Soaring to New Heights

My 139th and final species for 2018,
the golden-crowned sparrow.

From an Anna's hummingbird on January 1 to a golden-crowned sparrow on December 27, 2018 took flight and became a record-shattering year of bird-watching for me.

Starting with the Anna's hummingbird bright and early on the first day, the year wasted no time earning its wings. By the end of the first day, I had 18 species sighted, and before February began, I had 37.

I flew past my previous best of 120, set in 2017, on August 7 and kept going. A final trip to the Billy Frank Jr. Nisqually National Wildlife Refuge on December 27 gave me 12 new species to end the year, putting me at a total of 139. The last of these birds, the golden-crowned sparrow, presented itself at the end of the day just before I reached the refuge parking lot. It seemed like a good punctuation mark for a great year.

The year featured 14 species I had never previously seen. These included the lesser scaup, the blue-winged teal, the field sparrow, the Lincoln's sparrow, the white-throated sparrow, the lark sparrow, the Harris's sparrow, the wood thrush, the hooded merganser, the ring-necked duck, the northern shoveler, the northern pintail, and the greater yellowlegs. One particularly spectacular life-list addition was the sandhill crane, which I blogged about seeing here.

Besides the new personal best and the life-list additions, I had another major highlight. During 11 days (May 4-14), I saw 43 species. That's almost four species per day and nearly one-third of my total for the whole year. It was such an exciting time. I just kept racking up the identifications, and when the run was over, I knew it would be a special year. At that point, I already had 107 species on my list, that new record close at hand.

Last year, my bird-watching reached new heights, and it's up, up, and away for 2019.

It's My Party

Parties are fine, but they're no sunset at the beach.

This past New Year's Eve crystalized for me the realization that I prefer outdoor activities to traditional parties as ways to celebrate or mark occasions. I reached this determination on a clam-digging trip with my mom and uncle.

Traditional parties generate mixed emotions for me. I enjoy seeing friends and family, but I also consider parties somewhat constraining. Almost without fail, I find myself seeking some alone time to break away from the social confines. In addition, I'm not convinced that parties always serve as the best ways to celebrate. Once, I even remarked how hikes seemed like better ways to mark upcoming weddings than bachelor parties.

Roosevelt Beach celebrates the end
of 2017 with a resplendent sunset.

The clamming trip to Roosevelt Beach on New Year's Eve finally put all my feelings about parties together. Instead of celebrating 2017's end with a party, I took my camera to the beach, and while my mom and uncle dug clams, I photographed a brilliant sunset that had so many dazzling colors I could hardly decide where to look first. The light show had already begun when we parked on the beach. Excitedly, I pulled the camera from the bag, jumped out of the truck, and started snapping shots. The entire time the other two clammed, I took pictures, ending up with more than 120. Each photo seemed to capture some new color achievement produced by the interplay between the sun and the clouds. I smiled and smiled some more as I checked the images in the camera's viewer screen.

On the drive home, the contrast between what I had seen at Roosevelt Beach and the events of a traditional New Year's Eve party played out vividly. We saw people lighting off fireworks, and I couldn't help but feel how those colorful explosions paled in comparison to the sights I witnessed on the beach earlier that evening. The camera in the back seat now held images and memories a party could never have equaled.

With no party on the schedule, I went to bed before midnight. However, that allowed me to rise early and upload my beach pictures to Flickr. After accomplishing that task (you can see the full album here), I looked outside at first light and saw my first bird of 2018, an Anna's hummingbird. I really could not think of a better way for me to end one year and start another. I had watched the sun set on 2017 in astonishing fashion and seen it rise in 2018 with a feisty, energetic bird. It was nature from end to start, precisely who I am and how I experience this world.

Above all, I comprehended fully that it's my party, and I'll take photographs at the beach and watch birds at first light if I want to.