I hiked Farren Road this morning. Nothing remarkable here today though it was a beautiful morning for a hike. I did not see or hear Scott's Oriole or Common Ground-Dove today but I did hear a Roadrunn

Um . . . That's Santa Ynez RIVER, not Rover. Sorry, Florence

I was intrigued by Peter's report of the ducks he found in the Rover where it crosses under Santa Rosa Road, so I rook a trip up there this morning. I found almost no ducks there or elsewhere on the r

I got back to the mountain for the first time in a month. It was lovely up there today but not very birdy, though not quite as birdless as I found it a month ago. Best birds were a Northern Pygmy Owl

This is an interesting place for Phainopepla, but I have had one in the vicinity a couple of times, both times in winter. Florence Sanchez

I had a Western Tanager at Camino Corto open space on Wednesday, Feb. 10. I assume it was an over-wintering bird. Florence Sanchez

Many, MANY years ago (sometime in the early 1970s), my husband and I saw one in this general area on Christmas Day. It was nice weather and Tom wanted to play golf, so we went to the Ocean Meadows gol

I checked out this area this morning. It's been months since I visited and I was shocked to see how much habitat has been cleaned out in the riparian area. Gone are the blackberry-poison oak thickets

I had some time to check these out this morning, so drove to the location via Foxen Canyon Road. That enabled me to check the ponds going from east to west and that turned out to be a good thing. It w

After missing them several times over the past few days, a small group showed up in the pines at Ortega Ridge and Ortega Ranch Road about 11 a.m. today. They flew in from across the street and I spott

This morning, several birders were out looking for them along Ortega Ranch Road, Ortega Ranch Lane, and the foot trails below the roads. I was the first to arrive, starting about 8:00 a.m. As of when

With the weather due to change significantly for the next week or so, I headed up to La Cumbre Peak this morning. It was very quiet, almost no birds. No Pygmy Nuthatches, no Steller's Jay, no Townsend

Yesterday, I tried for several hours to find the American Redstart reported from Atascadero Creek without success. I know at least two other birders also tried to find it, even walking down in the Cre

I headed up to Santa Maria this morning to see if I could turn up some of the nice birds recently reported. I first stopped at Donovan Road to see if I could find the blackbird flock I saw there on my

I hiked East Pinery Road this morning but I ran into the wind that was forecast for tomorrow, not today. I'm not sure when it happened, but there is a new tree down over the road in the same spot wher

Today I went over to the valley to see if I could turn up the Brewer's Sparrow found on Casey Road by Dave Compton and re-found by Mark Holmgren a few days later. Unfortunately, I did not. I walked th

I found the Tennessee Warbler this morning in its usual bottlebrush tree in front of 354 Arroyo Rd. It was working very low in the tree, making it easy to see all the field marks. Afterwards, I looked

I checked on past reports from several spots this morning--some successes, some misses. I found the Hammonds Flycatcher in its usual spot on arroyo Burro Creek about 9 a.m. It came into the creek vege

I made one more try for the Lesser Black-backed Gull that has been seen in Lompoc by a few people but struck out again on a very chilly morning. At 8:15, there was only a single California Gull on the

Thanks to all who responded with good directions to the spot. Because I went to Ventura earlier to see a Scarlett Tanager and other things, I didn't get to the spot until after 11 a.m. I stayed until