Happy New Year!

 It was a strange weather end to a strange weather year. I dug potatoes out of the garden on Dec. 31st. Good thing because it turned cold... 28 that night. We ate chard out of the garden on New Year's Day. A few tomatoes were still ripening on the windowsill. But the hummingbird feeder had ice in it that morning.

Traditionally, we hiked Spirit Mtn. on New Year's Day, but those days are gone. Neither of us have knees up to the hike back down. So this year we hiked to Yoncalla Falls instead, which is just a short jaunt up the road from us and a short hike in. And beautiful on clear New Year's Day 2019.

Johnny took this photo of me hiking up closer

 Then we hiked back to the van and drove up to a recent clearcut where we watched wee birds, nuthatches and chickadees mostly, high in a tree alongside the logging road. The easiest way to watch was from our backs.

Since I don't see so great, I took photos and zoomed them in closer.. To my amazement, I actually managed to capture both a chestnut-backed chickadee and a red-breasted nuthatch. Good camera.

 Way off in the distance was a view of Spirit Mountain from the back (relative to what we see on our farm).

And beyond and to the left as we were facing, the whole range of Cascade Mountains from Mt. Hood to the Three Sisters. Of course, you needed binoculars to see them. My camera obliged.

They are there, I swear!

Starting from Mt. Hood...

closer...

to Mt. Jefferson...

 closer...

 Three Fingered Jack...

and The Three Sisters...

Amazingly, the four Christmas Bird Counts we did also had reasonably good weather, especially the last two: Dallas on Dec. 27 and, on January 4, Yamhill Valley. We did the Dallas CBC with friend Melinda, who lives inside the count circle. We got the most birds on her road... including 54 wild turkeys!

A new friend who lives inside the Yamhill Valley CBC went with us on that count. Mary was a great help as she can both see and hear the birds better than I... and also identify them. Although four CBCs was a bit too exhausting for us, it was so nice to have other birders with us that we will likely do it again next year... if we can talk them into helping again.

This Cooper's Hawk posed for me on the Yamhill Valley CBC.

I also managed to cram in my monthly Beached Bird Survey on January 2nd, a good weather day. I started by stopping on the way at Gunaldo Falls, which is always hard to spot through the trees but at least has water in it now.

The coast was beautiful, as always.

Chief Kiawanda rock was mirrored in the damp sand.

The King Tides of December had carved still more off the dune, making a very wide beach.

Then on Monday, January 7, we did our Grand Ronde raptor route in spite of morning fog. The forecast is for rain for at least the next ten days and we have one more raptor route to do this month: the North Santiam. In between all this birding, there are still chores to do morning and night and upcoming cataract surgeries for my eyes. Here's hoping I will be able to see birds better after the cataracts are gone.

Johnny, when not carting me around to bird surveys, has been working diligently at various repair projects, including my EZ Go. I have been using his to haul horse manure. I think he wants it back.

Happy New Year!