Fowl Play

Black Phoebe, Nelson (10/23/20) Robert Kermen

This year, we don’t have any bird teams in the World Series. No Cardinals, Blue Jays or Orioles. Just Rays and Trolley Dodgers.

Though their play has been entertaining, Robert Kermen set out in search of fowl play, and he found pretty much the same.

No Snow Geese or Black Necked Stilts. No American White Pelicans or American Bittern. Not even a Sand Hill Crane.

That’s because the rice farmers near Nelson, where Bob lives, are just now flooding their fields and these birds are feasting elsewhere in the Sacramento Valley. They will appear eventually, however.

So, Bob shot locally finding avian interest in his own backyard, be it a red-tailed hawk (Buteo jamaicensis), yellow-billed magpie (Pica nutalli), a black phoebe (Sayornis nigricans) and even a California grey squirrel (Sciurus griseus) to entertain him.

The lesson learned is that when the game isn’t going your way, start the next inning with a fresh perspective.