Towheeblog

The Salem Audubon Society’s Wednesday bird walk was at Albany’s Talking Waters this afternoon. It is wondrous place where man actually co-operates with nature rather than exploit or ignore or destroy.

There was Song Sparrow singing. Bushtit whispering. A Sora squealed, twice. Wigeon imitated a rubber ducky, Wood Ducks whistled, Mallards made their mallardly complaint. The coots were amazingly quiet, perhaps number into complaisance by the abundance of floating duck weed to eat.

One woolly bear, multiple dragonflies, a dozen or more sliders [introduced turtle sp.] on logs.

The birds and turtles were afloat in the real world, but still, many were logged on as we watched:

The domestic Peking duck is genetically a Mallard so they will naturally interbreed when domestic ducks get dumped into a park or other marshy area.

More than ducks, I saw this hiding killer (a Coop in Simpson Park) before our walk began.

Talking Water Gardens, Linn, Oregon, US
Oct 7, 2020.
22 species

Wood Duck  3
Cinnamon Teal  1
Northern Shoveler  1
Gadwall  6
American Wigeon  30
Mallard  X
Green-winged Teal  3
Pied-billed Grebe  1
Sora  1
American Coot  40
Wilson’s Snipe  7
Turkey Vulture  12
Belted Kingfisher  1
Acorn Woodpecker  2
Northern Flicker  3
Steller’s Jay  6
California Scrub-Jay  3
Black-capped Chickadee  1
Bushtit  1     a loner!
American Goldfinch  X
Song Sparrow  5
Red-winged Blackbird  4