Blue-gray Gnatcatcher - A subtle beauty

Blue-gray Gnatchater

The Blue-gray Gnatcher is a common bird in Central-Coastal California in the summer. It flits around in the brush wagging and lifting its tail which startles insects causing them to fly to become a tasty morsel for this bird. This photo is of a male because of the blue “V” on its forehead.

If lucky, you will encounter these birds nest building. They gather caterpillar and spider silk and use it to fasten fragments of lichens into a small thimble which becomes the nest. The nest looks like a bump on a tree’s branch and it’s impossible to know if it’s a nest unless you see an adult fly onto it.

Common Mergansers

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It has been raining constantly for the past week and Steven’s Creek, which can be dry in the summer, is overflowing it’s banks. Yesterday we came across a pair of common mergansers in the flooded stream and, while I’ve shied away from painting ducks in the past, these two in the stormy woods spoke to me.

Western Tanagers

Dave has been posting images of the colorful tanagers we saw in Costa Rica. Our local Central California tanager is the Western Tanager. It is no longer in the Tanager family but the name survives. We see these birds in the summer, particularly in the Sierras, when the males have brilliant breeding plumage. They have inspired many paintings.

Ferruginous Hawk Sketch

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In general I don’t like using Dave’s photos as references for my paintings - except when the photo is flawed in some way.. In this case the hawk in the photo was lopped off on the right side. But I loved the pose and used it as reference for this quick sketch. It was amazing to see this hawk up close on our trip through Panoche Valley.

White-crowned Sparrow

White-crowned Sparrows 12” x 12” watercolor on wood panel

A 12” x 12” watercolor on wood panel

Here is a painting I did a couple of years ago. These are in the same genus (Zonotrichia) as the Rufous-collared that Dave photographed in Costa Rica. They are superabundant in our yard in the winter.

Sandhill Cranes

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One of the draws of driving to Merced National Wildlife Refuge is to see sandhill cranes. We did not see huge numbers as in past years but several groups were quite close. I love seeing the blue grey birds against dried grasses.

Mountain Plovers

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The last three winters we have driven two hours to Panoche Valley to look for Mountain Plovers with no luck. But this year they were there! In fact there was a flock of over 80. In spite of having ‘mountain’ in their name these are birds of short grasslands and were once associated with bison herds.