The night of the duckling incident, I read about some unusual sparrows that a fellow named Roger had seen up at Grant Narrows Park, one of my favorite hangouts. The birds were in a very easy part of the park to get to, so I thought that even in my state of recovery I would be able to find them. I was feeling fairly good, except that I'd get a nasty sharp pain whenever I twisted my abdomen.

So, fool that I am, I decided to go see these birds the next day. I quickly discovered that shoulder-checks and driving in reverse usually involve some twisting of the abdomen, and of necessity found ways of doing these operations with more hip-twisting than abdomen-twisting.

As I arrived in Pitt Meadows, I decided that I would take a short detour down Thompson Road just to see what was going on there. I was surprised to see that the tree farm there had Strict Bio-security in effect.

I wonder what that really means. Did someone deploy a biological weapon there? Do they have sentient plants watching over their farm equipment, to keep people from stealing it? Maybe there are self-destruct mechanisms built into all of their trees. Is there a plant virus loose on the farm? Could they have developed a new strain of trees that they don't want people absconding with? Is there milfoil loose on the farm, and people should check their pant legs for it whenever they leave? Or maybe they just sprayed everything with pesticides and they don't want people taking the tree leaves and eating them. That's a pretty cryptic sign to me.

Anyhow, behind that wall of strict bio-security, I did find a couple of tree spades. A tree spade is an attachment for your heavy machinery used for digging up and transporting trees. You drive it up to a tree, close the hinge so that it encircles the tree, and then the (in this case, four) digging blades are hydraulically driven into the ground under the tree. Then you hydraulically lift the attachement, and away you can drive with your tree. These are pretty small tree spades, and I wouldn't be surprised if they attach to really light heavy machinery, like a bobcat.

I really like the idea of light heavy machinery.

Anyhow, that was it for Thompson Road. Back on Rannie, headed towards Grant Narrows, I pulled over beside a field to take a few photos. Bessie here wasn't too happy with that.

With those photos, I discovered that taking photos while walking about was easier than taking photos while in the car. The photos from the car seat had involved a lot of twisting in order to point the camera out the window. I had no such problem once I was out of the car.

Also on the way to the tower, I saw an Osprey on a dolphin tearing strips off of a fish.

At the tower, I spoke with a pair of birders, one was local and the other was from Wales. The guy from Wales really knew his North American birds, though, certainly better than I did. As we spoke, a light rain started. Occassionally the intensity of rain would pick up for a couple of minutes, and then abate.

Soon the other birders left the tower, and since I was a little tired I decided to sit. The only place I could find to sit that was both dry and facing some good habitat was under the tower. So I sat there and watched the bushes for a good half hour or so. It was an interesting time, as many small yellow birds came by to check me out.

Here's the first of them, an Orange-crowned Warbler. He's got a black line going back from his billl, and that line breaks up the bright ring that otherwise circles the eye.

Well, it was either that or he was mooning me. I never did figure out which it was.

After my little rest, I headed back towards where the sparrows had been reported. I found them in exactly the area where they had been the previous day, right next to the snack bar across from the boat launch.

When I first got there, my attention fell to a typical Golden-crowned, so I'll start with them. This is a textbook breeding-plumaged Golden-crowned Sparrow, and most guide books have a picture looking a lot like this.

Now, I'm fairly sure that all of the birds so far are straight Golden-crowned. (But I'm just a guy with a camera and an opinion, and nowhere near an expert opinion, at that. If you are an expert, please let me know if I've goofed anywhere here.) The birds that I was looking for weren't straight Golden-crowned, but were hybrids—the results of a Golden-crowned Sparrow breeding with a White-crowned Sparrow.

The next three photos show birds that I'm not sure about. Maybe they are hybrids, but maybe they are just in transitional plumage. The first two are of the same individual, who may be the same as in the third photo above. I lean towards calling this one a straight Golden-crowned.

Okay, I'll confess. I do have a guide book with a photo of something like this sparrow, but it's a specialty guide book just on sparrows.

Here's the same individual shown in the last photo, after he applied a bit of mousse.

Well, hybrid sparrows are a bit of a rarity and it was a real treat to have them there and so accessible. I was happy that I dragged my should-be-resting body out and got to spend some time with them.

I did go a little ways down the nature dyke, just to see what was around. I found some very droopy mushrooms on the side of a tree.

I turned back after only going a short distance. On the way back, I did find a few Yellow Warblers, like this guy I caught taking off.

Back by the snack bar, a female Rufous Hummingbird had come by to visit the feeder. Here she is on a nearby branch.

And here she is a little later, at the feeder.

I had been out for about three and a half hours, and I was pretty tired. I left the park, but I still had a couple of sightings in store for me.

The first one occurred a few klicks down the road at the Swan-e-Set golf course. There, there were a pair of Sandhill Cranes grazing in the front yard.

Well, I was beat, and had maybe pushed myself further than I should have, but I had had a great first venture back into the field, with lifer vultures and hybrids.

Slowly and stiffly chasin' them birdies,
Tom