SNOWPOCALYPSE 2019 ~~ PARTING SHOT

SNOWPOCALYPSE 2019

What a week it has been! If you live anywhere in Washington State, you probably heard the terms "Snowpocalypse" and "Snowmageddon" used a lot in the past week. For my friends back East, you probably read about it or heard it on the news. The reason is that entire state of Washington has had snow for the past week, and most of the time it was non-stop. Right now, Yakima is sitting on 21" of snowfall for this winter season. Last year we had 5" so it's way more than we had then, but not nearly as much as we had the two previous years with 34" both of those years. I got this information from the website How Much Will It Snow. You can check the actual snowfall and the predictions for any city in the US. This website is predicting 4 more inches for us tomorrow. Although the snowfall amount for Yakima is not all that unusual, Seattle is a different story entirely. The amount of snow that has fallen on Seattle in the 2018-2019 winter season is 20" and is the most snow that city has seen in the past 50 years. The two previous years they had 4" each year, and the two years before that they had 0" each year. So you can see it was a very big deal for people living in Seattle. That city has so many hills, not to mention so many people, that I would not want to drive in that much snow. As a matter of fact, I don't like driving in Seattle when it is bone dry! Here are a few pictures below that Linda's daughter, Emily, sent us of the snow in Seattle.

Emily's bird feeder area

The rest of the back yard

Emily, like most of us who love birds, continued to keep her feeders filled so the birds would have something to eat to keep themselves fueled up. Birds have to eat constantly during the cold weather in order to keep their core body temperature up so they won't freeze. It becomes more difficult for them to find natural food sources due to the fact that whatever is on the ground is covered up by several inches of snow. Below is a picture of her bird feeder area with a Northern Flicker clinging to the side of the suet feeder. Below that is a picture of one of her hummingbirds perched on the heated nectar feeder. Over to the lefthand side of the hummer feeder, Emily has a work light trained on the feeder to add extra heat so the little hummers can stay warm while feeding.

Northern Flicker on suet feeder

Hummer on feeder

Not to be outdone, Linda's sister Wendy reported in from Tacoma and sent pictures as well. Tacoma is only slightly behind Seattle with 19" of snow this season. Wendy took some walks around the neighborhood and sent back some stunning pictures of trees in the snow. Below are a couple of her shots.

Large evergreen tree flocked in snow

Tree heavy with snow

Meanwhile, Linda has been working hard to keep the driveway shoveled. I shoveled a little bit a couple of times, but I have a shoulder that is giving me some problems so I haven't been too helpful (how convenient, you say). Anyway, she has been diligent at this, which is no small feat considering that for the past week, it has snowed every day (except for today, we caught a break). She still shoveled snow today anyway!

Break time is over, back to work!

I spent most of the snowy days trying to get some good bird video. Since it was so cold I opted to shoot through the windows for the most part. I have put together several short video clips to make the video below that is about 2 1/2 minutes long. Now, I know most people only have an attention span of about 10 seconds these days, but I think this video is worth a couple of minutes. Also, turn your sound up if at all possible.

The video begins with sparrows and house finches on the seed feeder in the back yard, with Oregon Juncos on the ground. This particular day it was very windy due to Yakima being under a Blizzard Alert, with winds gusting up to 50 mph. The sparrows struggled to stay on the feeder, as did a larger black bird, the Brown-Headed Cowbird. The sparrows and juncos on the ground were soon joined by another bird that resembled a very large female house finch. This was actually either a juvenile or female Red-Winged Blackbird (hard to say which because they look very similar). There was no mistaking the male blackbird, though, when he showed up. The jet-black body and bright red shoulder epaulets gave him away. The blackbirds had a hard time staying on the feeder, but still they gave it their best shot as they were probably very hungry. Meanwhile, inside the house Summer Girl was enjoying the birds from the comfort of the front window sill. In the last segment of the video, the bird feeder may look like it's on fire, but that's just the reflection of our fireplace in the front window. And by the way, I asked for quiet while I was videoing, but as you can hear, Summer Girl had other ideas.

I will be the first to admit that I am not the best photographer of snow. I think my best photographs are taken in the Spring and Summer, when there isn't all this pesky weather to contend with. However, one day I was looking out the front window at the sparrows under the bird feeder when all of a sudden I saw them scatter. I happened to have my iPad in my hand, so I immediately hit the "record" button and this below is what I got.

It was our old friend, the Cooper's hawk, trying his best to catch his breakfast. He went away empty-taloned that day, but I am sure he is still around, keeping a sharp eye on both feeders. No telling how many birds he nabs when no one is looking.

One more video and I will stop...for now. This one is just under a minute long, but I had to include the footage I got of the Black-Billed Magpie pecking away at the suet cake. We had some spectacular icicles hanging off of the roof, so I tried to get some closeups of those. Also, I stepped out onto the porch one morning with my camera and saw this sweet little bird, which I think is a Song Sparrow. And closing out the video we have a male House Sparrow checking out the situation. He even turned around to show off the beautiful feathers on his back.

PARTING SHOT

Summer Girl does not really like all the snow, she says it cramps her style. She has been content to watch the snow out of the window, and lately she has taken up helping Linda do the jigsaw puzzle.

Hey, Mom, I found a piece!

That's all for now, join us again next week and I promise...no more snow pictures (maybe)!