Colusa National Wildlife Refuge

After we left the San Pablo Bay NWR, we headed for the Colusa NWR, a few miles south of the Sacramento NWR since I had never been there before. I’ve already posted my favorite shot from our visit, Leslie’s White-Fronted Ibis, but we saw a lot more than that there.

I’m not sure there were more Snow Geese at Colusa NWR than at the Sacramento NWR, but the amount of feathers in the water

White Feathers in water

certainly suggests that there were more per square foot than there was at the Sacramento NWR. In fact, they were so thick that it was impossible to take a picture of a single bird, though the single Greater White-Fronted Goose in the middle of the flock caught my attention.

single Greater WhiteFronted Goose  with Snow Geese

I’m not sure if the tight quarters was beginning to fray tempers, but there was an awful lot of goose talk going on, particularly among the Greater White-Fronted Geese,

Greater White-Fronted Goose

and it didn’t sound, or look, particularly friendly.

It wasn’t until we left the main “lake” at the visitors’ center that we began to see other kinds of ducks, but there were plenty of other birds to see, like this personal favorite,

male Northern Pintail

a male Northern Pintail.

I think Leslie saw her first Cinnamon Teal at the Sacramento NWR and kept telling me to get a shot of one. Either they were too far away or the sun was behind them when I was there, so this was the first place I was really able to get a good shot of one.

male Cinnamon Teal

There’s certainly no doubt where this guy got his name from though, is there?

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