Lynn Barber's Birding Blog

Although I did not visit any area with “reflection” in its name, today was a day for beautiful reflections after a beautiful cloudy sunrise and after  I left the highway. Along the highway I zoomed past Potter Marsh, noting on the way down that there were two Trumpeter Swans and 14 Northern Pintails, plus Mallards and gulls of course.

In Girdwood, I pulled over to check whether there was anything new at the wetlands across from the gas station. The number of Northern Pintails there had increased to over 25, and there were 12 Canada Geese and one lone Trumpeter Swan.

I walked a portion of the Trail of Blue Ice beginning at the Moose Flats area on the road that goes to Portage Glacier.

There were sounds of spring everywhere, including singing Varied Thrushes, Ruby-crowned Kinglets, Black-capped Chickadees and an American Robin, all of which were singing. I heard another song which I could not identify and then saw that it was a Pine Grosbeak (which seem to have disappeared from Anchorage for some weeks and I had already forgotten its song). I also heard a distant raptor calling but could not see or identify it.

At the Chugach National Forest pulloff area before reaching the Portage Glacier there were more Varied Thrushes and Ruby-crowned Kinglets, plus the apparently resident Barrow’s Goldeneye pair.

At the fish-viewing area nearer to Portage was a pair of American Dippers While the more distant one was standing on a rock and splashing and bathing, the nearer dipper mostly dozed. Every now and then it would blink and then go back to sleep.

On the way back toward Girdwood I watched a Bald Eagle pulling a branch off a dead tree, clearly in nest-building mode. It then flew off, dropping the branch as it flew.

129 species so far