I knew next to nothing about Virginia Rails when I found a nest. A bit of info about Rails: They are Precocial, meaning that from the day the chicks hatch, they are able to feed themselves. The parents will still help them to find food, and will protect them, but the chicks are independent from day one. The parents spend about 4 days protecting them and teaching them to forage. After this brief period, they disburse, and the chicks are on their own.  In this case, I think these chicks stayed with Mom and Pop for 5 days, but still, that is asking a lot! 

I believe I found the nest on the day the chicks hatched. I was thrilled to see these little black fluff balls: I had no idea how many chicks there were. Both Mom and Dad were helping to raise them, and the group was widely disbursed as they foraged through the grass and mud flats.  I think there were 5 chicks, but that is just a guess. There was almost always one chick under a parent.  These chicks would get fed by the parent. For some reason, I was not able to find the chicks on day two. I was probably there when they were all sleeping. On day three I decided to arrive at 5:30 am to catch the early morning foraging.  To my horror, I was greeted by a raccoon as he was raiding the nest.  I know we are not meant to intervene with nature, but my gut instinct took over, and I started yelling at the raccoon with my alpha voice.  He stood up and looked at me, then disappeared into the grass. I decided to leave the area, as there was nothing I could do at that point.  I returned one hour later, and much to my amazement, all chicks seem to have survived the attack. A short while later I was able to get a photo of 5 of the 7 members of the family. (I have no photos showing the entire family). On day 4, I chose to stay well back, so as to not stress the family. They had been through enough the day before with the raccoon. By day 5, however, I finally had a major breakthrough in my understanding of Rail behavior. I stayed well back on day 4, because they were vocalizing a lot, and I was concerned that I was making them nervous.  On day 5, however, they were vocalizing a lot even before I arrived.  I finally figured out that they are vocalizing constantly to keep in touch with each other.  It is the two parents who are calling constantly.  I think it is to let each other know where they are at any time, but also to keep the chicks nearby.  Once I realized this, I felt comfortable approaching much closer.  On average I think I stayed about 20 yards away from them, and they continued to forage, unconcerned about my presence.  The constant calling made it very easy to find them at any given time.  I spent almost 4 hours with them on that day. It was a good thing too, because this was their last day together. The parents kept tag-teaming each other. One would fly to "the mainland" (the nest was on a small island), while the other stayed behind.  After a few hours of this, finally both parents flew off for a brief vacation. The chicks took this opportunity to start venturing out away from the island. When I departed, both parents were back and foraging with the chicks. This was the last I saw of the family.  I returned on day 6, and searched for several hours. I saw no sign of adults or chicks. When they disburse, they really disburse.  I wish them all well, and it was an honor to spend the nestling period with them.

I have been playing with water in my back yard. The incentive was to attract Hummingbirds, since they like to bathe in moving water.  But, while waiting for the hummingbirds to show up, I played around photographing the water. I shot most of the pictures in the late afternoon, about 5 pm or so.  At certain times, the water spray from the hose would catch the light just right and rainbows would form: It was always clear water on top, transitioning to red, then yellow, then blue, then purple.  I played around a lot with closeups and got some cool effects: After a while, the sun moved and the effect was over: Something I am curious about is why the lines are all dashes? All photos were taken between 1/10 and 1/13th of a second.  If you increase the shutter speed to 1/40th of a second, this is what you see: 1/100th: 1/400th: Then lastly, 1/1000th: So, all the water is just little droplets, but I would like to know why at 1/10th of a second, it appears to be dashed lines. Any thoughts??

I went over to Bainbridge Island on June 6 looking for Bald Eagles.  A friend had reported that they were all over the beach.  I arrived at 6 am for the morning low tide.  Unfortunately, the low tide was not low enough (+2 feet), so the eagles had nothing to feed on.  However, I was treated to many other sights, so the day was far from wasted.

There was one juvenile eagle present just about all morning, but he barely moved off of his perch.  

Juvenile Bald Eagle However, I was treated to many Belted Kingfisher sightings, including two successful fishing ventures.  

Male Belted Kingfisher The most entertaining part of the morning was the Purple Martins.  Many of the dock owners have gourds for the Martins to nest in, but the one pier without gourds had a Martin family nesting in a piling.  I got permission from the dock owner, and I spent the next hour watching the Martins.

This is Mama:

Female Purple Martin This is Papa:

Male Purple Martin in flight And this is the chick with papa:

Male Purple Martin with chick And the whole family:

Purple Martin family

I was thoroughly entertained for the hour, but I moved on from there to see what other species I could find. I headed up to Indianola and found a small restored area with lots of wildlife:

Even before I got out of my car I was treated to a White-crowned Sparrow family:

White Crowned Sparrow with chick I watched them for quite some time. There were two chicks, and I had just one opportunity to get them both in the same plane of focus:

White-crowned sparrow chicks While watching the chicks, I noticed something in a far away tree.  It was at least 150 yards away, so I took a picture to ID it.  While snapping the picture, what turned out to be a crow was regurgitating up a pellet.  I did not even know they did that. It is a lousy photo, but that is all I got:

Crow regurgitating a pellet Also in the area was a lot of Poison Hemlock.  It got me wondering whether the bees who feed upon it get poisoned. It turns out the answer is no.  The bees are just fine.

Honey bee on Poison Hemlock flower Just before I left the nature preserve, I heard the unmistakable chirping of a Douglass Squirrel, so I felt obliged to take his picture.

Douglass Squirrel I drove from there up to Point-no-Point.  I have always wanted to visit the area.  I know that it is a very famous migratory bird area. I had no expectation for what I would find, seeing as this is not a time of migration. It turns out that there was a flock of Steller's Jays there and they were constantly in motion.  I took probably 100 photos of them flying over my head, of which maybe 5 came out.  Hazy sky and dark birds do not make the best combination:

Steller's Jay I finally got one perched just before I left.  The end to a fruitful day:

Steller's Jay