Perhaps the best photo I took during the entire period of being snowbound during the “Great Snowstorm of 2008,” or at least the one with which I am the most pleased, was this one of a Northern Flicker, Colaptes auratus, red-shafted form. With her feathers raised to help insulate her from the cold and the […]
Those of us living in the Pacific Northwest of the United States are quite accustomed to seeing ghost birds while we are walking in the forest during wintertime. While strolling among the massive trunks of the Douglas Firs and the Western Hemlocks we not infrequently get a quick glimpse of what we think is a […]
A year-round resident of the Pacific Northwest, primarily of the higher altitude evergreen forests, the Varied Thrush, Ixoreus naevius, is a regular visitor to the lowlands during the coldest months of winter While many may wax poetic over the flame orange color of the male Blackburnian Warbler, and justly so, I’ll take the glowing ember […]
Among the Haida people of the Pacific Northwest, the hummingbird is considered to be a symbol of good luck or good fortune. Spotting a hummingbird just before undertaking a new endeavor was thought to be an auspicious omen. As the Anna’s Hummingbird, Calypte anna, overwinters in northwest Oregon, we have the opportunity to partake in […]