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The Daily Bucket - windy days on the bay [1]
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Date: 2025-01-06
January 2024
Salish Sea, Pacific Northwest
It sounds like a broken record, but windy days are what we get here in the islands more often than not in winter. Today (Monday) is actually a rare calm day woohoo! but for our late bucket today I’ll share a few windy observations from the past few days. Our weather also tends to be grey in winter, so on those days things are a bit dark and silhouetty, which has been the case for the past week (today we’re getting some clearing double woohoo!)
Wind being a dynamic feature, most of my report is video (however shaky) so I hope you’re able to watch them.
A couple days ago I was out at one of the bays I visit every day on my daily walk and heard a raven. Looking up, I saw it riding the wind, dipping and swooping. When it’s gusty like we usually get it can be tricky holding position in the sky.
Raven
It was cool to watch it maneuvering in the gale. But it got more interesting. What it was really doing was dislodging an eagle from where it was perched in the trees. Ravens don’t like eagles. I watched it chase the eagle over the bay. Both birds were using the gusts to dart around. Eventually a second raven appeared, and then I think a gull joined the fray (gulls hate eagles). At that point the eagle decamped. My last sight of the ravens was the pair talking the whole thing over as they flew out of sight beyond the trees. This is their bay; they nest every year in these trees.
A couple of screenshots of the action in silhouette below. The title image show the comparison in size and shape between the raven and eagle. Otherwise size is impossible to gauge in the sky.
Bald eagle. Impossible to say whether adult or immature, though I suspect the latter by overall dark coloration.
The local raven pair
Meanwhile, out on the water, a lone oystercatcher on a rock barely above the tide was deciding whether it was worth staying there to forage.
It gave up and flew off to a higher rock, circling several times.
Gull and oystercatcher chillin up on rock
One last observation to share from the bay. A couple of days earlier I heard the strangest sound, a moaning down on the beach. A mammal? But it turned out to be a driftlog balanced on another, tipping back and forth with the surge. Wearing a notch in the softer log.
The wind wasn’t too bad that day so you can hear the squeaky logs:
On my visit two days later the tide was a bit lower and the logs had sorted themselves out. One end of the balanced log is now stuck on the sand. You can see where it ground down the lower log with all that friction. They’ll shift positions many more times as the winter goes on. Every high tide rearranges the driftwood.
These logs are big and heavy, but act like matchsticks in the sea. Each low tide reveals a new configuration on the beach.
🌎
A pretty nice day today. Some sun and fairly calm. Chiller than it has been but still unseasonably warm. No freezing weather yet.
What’s up in nature in your neighborhood?
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