A commonly-seen winter bird is the chickadee which will come to your backyard bird feeder. Learn more about this bird at BirdNote, a daily two-minute program on-line and on public radio.
BirdNote seeks to transport people out of the grind of daily life and into the natural world by highlighting birds and our connection to them. Chickadee Line-up on BirdNote features descriptions and calls of the seven types of this bird family.
Valarie says: The Yesler Swamp is a wonderful nature area and bird sanctuary, easily accessed from the east corner of the parking lot of the Center for Urban Horticulture, 3501 NE 41st Street. There is a signboard for starting point of the Trail. See the Friends of Yesler Swamp page for news of the trail project.
Back to the Yesler Swamp (part of the University of Washington’s Union Bay Natural Area, on the shore of Lake Washington). As I’ve mentioned before, this area is flooded in a foot or two of water all summer when the Army Corps of Engineers raises the level at the Ballard Locks. That keeps Seattle’s usually jungle-like undergrowth at bay, so in the winter these scraggly old trees lie on open ground instead of being buried in smaller plants. The ground level has to be just right for this to happen, and there aren’t many places around the lake like this. I keep looking for others, but so far this remains the best I know about.
A massive earthquake struck the city of San Francisco in the early morning hours of April 18, 1906. But worse than the damage caused by the earthquake itself were the fires which raged through the city for three days afterward. Ships coming into the harbor were turned away because there was no place for arrivals to go, and that is how Denjiro Nishitani, immigrant from Japan, came to Seattle instead of San Francisco as he had intended.
Knowing no one in Seattle, Denjiro found his first job as a dishwasher in a restaurant. From there he made his way to northeast Seattle and worked as a farmhand. Through his determined efforts to advance himself, within five years of his arrival in Seattle Denjiro became the owner of a plant nursery called Oriental Gardens in what is now the Meadowbrook neighborhood.
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Valarie says: It’s owl season, but spotting them takes time and patience. Our thanks to photographer Joe Sweeney.
This week’s photo, taken January 24, 2013 in Discovery Park in Seattle, WA, features a GREAT HORNED OWL, lounging on a limb after working the night shift.
Today, Thursday, I spend a few hours in Discovery Park, Seattle’s largest park. During my outing, bird activity is rather quiet, overall, but a few special sightings make up for the low numbers. At the pond, a SHARP-SHINNED HAWK perches and preens for several minutes. The hawk’s presence probably is the reason no other birds are visible in the immediate area. Meanwhile, in an evergreen tree deep in the forest, yet not far from the pond, a large owl sits close to the tree’s trunk. It has its back to me, but because of its massive size and prominent ear-tufts, it must be a GREAT HORNED OWL. When it eventually turns and looks at me, there is no longer any doubt.
At the…
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Lake City is the northeasternmost neighborhood of Seattle and did not come into the city limits until 1954. Map courtesy of Historylink.
In the 1920s and 1930s the (future) Wedgwood area lacked a strong name association in part because it lacked a school to give the neighborhood an identity. But just to the north, on NE 100th Street at the corner of 32nd Ave NE, was a school, Maple Leaf, which had a very strong history and for a long time it gave its name to the neighborhood.
The name of the Maple Leaf School had a different origin from today’s Maple Leaf neighborhood which is located in north/central Seattle with Northgate as a marker of its north boundary.
Today the old Maple Leaf School site at 3212 NE 100th Street is in the Meadowbrook neighborhood. Meadowbrook is one of the five contiguous neighborhoods of northeast Seattle which are included as part of the greater Lake City area, including Victory Heights, Olympic Hills, Cedar Park, and the business district of Lake City.
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Valarie says: The Meadowbrook Pond is directly across from Meadowbrook Community Center (10517 35th Ave NE.) The Pond is an urban oasis and a refuge for birds.
This week’s photo, taken January 15, 2013 at Meadowbrook Pond in Seattle, WA, features a RUBY-CROWNED KINGLET flashing a slice of its bright red crown at the photographer.
