Bundle up and get outside to see birds and other wildlife

BLAINE, Whatcom County — Hanging out with birders from the Pilchuck Audubon Society is like hanging out with superheroes whose special power is the ability to spot interesting birds where you and I see only the ordinary.

See that black line bobbing up and down way out in that choppy bay water there? Surely, just a couple of floating logs, right? Wrong.

"There're some surf scoters, Western grebes, and I'm pretty sure that's a Northern pintail," says Virginia Clark, a birding superhero from Arlington, peering into a high-powered scope. Turns out it's not a log at all, but a flotilla of waterfowl.

See those cormorants lined up side by side on that wharf, bracing themselves against the wind? Seen that a million times. Not worth a second look, right?

Wrong.

"There's three sanderlings, some marbled godwits and ... right there, a couple Harlequin ducks," says superhero Art Wait, of Snohomish, inviting me to take a gander through his scope.

And, whad'ya know, as if by magic, a peek reveals the distinct rust, white-stripe and slate-blue plumage of two Harlequins hunkered down at the cormorants' webbed feet.

Audubon outings

For information on field trips, programs, presentations and membership with the Pilchuck Audubon Society, call 425-252-0926 or see www.pilchuckaudubon.org.

Christmas Bird Count

Local chapters of the Audubon Society hold an annual Christmas Bird Count during the final two weeks of December, starting Dec. 14 this year. Dates vary according to individual chapters. A comprehensive list of dates, details and contact information for Christmas Bird Counts throughout Washington can be found at the Washington Ornithological Society's Web site: www.wos.org/WACBCs.htm.

This year's Christmas Bird Count for Seattle Audubon Society is Dec. 30. East Lake Washington Audubon's count is Dec. 16.

For a complete list of Washington State chapters of the Audubon Society, go to the Audubon Washington Web site: www.wa.audubon.org/chapters.html.

It's proof that when summer warmth goes south for the winter, not all wildlife does. (For some birds you'll see this time of year, this is south.) Wildlife viewing takes on a special quality in the Northwest's cold months. Not only might you see different creatures than in summer, but because of mountain snows, some animals descend to elevations where it's easier to get an up-close look.

What you won't see out in the field this time of year: crowds of Homo sapiens.

Cold count

There're about a dozen of us out here on Semiahmoo Spit, the mile-long finger of land pointing toward Blaine, the last town in the Lower 48. It's blustery, cold and spitting rain; the noon sky is dark. The perturbed waters of Drayton Harbor crash against the cormorants' and Harlequins' wharf.

"They must be cold, those birds, the way they're all bunched together out there," someone says.

"Maybe that's what we should be doing," Clark retorts, to gales of laughter.

We're on one of the Everett-based Audubon group's weekly Tuesday morning field trips — Blaine, Drayton Harbor, Semiahmoo — and you can tell that this group of mostly 60-somethings likes to have fun. The laughter, along with the spotting and identification of ornithological wonders, comes easily for these folks.

"Some of us have better eyesight than others and are better at identifying birds. Then again, some of us make up for it by having more vivid imaginations," Wait says, chuckling.

Along with weekly Tuesday outings, the 1,500-member Pilchuck group holds numerous weekend field trips to places all up and down Puget Sound as well as east to Leavenworth and west to Sequim. An upcoming big event is the group's Christmas Bird Count, which takes place Dec. 16.

One doesn't have to be a member to go along on the group's outings. But birding, like all wildlife viewing, can be addictive, and joining a club sometimes just kinda takes place on its own.

"What happens is that people start by watching the birds in their backyard," says Wait, who, along with Clark, leads today's trip. "Then they get a book because they get a little interested. Then they watch some more, and get more and more interested, and more and more books until they're out here with us doing this."

Birds at the border

We started today's trip at Marine Park in Blaine. (Make the "OK" sign with your right thumb and index finger. Then separate the two by a quarter-inch. Semiahmoo Spit would be your thumb; the Blaine Harbor Peninsula, where Marine Park is, is your index finger; and the encircled space in the middle is Drayton Harbor.)

Here, against the backdrop of White Rock, B.C., less than two miles across Semiahmoo Bay as the grebe flies, logs turn into waterfowl. Great blue herons pick through the mud flats, lifting their long legs with a slight air of distaste, as if they wished they'd worn proper footwear for all this muck.

From the park we continued on to the wharf at the end of the peninsula (the tip of the "OK" sign index finger) then followed around Drayton Harbor to Semiahmoo Spit (the thumb), with several stops along the way. Eagles, herons and kingfishers are abundant and we spot grebes, loons, dunlins, Western sandpipers, red-breasted mergansers, marbled godwits, sanderlings, black-bellied plovers, lesser scaups and more — 46 species in all.

"Usually, we get about 50; on some great days we'll get 100," Wait says.

Forty-six species: Sounds good to me.

Mike McQuaide is a Bellingham freelance writer and author of several guidebooks including "Insiders' Guide to Bellingham and Mount Baker" (Globe-Pequot) and "Day Hike! Central Cascades" (Sasquatch Books). Contact him through his blog at www.mcqview.blogspot.com