A Year in Carkeek Park

 I saw the first flowers of spring today! My best guess is salmonberry. I'll keep an eye on it as the leaves get bigger. I also heard my buddy the song sparrow again and saw several other birds, one of which was quite small, I thought possibly even a hummingbird (Anna's hummingbirds winter in the Seattle region). 

 I heard that Sounder rail actually cancelled service for most of this week between Seattle and Everett. What does that have to do with Carkeek Park, you may be wondering. Well, the train tracks run right under the bluffs at Carkeek, sandwiched between the steep forested cliff and Puget Sound. Because of all the rain, the ground has been saturated and there was the danger of mudslides on the tracks. You can learn more about landslides in the region here . It stopped raining, but you can see the evidence it left behind. These deep crevices in the gravel trail were made by excess rainwater turning the trail into a riverbed. The water is gone but the crevices remain. Watch your step! I couldn't see any birds (it was getting dark and as usual, my mask was fogging my glasses) but I did catch a recording of some song that BirdNET tells me is most likely a cedar waxwing ( Bombycilla cedrorum ). I was hoping to get all the way to the marsh to hopefully get some duck pics, but it was alread...

It was dusk when I made it out to the park today and in the dim light and with my glasses fogged up from my mask, I knew bird ID was going to be difficult. I caught this lovely singer by Piper's Creek on video to look up later. BirdNET tells me it is almost certainly the sound of a song sparrow ( Melospiza melodia ), which is a species identified in the riparian habitat of Carkeek Park (see more here ).