No Grizzlies Mangling Pumpkins, but Still a Lovely Day

Went up to the zoo today, intending to join a press photo shoot heralding this upcoming weekend's Pumpkin Bash--an event featuring the joyful union of curious, hungry animals and large orange gourds. (Think "hippo eating pumpkin.") I looked forward to seeing meerkats dart in and out of Jack o' Lanterns and the grizzly bears destroying theirs. This week, however, has been confusing, and I had shown up on the wrong day.

But this was not even remotely a disappointment. For the sky was deep blue, the air crackling with autumn chill, the leaves flaming with color. And any day that includes meeting a wallaroo is a good one.

The keeper noted that this wallaroo is
the grand old lady of the zoo's mob and
often appears to pose for pictures with
great dignity. I like her black gloves.



The barred owl was enjoying a nap
on his branch, stirring only to regard me
soulfully before shutting his
eyes and no doubt getting ready
for a good day's sleep.



The Komodo dragon, proudly displaying his lacerating claws
and his deadly, bacteria-laden saliva.



You can never have too many meerkats.

The day also offered up many non-zoo animals to enjoy: a bevy of crows in a bare birch tree, lots of very busy squirrels, and many tiny Anna's hummingbirds zzzeeping and zipping overhead. Anna's hummingbirds overwinter in Seattle, which is a fairly recent phenomenon. Ornithologists speculate that a combination of feeders, exotic garden plants, and climate change may account for this shift in behavior (and they have suggestions here for how to take care of hummingbird feeders in winter).



Hummingbirds can also sink into a state of torpor at night
when it's cold in order to conserve their energy.



The nice thing about having missed the photo shoot, of course, is now I have an excellent excuse to skip off to the zoo again in the middle of another work day.

Early birds at the Zoo

May 8 dawned bright and clear, and by the time I arrived at the local zoo at 6:45 a.m., the grass gleamed lemon-yellow in the slanting rays of sunlight and the air was soft and warm. At this hour on a Saturday, few cars roll along the roads, and the only people out and about are joggers and dogwalkers. And, here at the zoo, birders.

We'd come to stroll the zoo grounds in the company of a bird curator and enjoy the rare opportunity to amble about the 90+ leafy acres without encountering large family groups of moms pushing prams and screaming toddlers sticky with Itzakadoozie candy--not that there's anything wrong with those things. They just have a tendency to make it hard to identify the sibilant whisperings of a shy, small bird high in a treetop.

Though we didn't spy any rare migratory species, we did enjoy a nice selection of birds that are either year-round residents or seasonal nesters: white-crowned sparrows, bushtits, black-capped chickadees, house finches, violet-green swallows, barn swallows, robins, Bewick's wrens, and a pair of bald eagles nesting in a tree. The curator also identified a glaucous-winged/Western gull hybrid relaxing on the savannah, incongruously situated among zebras and gazelles. And I got to add a new bird to my life list upon glimpsing a yellow-rumped warbler gleaning insects high in an oak.

The zoo's own birds also exhibited a restfulness and poise rare to see during the hours that it's open to the public. Chilean flamingoes stood one-legged in their pond with their necks corkscrewed over their backs in repose, watching us carefully with their squinty yellow eyes but otherwise unflappable. One peacock glowered down at us from a treetop perch while another fanned out his emerald tail coverts, parading around us just in case there were a peahen hidden in our midst.

Of all the birds we saw that morning, I most enjoyed watching this busy white-crowned sparrow hunting insects in the savannah grass. I'd never seen this bird when I lived back east, and now every spring I look forward to hearing its wistful song, sometimes rendered as wee SWEE chilly-chilly-SWEEE cheer-cher-er. One bold sparrow even staked out a territory in the courtyard of my daughter's elementary school--a brilliant location, noisy with children, perhaps, but unlikely to attract a hungry Cooper's hawk.