[Lisa Millbank]

Yesterday (Wednesday) I walked to Oak Lawn Cemetery again before sunrise, but I could see hardly anything due to thick fog.  All I could see were a roaming flock of WESTERN BLUEBIRDS who landed in a large oak nearby.  However I could hear a WHITE-THROATED SPARROW singing from the nearby neighborhood along with lots of his GOLDEN-CROWNED SPARROW pals.  At Mary's River Natural Park there was a FOX SPARROW singing.  I forgot to mention that last Sunday there was a HERMIT THRUSH there as well.  The LINCOLN'S SPARROWS are back in the brushy areas along the boardwalk. I went back up through the cemetery and watched an ACORN WOODPECKER rearranging her acorn cache in a granary tree.  As the fog began to dissipate I enjoyed a lot of common residential birds on my way back, especially some WESTERN SCRUB-JAYS messing around in the leaves in someone's rain gutter on their roof.  I know they do cache food in leaf-clogged gutters, but these jays appeared to be flinging leaves out and watching the leaves fall to the ground.  (Maybe you can hire them to clean your gutters.  They'll work for peanuts!)
At the Sunset Park boardwalk there were two female-plumaged HOODED MERGANSERS fishing among all the MALLARDS and a couple of AMERICAN WIGEONS.  The BELTED KINGFISHER was also having a good day fishing and was excitedly raising his crest and making his rattle call.  There were 2 RED-SHOULDERED HAWKS there, at least one of whom is an immature (a hidden one was screaming while I was watching the other).  A RED-TAILED HAWK showed up as well, which seemed to make the Red-shouldered a little anxious.  The AMERICAN CROWS were upset about something and I wondered if it might have been the Great Horned Owl Will Wright reported, but I couldn't see what they were after. At the community garden, I planted garlic and carrot seed, and Peanut Queen and her mate (scrub-jays) came to grab peanuts as usual.   A WHITE-CROWNED SPARROW, ANNA'S HUMMINGBIRD and BEWICK'S WREN were singing.

It really feels like fall now with the long-awaited emergence of swarms of Blue Fuzzy-ass Gnats around ash trees.  That's my grandfather's name for them, one of several off-color but descriptive names he gave to various animals.  These insects are actually not gnats because they have two pairs of functional wings, unlike true gnats, which are flies, and have only one pair.  Officially, they are a woolly aphid in the family Eriosomatidae.  Check out that luxurious white fuzz in the picture.  But, I know I'll always think of them as Blue Fuzzy-ass Gnats anyway.  There were a few lingering meadowhawks and bluets (dragonflies & damselflies).  One Large-leaf Lupine was still blooming!  I think it may be hybridized with the garden variety of this species, which has been bred to have a longer blooming season, but it was still interesting to see a lupine flowering in November.
Lisa

www.neighborhood-naturalist.com