American Coot

The red bump at the top of an American Coot’s bill is called the callus. Almost all North American coots, like this one we photographed on Olympia’s Capital Lake on 27 June 2019, sport a reddish callus. Only rarely is the callus white or yellowish. In the eastern Caribbean, however, most coot calluses are white. Other than that, most North American coots are similar, although recent studis suggest that western birds may have smaller frontal sheilds on their bills (Brisbin and Mobray 2002).

Eastern Gray Squirrel

Eastern Gray Squirrels greeted our arrival in Olympia. This image was taken on 29 March 2019. Western Gray Squirrels do exist, but they are a threatened species now found only in three areas of Washington associated with oak woodlands and pine/fir forests. The western squirrels suffered from fire suppression and consequent loss of oak forests, urban development, and commercial forestry practices.

Eastern squirrels, told by the brown color on their heads, were introduced to Washington and other parts of western North America in the early 1900s. They are now the most common tree squirrels in many urban areas (Wikipedia). Eastern Gray Squirrels are also introduced to parts of Europe, South Africa, and elsewhere around the world.

California Spreadwing

I’ve been looking for the late-flying California Spreadwing, but it took David to find and photograph one for me. Usually spreadwings, especially immatures like this one, are very hard to identify. This damselfly can be told by its large size and bulbous abdomen end. This creature was perched in cattails in a small urban park in Olympia on 6 July 2019. The species is found from northern Washington south to Baja California and Sonora.

River Jewelwing

Dennis Paulson alerted me to the occurrence of River Jewelwings along Black Creek in Grays Harbor County. He wrote to look where Highway 12 crosses Black Creek. Our son, a recent convert to dragonfly chasing, lacked this stunning damselfly on his list. Finding ourselves at a public boat launch along Black Creek on 8 July, we stopped and looked for jewelwings. David quickly spied one across a small feeder creek. As I struggled to find it, this stunning damselfly flew across the creek and landed a few feet from us. Not often do you encounter a people-watching dragonfly!

River Jewelwings were among the first dragonflies I listed in Minnesota in my new-found career as an entomologist. I wrote about that encounter in this blog. The species is found from southern Canada to the northern United States. Paulson, in his new book on Odonata, writes that male River Jewelwings flutter in front of females. Then they land on the water, presumably showing the female that the current is perfect for carrying oxygen and slow enough that the eggs will not be washed away.

Common Yellowthroat

This image of a female Common Yellowthroat skulking among my blog queue since Erika and I founnd this bird on 23 May 2019 at the Nisqually National Wilflife Refuge. This bird is common across much of North America. This species is one of the first American birds described by European ornithologists. Yellowthroats are found in a variety of habitats, especially tangles in wetlands, from which they sing their song, sounding like “witchity, witchhity, witchity.”

With such a wide range, it is not surprising that many local races are described. These subspecies differ slightly in male color and pattern. Unexpected is the finding that. although the mitochondrial DNA of Eastern birds is similar, Western birds carry quite different sequences than Eastern ones. Erika and I notice that the calls of Washington yellowthroats are much slower than the calls we are used to when we were in Minnesota.

Western Tiger Swallowtail

This spring we watched a plethora of Western Tiger Swallowtails flit through the garden. Males fly back and forth searching for receptive females. They rarely perch, and, when they do land, it is but briefly. This behavior makes them hard to photograph. This image was captured on 3 July 2019. As the name implies, Western Tiger Swallowtails are found across much of the West, from British Columbia to North Dakota, south to Baja California and New Mexico. The Eastern Tiger Swallowtail, a larger butterfly, replaces it in the East. There is one flight from June through July. The western species spends the winter as chrysalids.

California Scrub-Jay

California Scrub-Jays are found along the West Coast from Washington to Baja California. Erika and I lack this common species for our yard list. Perhaps our habitat is too forested. We took this photo on 2 July 2018 two miles from home in a slightly denser suburban section of Olympia. Elsewhere in this blog, I wrote that the Western Scrub-Jay was recently split into two species, the California and Woodhouse’s jays. Woodhouse’s Jays range from the Southwest into most of Mexico.

Garter Snake

My guess is that this snake is a Pacific Sound Garter Snake. Erika and I found it at Saint Martin’s University on 28 June. The snake was pulling a dead Bullfrog into the undergrowth. Even with its unhinged jaws, typical of snakes, we could hardly imagine how the snake might swallow the amphibian. Here the snake has wrapped its jaws around the frog’s hind leg. Garter snakes eat amphibians, although Pacific Sound Garter Snakes, being somewhat smaller than other species, tend to specialize consuming worms and slugs (Paulson).

Aaron’s Beard

Aaron’s Beard, or Saint John’s Wort, is a short, spreading shrub native to southeast Europe and southwest Asia. It is used as an ornamental, landscape plant in North America, where it often escapes to become a noxious, invasive plant. Erika and I found it along a parking lot edge at Saint Martin’s University on 28 June 2019. According to Wikipedia, extracts from these plants reduce depression in mice without various side effects shown in other, similar antidepressants. I suppose, if that’s what you do for a living, a depressed mouse is easy enough to recognize.

Lorquin’s Admiral

“There’s a different butterfly in the backyard!” exclaimed Erika. This Lorquin’s Admiral zipped around Erika’s garden, and made repeated stops on the edge of the bird bath. These butterflies are fond of mud, where they presumably sip moisture. They also feed on various plants, but also bird droppings and dung, which also may decorate the bath edge. The species, although new for Erika and me, is common in a wide variety of habitats, even urban settings, from western Canada south through the Rocky Mountain West south to California. According to Wikipedia, “They are extremely territorial and will attack any intruders into their habitat, including large birds.”

This butterfly is named after Pierre Joseph Michel Lorquin, a French lepidopterist who lived from 1797 undtil 1873. He collected butterflies and beetles in many parts of southeast Asia, the Pacific Islands, South America, Africa and Europe. He worked in California in 1849 and 1856.