The 21st of November was a Sunday and when I woke I was still psyched from my Saturday photography. I decided to head back to Brunswick Point, and with a minimum of puttering about I was on my way. It was a dark, grey, cold day.

I passed downtown Ladner without incident, and stopped at one of my favorite eagle-watching places along River Road, vaguely across from a pile of wood chips. True to form, a Bald Eagle was around, and he flew away as I stopped. I got a few shots of him as he retreated. I liked this one, which shows the huge arch of his wing beats, with his wingtips blurred from the motion.

A little further on, I passed the turnoff for Westham Island and Reifel, and quickly came upon a line of stopped vehicles in the road. At the head of the line was a fire truck, and to my right, just over the dyke, there was a group of firefighters in the late stages of putting out a fire.

I naturally pulled over and started shooting. I quickly discovered that my usual birding lens, a 80-400mm zoom, was not suited for this subject and so I switched to the lens that came with my camera, an 18-70mm. This lens has a lot less glass, and is therefore much lighter, than the 80-400mm. My camera felt like a toy in my hands--maybe I should change lenses more often.

Anyhow, here's the smoldering building, which was a clubhouse for a boating club.

Although it was cold, that wasn't snow on the ground. It was foam that the firemen had used. Another thing that's difficult to tell in the smoke and gloom is that we are pretty much on the river bank; to the left of the fireman on the ground (and the right of the grey port-a-potty) is a pier that is over water. Maybe that's easier to see in the following photo, with the a small bit of the pier and water on the right edge.

Back by the road, I took some photos of the fire trucks and packing-up activity.

Ladner is one of about four communities that make up the corporation of Delta. It appears that the Delta fire trucks are white. I've seen red and I've seen chartreuse, but I don't remember seeing white before.

Most of the action was done at the fire scene, so I headed on down the road to Brunswick Point. I was looking for Swamp Sparrows and American Tree Sparrows, both of which I'd never seen before.

What I ended up finding was a different story. The place was filled with the usual crowd. Here's one of them, a House Finch.

Over the foreshore and the field, the ever-present Northern Harriers were hunting.

I walked a ways along the path to what looked to be a particularly birdy spot. There were a lot of sparrows in the area, and I was looking for sparrows, so I sat down to watch and wait. The sparrows turned out to be mainly Song Sparrows and first-winter White-crowned Sparrows. Here's one of the latter.

In the darkness of the day, it was hard to get photos without long exposure times and the consequent blurring. So lacking anything better to do, I experimented with using my flash. Here's another young White-crowned, caught by the flash.

In that photo you can also see why this spot was so birdy...someone had spread a lot of birdseed along the ground here. Here's a Spotted Towhee, caught flicking his tail.

I eventually figured out that I did have something better to do: I could go back to my car where it was warm rather than sitting like a fool outside in the damp and cold. As I was headed back, I encountered another birder, and as we were speaking, he called out a Merlin. (Birders have this habit of calling out—saying species names aloud—when they make an identification, so that anyone around who wants to see said bird is notified. It's a friendly thing.)

The Merlin flew past us and landed on a tree off in the distance, back where I had come from. I headed off in that direction to try to get good photos, stopping every few moments to take a few shots. Unfortunately, the Merlin didn't stay put long and I wasn't able to get any clear close-ups. Here's the best I got.

After the Merlin took off, I once again headed back towards the warmth of my car. I stopped for a while near a trail junction, as the bushes there were loaded with sparrows. There was little chance of finding a Swamp Sparrow here, farther away from the foreshore. However, maybe there would be American Tree Sparrows.

First I saw a bunch of Song Sparrows, like this guy, who I caught with the flash. The flash contributed the catchlight (highlight in the bird's eye) and a little fill lighting, but not much else.

I was checking every sparrow I saw (and there were a lot of them). I was getting discouraged when up popped a little guy with a black spot on his chest and a brown crown. There he was—an American Tree Sparrow!

He was looking pretty fearsome. I can imagine being an insect and having this guy swooping down on me. Yikes!

Also evident on these photos is another good field mark for the American Tree Sparrow: the boldly bicolored bill. He's got a dark upper mandible and a yellow-orange lower one.

When he flitted away, I continued my quest for warmth, stopping only to take a photo of a bunch of Red-winged Blackbirds feeding on something. Here there's a male in flight and a boatload of females on the ground.

Back in the car, I decided to head back to the farms near Boundary Bay to once again check for the Cattle Egret. Along the way, I spotted an eagle in a tree, behind some branches. The branches kept me from getting any good perched photos, but I waited a while and was eventually rewarded with him taking off and flying around a bit.

For that photo, I spent some time doing funky stuff in Photoshop to get the detail up on the bird without making the photo look grainy.

As the Cattle Egret had been reported hanging out with the sheep, I visited the sheep farm, but again the egret eluded me.

The sheep were my last clear subjects of the day. I did spot a Northern Flicker a bit later in Surrey, but by that time it was too dark and all the photos were blurry.

Your humble and somewhat chilly photographer,
Tom