I birded mostly in Bonner and Boundary Counties this weekend beginning on
Lake Pend Oreille, where the first sign of migration was maybe 10,000
swallows (I conservatively eBird 5000) skimming over the water and
dominated by Violet-Green, Tree, and Northern Rough-winged, with smaller
numbers of Cliff and Barn but zero Banks (Vaux’s Swifts are also arriving
in small numbers). Arriving Nashville and Orange-crowned Warblers were
present in suitable habitat at most stops, but there wasn’t much water bird
migration to speak of. A walk around Hope produced 5 species of warblers
including Nashville, Orange-crowned, Yellow-rumped, Townsend’s (several),
and MacGillivray’s (one) plus my first-of-year Rufous Hummingbird and
Cassin’s Vireo. A flock of over 60 SNOW GEESE, 5 ROSS’S GEESE, and my
first Chipping Sparrows were near Selle, north of Kootenai. In the late
afternoon and evening, I birded the Kootenai River Valley from Bonners
Ferry to the international border. Kootenai NWR produced my Boundary
County fist VESPER SPARROW (photos:
https://ebird.org/view/checklist/S45044816). The major swallow movement
continued, but here, Northern Rough-winged was the dominant species.
Sunday morning I spent 3 hours at Boundary Creek WMA, where a minor fallout
of mostly Yellow-rumped Warblers and Tree Swallows was underway. There
were on the order of 80-100 Yellow-rumps lining the creek including 4-6
MYRTLE “YELLOW-RUMPED WARBLERS and a few other common migrants (warblers,
sparrows, Cassin’s Vireo, and my first Hammond’s Flycatcher). A female
MERLIN had a snack on a nearby snag. A WHITE-THROATED SPARROW was at
Kootenai NWR, later in the morning. Birding along the Pend Oreille River
in the afternoon was very quiet, but a nice drake RED-BREASTED MERGANSER
was in the river at the Riley Creek Recreation Area.
Good Birding,
Carl Lundblad
Moscow, ID