This year “began” when I got back from vacation, to see a curve-billed thrasher on 1/14 with Paul coming to a feeder in MN! Admittedly, much of the rest of the year was a drought, with some crucial misses. Just as the birding demoralization was setting in, though, it came time for our trip out west! It was our first time to the Pacific NW so birding a new place was magical. I wrote posts along the way at the time that tell the more detailed story, but here were our lifers…
- Pacific-slope Flycatcher
- Hutton’s Vireo
- Black-throated Gray Warbler
- Vaux’s Swift
- Pacific Wren
- Brandt’s Cormorant
- Surfbird
- Mew Gull
- Pigeon Guillemot
- Marbled Murrelet
- Rhinoceros Auklet
- Northwestern Crow
- Black Oystercatcher
- Black Turnstone
- Common Murre
- Bushtit
- Steller’s Jay
- Chestnut-backed Chickadee
- Swallow-tailed Gull
- Heermann’s Gull
- Pelagic Cormorant
- Glaucous-winged Gull
Then the fall brought me not a lifer, but a “deck bird” Short-eared Owl! I first saw it when it bombed down over my building and kept on flying across the street, only to bank and head back my way. Then, I saw it (or maybe a different one) a few weeks later hunting the dunes across the street!
The year wrapped up in late fall with some really satisfying looks at nemeses! I finally caught up with my lifer Pacific Loon on Lake Superior. Then, Paul and I saw our lifer American Three-toed Woodpecker in Two Harbors, MN!