Damon's Birds for the Week of February 17 - February 23

I was not shut out this week, yay! I was also not in New Orleans like Paul, so I didn't get to see pelicans and Bonaparte's gull  (I already had black vulture, great blue heron, and northern mockingbird though). I would like to say I am not bitter, but dammit I am bitter!

Luckily I can leverage my job into more birds on my list. You see, part of my job (at times, including last week) is to not just watch for birds and other wildlife, but to identify it and point it out to people. So as I stand on a perch three stories above a wilderness area that has a marsh and a river running through it, I actually see many different species.

I've been working on the gulls I see there (and there are plenty of them), but I am not nearly good enough to identify gulls in flight yet (with the glaring exception of the one I added last week, though I did identify it while some were standing), and I know I'll get a few more ducks. There are plenty of mallards and Canada geese there, and I am about 90% sure I saw some pintails, but 90% isn't good enough for me so they remain off the list for now (oh, worry not, I will see them soon enough there).

One really good thing is that I saw a bald eagle. This will spurn me to write a piece on bald eagles and their recovery, but more importantly my oldest son has this:

Worry not, there will be no hot man on bird action with this one. Probably.

37; Fish Crow; 2/17/2013; DuPont Environmental Education Center; Wilmington, DE
38; Bald Eagle; 2/22/2013; DuPont Environmental Education Center; Wilmington, DE
39; Greater Black Backed Gull; 2/22/2013; DuPont Environmental Education Center; Wilmington, DE