September 23, 2026

Where: downtown DC

When: 5:40 pm

Bird Species: house sparrow, European starling, common grackle, mourning dove, common yellowthroat, American robin

Things I Thought About:

• Has there ever been a girl frog Muppet? It's always been good that when Kermit and Piggy have kids in a story, the girls are pigs and a boys are frogs. But there have also been male pigs on the Muppets, and I can't recall a girl frog.
• I have spent almost a full day thinking about this.
• The captain on Pigs in Space was such a himbo.
• Interesting walk tonight. I'm going to have to start googling what's going on downtown before I decide if I'm going to try for birds after work. Nice little mixed flock of grackles and starlings, on the mall, but it took me forever to get here tonight.

• My usual route takes me from the 1300 block of Pennsylvania Avenue, through the Reagan Trade building plaza and out at Federal Triangle, then up two blocks to the National Mall, and over to the castle gardens. Tonight I am encountering temporary fences and massive police presence, and, the main thing, about maybe fifteen hundred people lining the streets with Chinese flags and American flags and signs in Chinese lettering in red and gold.
• It turns out, according to DuckDuckGo, the Chinese president is in town for three days. I thought for a second it was going to be a parade of some kind, but I asked a cop and it's just going to be a motorcade.
• Sorry for talking to a cop. In my defense, I wanted to pet his horse.

BOTD: common yellowthroat. A surprise, and a treat.

The walk was a real roller coaster tonight. First, I was excited just to be walking around on a chilly day, and then frustrated there was fencing around Freedom Plaza again, then interested in all the Chinese speakers and the signs and the atmosphere. Then I was very pissed that I couldn't walk through the Reagan building all the way, and then ran into a road closure where I couldn't cross and had to backtrack and go up 13th Street. Then I disassociated watching the starlings and the grackles for a bit. Finally walking into the gardens, I was delighted to see these two common yellowthroats first thing.

Then, despair, as they closed the gardens around me after about 18 minutes. I asked if it was because of the state visit (there is a good, old-fashioned 'FREE TIBET' megaphone protest happening outside) but they said it was just because it's getting darker earlier. Miserable news.

The yellowthroats were nice, though.

I have never seen these birds here before. They are married.