Eagle

The morning mostly got away from me.  A male red bellied woodpecker arrived before lunch.  The boss butterbutt was back.  White throated sparrows continued their hunt for fallen food.  Then the birds scattered and I saw why.  I believe it was a young eagle.  The crows thought it was a menace and it thought they were pests.  Eventually they annoyed it into leaving.  I saw crows gather again later so it may not have gone far.  But they may have been after a different raptor. 

A mockingbird copied the warbler and refused to let other birds have suet.  But it was outmatched by the blue jays.  A red breasted nuthatch made a couple of trips for seeds.  When I went back inside, the female oriole came out.  But the mockingbird wasn't having that.  It sat on the suet till a squirrel climbed the post.  Then, I think, a hawk swooped through aiming for the house finch on the seed feeder.  The squirrel seemed startled but not fearful so it was probably a Coopers hawk, or possibly a sharp shinned hawk.  Unless it was something else - all I saw was a pale underside.

A female bufflehead fished our stretch of the creek.  A pelican took its time gulping down whatever was in its pouch.  It lifted its beak to the sky, then flapped its wings, whether to aid digestion or to celebrate its meal, I don't know.