When All You Can Painted Bunting is Think About

January sizzled from start to finish, and apparently February is not about to let things settle to a simmer.

On Wednesday, a Pacific Golden-Plover was found out at Fern Ridge. Word started spreading about the sighting as Mason and I were on our normal stroll through Delta Ponds. Talking a three-year-old out of their present moment of fun into some other sort of adventure is no small task. Thankfully the idea of seeing a new place (always my go-to) and stomping in some mud was convincing enough for him. Off we went.

We arrived as the sun was getting low in the sky, which made the golden tones of this little shorebird just sing. Oregon gets two species of golden-plover each year, usually during fall migration (typically Pacific comes through on the earlier end, and American on the later, but there's plenty of exceptions). Both of them can be easy to miss if you're not on the ball, so getting one served up on a platter like this so close to home and so early in the year was a huge bonus!

Pacific Golden-Plover

Fern Ridge, Lane County

This made for some nice momentum to start the month, and the weekend sent matters into overdrive.

On the afternoon of January 31 a Salem resident posted photos on Facebook of an adult male Painted Bunting at her feeder. Many times in these kinds of cases folks are willing to open up their yards for the birding masses to come enjoy the bird, and that is especially true when the homeowner is a birder. But this was not one of those cases, and you can understand why—a crowd of visitors in the backyard in the middle of a pandemic is not what most people think of as a good time. 

So, birders had only a general idea of the neighborhood where the bird was. Sometimes this can be enough to be useful. But in this case, the streets are lined with front yards devoid of greenery, and the backyards are all closed off by fences. In other words, there's no way to see into the areas where a Painted Bunting would typically like to hang out.

With only a general sense of where the bird was, a number of birders searched high and low along the surrounding streets, trying to catch of glimpse of this flashy little visitor to no avail. With no positive reports coming February 1 or 2, it seemed unlikely that the situation would develop into a stakeout.

But on the morning of February 3, Caleb Centanni spotted the bird, and things started getting interesting. Over the next couple of days, some semblance of a pattern began to develop. While the bird would spend most of its time below the fence level, a few times a day it would pop up into a tree where it was visible from a couple different vantage points. The tree is a curly willow with dense patches where it could hide from the local pesky accipiters, as well as creepers of the birding variety. From mid morning to late afternoon, the bird will hop up into that tree a handful of times. With patience and a bit of luck, there's a good chance you'd catch a glimpse.

Seeing reports of this bird start to trickle in while at work was, well... Have you seen this comical little commercial from Postmates?

When all you can Pad Thai is think about.

That was my week, just substitute in the Salem Painted Bunting. Every time a positive report would come through I would check my watch and my schedule and my workload, and every time the verdict was the same: you cannot chase right now. That did not keep me from checking my watch and my schedule and my workload every time I got a notification. But it was just too busy of a week to be able to drop everything and go.

The first moment I was free, I was northbound. I tried my luck on Friday after picking Mason up from school. He thought seeing a rainbow bird, as he came to call it, sounded like fun, and our drive to and from Salem was even easier than our post-school trek to Albany a couple weeks earlier. In the last hour and twenty minutes of daylight I felt good about our chances of seeing the bird, but it did not show. A young Cooper's Hawk stood watch the entire time, which did not help.

Rude

Go find a House Sparrow and leave our lovely guest alone please

The next morning I didn't want to put little man through the round trip again, so we stayed local and picked up a couple new birds for the year: Barn Owl and Black-bellied Plover. Mason's takeaway from an hour on the mud flats at Shore Lane Park: "I like this muddy place." Me too man. (If you ever want to watch Dunlin murmurations, this is a fantastic place for it.)

As the morning progressed, the Painted Bunting was reported again. My afternoon plans were settled. After dropping little man off at home I was right back on I-5, bunting bound. 

Thankfully it began raining right when I arrived. Wouldn't want to make this too easy, of course. For me it was not a question of how long I was going to wait for it, but simply how long it would take to show up. Andrew and I chatted for a while, and the growing group of birders reshuffled every time another arrived. It was nice chatting with Tom Crabtree for a few minutes. He didn't need the bird for his state list, but he did for his birds-photographed-in-Oregon list, which was already well over 400.

Some photographers like birds. Some birders like taking photos. Tom is the latter, and he was the first to get eyes on the flash of color that darted straight into the heart of the swirly tree. The Painted Bunting sat deep in a tangle, and it was striking just how brightly it shone from the shadows. The red on its belly and breast could be seen with the naked eye all the way from the road.

We walked up and got to an angle for some decent photos. They don't do this bird justice, but it is great to have them as a way to remember the moment.

PAINTED BUNTING

Marion County

Any day you see a male Painted Bunting is a good day, even in the areas where they usually reside. But to see one in Oregon in the middle of winter is nearly too good to be true. Nearly.

Now, let's be honest. This is not terribly sporty. It is not birding at its best. Waiting on a sidewalk between two stranger's houses, walking streets in a suburb lacking any visible shrubbery—it's not what comes to mind when I think of the many soul-nourishing times I've had in the field. This is more the obsessive collecting part of the hobby, and it's just what we do sometimes. If this is all birding was, I would need another hobby. But when I think back to that moment, I'll remember the glow of that bird and I will be plenty ready for whatever chase is next.

And on that note, it's not like there's no other birds around, even in that peculiar little neighborhood. On one of the initial searches for the bunting, Rachael Friese found a Red-naped Sapsucker just a couple blocks away. The stunning, out-of-place woodpecker showed very nicely for us:

Red-naped Sapsucker

Marion County

That duo made for a great outing. Painted Bunting was my 381st bird for Oregon, and the sapsucker was my 190th bird of the year in (Western) Oregon so far.

By the end of the day, those lists were 382 and 191, but that's a story I'll have to save for another day.

Pad Thai, anyone?