A Feast for Crows... and Herons

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Low tide in Port Townsend provides a feast for crows, not quite the Game of Thrones feast for crows but don’t tell all the trapped fish in the tide pools that. For them this was just as gruesome as George R.R. Martins book. I could probably write an article about Port Townsend birding every year, it is one of our favorite places to visit and a very short trip from Edmonds. Just hop on the Edmonds-Kingston ferry and it’s about an hours drive from Kingston with a scenic crossing of the Hood Canal. Stop in Kingston or Port Gamble for a coffee or a bite to eat along the way.

The morning low tide flats were quite expansive, more than I had seen ever before in Port Townsend. This led to a vast area of tide pools and rocks which my kids enjoyed walking through to look for crabs, anemones, and other tide pool creatures. The birds were doing the same, many crows, shore birds, and at least seven or eight Heron were scouring the landscape for breakfast. Even a few bald Eagle’s joined, looking for anything they could steal from the other birds there. The birds were so focused we could watch them snatching small fish from the tide pools and swallowing them whole. You can see a short series of a Great Blue Heron doing this in the gallery below.

As well as low tide there was a group of breeding Pigeon Guillemot that must have been nesting nearby. They come near land during breeding season, these birds (classified as auk’s) live along the Pacific Coast, ranging from northern Japan to Siberia, Alaska, and then along our coast down to southern California. They really stand out in their breeding plumage, all black with white wing patches and bright red feet.

One last note for this trip, this is the first time we went to the local Rose Theater. It is a wonderful old movie theater that has three screens. We watched a movie in the Starlight Room. This room is on the third floor and has massive windows on two sides with views of the water and downtown. The seating is antique couches, chairs with side tables and coffee tables, a very unique theater experience. How do you watch a film in a room with large windows? When the movie is about to start they bring down huge blackout curtains and a screen and you are suddenly in a movie theater. It is a fun experience!

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Most of these shots were taken with the Sony a7 along with the Sony FE 200-600mm lens.
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