In my previous post, I mentioned a Western Gull I managed to rescue … by true luck. Here’s that story. We were in Los Angeles all of January and part of February, and in the context of a chaotic month, I stole an hour to go strolling on the beach. On my walk over, through…
Gull Chicks and Gateway Birds
“When you take a flower in your hand and really look at it, it’s your world for the moment. I want to give that world to someone else. Most people in the city rush around so, they have no time to look at a flower. I want them to see it whether they want to…
ReTerning to Bolsa Chica
The foot bridge is a crossing over a moat, into a kingdom of feathers at Bolsa Chica Ecological Reserve. In this regenerated, re-planted Bolsa Bay, bird calls and murmurs bubble up from the terns, Sanderlings, scoters, avocets, grebes, plovers, pelicans, sparrows, Willets and egrets who call this haven home. The marsh is barely shielded from…
Wet Eagles and Power Gulls
This is who we came to see in Beautiful British Columbia: And this is what drew our eyes upward … to the gossamer-draped mountains: All morning, the gulls traversed the valley in regiments. First one troop would cross, then another, then a third, their numbers interspersed with sudden flushes of Starlings from the trees (the…
Here He Comes to Save the Day …
This is part of my loosely-formed Coffee Break methodology. I take my coffee, my camera, and sit in my favorite spots. Sometimes things happen. Sometimes they don’t. Yesterday, this happened: :: First sign of trouble … Caspian Tern colony in Interbay flushes over the Magnolia Bridge … … signaling alerts. :: In the distance, over…
A Closer Look … for Birds in Trouble
This post contains one image of a long-deceased gull, just FYI. You’d think I would have learned my lesson last year, with the dead gull I found wrapped around a deterrent wire on a nearby warehouse … or the gulls we untangled last fall from a fish-pen net. But, in fairness, this location was difficult…
Bird Noir
There are wildlife photographers who apologize for any urban elements — like street lamps — in their bird images. I embrace those shots, for three reasons: I admire the rugged survivalists that are urban birds and wildlife. What we throw at them in the way of obstacles, pollution, windows, automobiles, poisons, traps, wires and electricity,…
Fly On Sweet Angel
Angel came down from heaven yesterday
She stayed with me just long enough to rescue me
And she told me a story yesterday,
About the sweet love between the moon and the deep blue sea;
Derelict Nets & Entangled Birds
Note: All gulls pictured in this post, and other trapped birds were freed from the netting. Follow Up on 10/21/11: I phoned today and learned that an official went out to this net, confirmed what we saw in terms of bird entanglement, and holes in the net have apparently been fixed as a temporary measure,…
Teaching the Kids to Forage
Juvenile gulls are as determined to get free food from their parents– as their parents are to wean them from the freebies. I’ve seen many adult gulls swimming or flapping away from their begging youngsters, forcing the juvies to forage on their own. I haven’t often watched a parent gull patiently teach the babies to…
