[birding] Riley Peak BBS

[Linda Fink]

We completed our BBS route that begins in Valley of the Giants today.
Our assigned start time was 4:58 a.m. at a 1/2 mile hike from our
campsite. I was cursing Roy Gerig, the originator of this route, for
starting the BBS there as I tripped over downed logs and fought my way
through eight foot high salmonberry tangles in the dark... and fell into
a hole made by uprooted giant trees. But when the Marbled Murrelets
began calling at Stop #1, I forgave him. Somewhat.

The return trip to camp was less eventful since it was now light enough
to see the path without my flashlight (which had not saved me from the
root hole). The rest of our route is on roads, some deeply potholed that
can only be traversed at 15 mph, but at least they are drivable. Besides
Marbled Murrelets, I found American Dippers at 3 stops... a new record
for the route. And Purple Martins finally came close enough to stop #50
to be counted... if they had come during my 3 minutes, which they did not.

Great weather and only saw 2 cars the whole route, one of which was
lost. Johnny gave them directions and hopefully, they made it out.

Linda Fink
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://www.midvalleybirding.org/pipermail/birding/attachments/20100629/33a5f65c/attachment.html