they are notoriously sneaky about it, which is why in about an hour of observation Dom never did see the pair because it got dark. 

Day 2: Sage Rage and Flammulations

The next day we camped in the open sage. Dom received a text that made him so excited he was like Luke Skywalker when he found out that R2D2 had shut off the garbage compactor. What this news was I cannot divulge. 

Dom exalting himself to the sage like a man-possessed

We were camped there for a reason: to slaughter a black-throated sparrow, a desert species that was found here recently, the only known spot in Canada. But you can't have everything in life, and even though we combed the sage ruthlessly for this peculiar sparrow, it had gotten the better of us. We sought refuge from a mighty wind by entering a cave, ever wary of Gandalf's advice regarding mountain caves, but instead finding a geo-cache box in which we inserted this record of our visit: 

Be wary when entering caves in the mountains, for they are seldom unoccupied

 Then...

Western Rattlesnake, denizen of the sage

We explored the domain of the Bighorn sheep. 

Bighorn sheep

Inspired by these cliff-dwelling mammals, we decided to climb this cliff. 

A menacing prospect indeed

Propelled by the spirit of John Muir and our own balls, we scaled the mighty cliff. 

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!

We climbed as far as we could, but the summit was blocked by sheer cliffs admittedly beyond our resources to climb. 

Then Dick Cannings, esteemed ornithologist and Russ's dad, took us out to see a Flammulated Owl nest box. The owl never poked her head out of the box, so we had to intrude in order to see her. This was one of the most bizarre experiences I've ever had birding. The Flammulated is one of the most elusive and difficult to see owls, and here I was peering into its home with the bird 2 feet from my face, lying on its belly on some eggs. An intimate encounter we will never forget - thanks Dick!

No problem we can just climb this ladder...

The private life of a Flammulated Owl