Sam

I've been observing birds on my feeder for the last week or so (they just found it yay!).  The first species to come enjoy a treat were the lesser gold finches, which usually come in pairs and one acts like a lookout.  I have also recently been seeing some more house finches who come earlier in the morning.  I observed a bird I did not recognize but didn't get a great look but was making some interesting calls so I used an app called song slueth to get some likely species then looked up further info on ebird to determine it was the California towhee.  Also saw an oak titmouse which is a little cutie.  More bird friends please!

So I took a chill hike in the mountains today.  We saw a bunch of birds and identified a few that we were able to find and take the time to observe.  My favorite was the white-headed woodpecker, which was a basis for a discussion on whether or not it was a woodpecker. We didn't observe it pecking at the tree nor did we see any red on its head (which I always thought was woodpecker distinguishing).  After some research (thanks Merlin), we were able to identify it and learned that its pretty common in the Sierras and forrest in the west which I think is pretty dang cool.