Today I got to bird with a good friend, Scott Haber, and his girlfriend Susan Newman who visited last February as well. I picked them up from the train station in Irvine, and we headed inland to Silverado Canyon. We arrived there after driving through a very green swath of Orange County (hooray for rain) to find that it will be closed until November 2008, along with the rest of the Cleveland National Forest, due to fire danger/damage. A $5,000 entry fine didn't sound worth poking around, so we made a beeline for Irvine Regional Park to look for the Lewis's woodpecker being seen. No dice on that bird, or phainopepla, ironic considering I'd seen a few of them only two days prior at the same spot.
We birded rather lazily, then decided it was lunch time, as the gorgeous weather and heat had our eyelids drooping and our stomachs growling. I introduced them to Veggie Grill, one of my favorite restaurants, stopped by Cha for Tea to get some bubble tea, and then gave them a quick tour of UC Irvine before getting them back in time for their train to LA.
According to a friend, this is probably in the genus Layia, common name is tidy tips
On my way home I stopped at the open field next to my apartment building to snap some photos of the flowers that popped up because of the heavy rainfall we recieved over the last few weeks.
According to a friend, this is Phacelia parryi
4 comments:
If Scott and Susan are still there tell them I said hi!
Hope you find more of the birds you are looking for :)
~ Nick
Gracias again for taking us out! Glad you finally got to take some pictures of flowers by the end of the day ;)
The yellow flower...amazing. Beautiful shot.
Scott - that was so much fun, I'm really looking forward to coming out east and birding with you guys again in your neck of the woods!
Peter - thank you, its currently my desktop background, if only I had my notes from Bug Bob's botany class or could remember what type of arrangement it is... =)
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