Merlins, compact birds of prey about ten inches long with a two-foot wingspan, are swift, powerful fliers, true thunderbolts on long, pointed wings. How do birdwatchers identify a particular species? This nondescript bird steps off a small boulder right into the torrent, and begins to peer under water.
But beneath the waves, with its flipper-like wings partly extended, it is a streamlined, masterful swimmer.
A Peregrine attacks a flock of shorebirds, igniting a breathtaking aerial display. Great Horned Owls are large, powerful owls with prominent ear-tufts. Loping overhead at dusk, with long slender wings, the Common Nighthawk chases down aerial insects with sudden, choppy shifts of direction. Look farther out, and you might see Pigeon Guillemots. Shortly after the summer solstice, however, the adults begin their southbound migration, without their young. In late summer, juvenile Glaucous-winged Gulls are taking flight over downtown Seattle.
This bird has also been called the Chattering Plover and the Noisy Plover.
To compensate, these birds move their heads. Some dabble along the surface, feeding along shallow edges of lakes and estuaries. Females predominate among the first wave of migrants, suggesting that males stay north longer to tend the young, which will fly south later in summer.
The bills of young birds are not crossed at hatching, but cross as they grow.
These gulls nest on flat, sunny rooftops that are generally inaccessible to humans. After hatching, baby robins spend up to fifteen days in the nest, growing and preparing for the world outside.
Females predominate among the first wave of migrants, suggesting that males stay north longer to tend the young, which will fly south later in summer.
Suddenly, a small murre chick, only three weeks old and just one-quarter the weight of an adult, lunges off the cliff, gliding clumsily to the water below. The robber escapes with edible tidbits and caches them in trees with its sticky saliva, reclaiming its stored food in the cold, snowy winter.
Loss of habitat, plus competition by non-native birds, caused their drastic decline.
Although many seabirds utter ugly-sounding groans and croaks, the Pigeon Guillemot produces a lovely series of trills and whistles.
The bills of young birds are not crossed at hatching, but cross as they grow. The harsh call of a silvery-white seabird rips the air.
Look farther out, and you might see Pigeon Guillemots.
Only a few weeks after young Bald Eagles fledge from their nests, the parents leave the area as well.
The Flammulated Owl is a study in camouflaged grays and browns, with cinnamon-brown shoulder straps and large brown eyes.
The Yellow-rumped Warbler, probably mid-way through its fall migration, is unafraid.
Shy and sometimes hard to see, the Band-tailed Pigeon lives in low-altitude conifer forests and treed suburbs.