You don’t have to travel far to huge tracts of land to find cool birds. Rewards can be big when you survey a pocket of nature just down the road. On Tuesday and Wednesday, I drive 4 minutes to Meadowbrook Pond, a quaint little sanctuary tucked into a northeast Seattle neighborhood. The pond hosts some attractive water fowl, including GREEN-WINGED TEAL, WOOD DUCK, BUFFLEHEAD and HOODED MERGANSER, but during my 2 brief afternoon visits, it’s mostly about the small stuff. 3 tiny RUBY-CROWNED KINGLETS and a YELLOW-RUMPED WARBLER repeatedly leap out of the bushes bordering the pond, as they take wing above the water in search of flying insects. The kinglets are oblivious to my presence as they boldly fly surprisingly close…
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There has been a grocery store at the corner of NE 85th Street in Wedgwood since 1959, first Tradewell, then Matthew’s Red Apple, then QFC. The QFC closed in April 2021 and redevelopment of the site is pending.
The intersection of NE 85th Street on 35th Avenue NE is the heart of the Wedgwood neighborhood and is its main commercial center.
Today it is difficult to imagine that any corner of this intersection would be vacant, and yet the site had no buildings on it until 1959.
Up until 1959 when the Tradewell grocery was built, the vacant corner property had a long ownership by people who seemed to be just holding it as an investment and did not come to live in Wedgwood themselves.
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Valarie says: Even in winter in Seattle there are birds to be seen, which is evidence of God’s grace in His creation.
Living in the Pacific Northwest, you have to take advantage of the few days during then winter months when we have light. Last week I only had an hour or so to spare during one of those days and questioned if it would be worth the effort for such a short outing. Fortunately, I managed to spot several species in such a short time period including this Downy Woodpecker.
Downy Woodpecker (Picoides pubescens)
Seattle Washington
500mm | 1/640th Sec. @f/4.0 | ISO 640
Canon 1D Mark III+ Canon EF 500/4L IS USM
Processed with Lightroom 4, Photoshop CS5.
Feel free to comment below if you like what you see or have any other observations.
Thanks for stopping by,
JayT
How does the history and development of Wedgwood compare to that of other neighborhoods in Seattle?
The Burke-Gilman Trail is the line of a former railroad and is parallel to the ship canal in Fremont.
Fremont was the site of some of the earliest land claims in Seattle in the 1850s, but it was not populated until developers bought the land in 1888. Fremont had this date as a definite start-point as a community with streets laid out. Its early development was planned by its land investors.
Many aspects of Fremont today, such as its street system and its hub for transportation, can be attributed to the strong period of development in the 1880s. Fremont’s early developers were also invested in the streetcar system and they brought this convenience to Fremont, as well.
Active Seattleite Henry Yesler was a member of the Lake Washington Improvement Company and in 1883 he bought some of William Strickler’s former homestead claim in Fremont for a place to create a canal at the northwest corner of Lake Union. That same year, Judge Thomas Burke bought some of the (future) Fremont land for the right-of-way of the Seattle, Lake Shore & Eastern Railroad. The railroad route has come down to us today as the Burke-Gilman Trail.
The Wedgwood Ale House at 8515 35th Ave NE is in Wedgwood’s earliest business block of the 1920s.
In contrast to Fremont, Wedgwood is a neighborhood which slept quietly until well after the year 1900, with no roads, railroads or other through-routes such as canals. Property records show ownership of land in what is now Wedgwood, but with no one in residence except for a period of homestead claims in the 1870s.
The Wedgwood neighborhood really began to grow in 1923-1926 when water and electric utilities became available. The biggest growth period in Wedgwood and the formation of the neighborhood identity finally came in 1945-1960 with the post-World-War-Two housing boom in north Seattle.
Approval celebration, part of the property acquisition process, on March 17, 1974. Mayor Charles Royer at center, City Councilwoman Jeanette Williams at right. Photo courtesy of the Seattle Municipal Archives #170708.
One of Wedgwood’s proudest claims-to-fame is as the birthplace of the Burke-Gilman Trail which officially opened on August 19, 1978.
This wonderful urban amenity links northeast Seattle neighborhoods with nature. As a transportation resource the Trail helps to reduce car traffic by making it possible for people to walk or bike to work. On the level of health and enjoyment of the outdoors, the availability of a walking trail in a beautiful natural setting is one of the treasures of northeast Seattle.
The creation of the Burke-Gilman Trail was spearheaded by a group of Wedgwood neighbors in the 1970s, who worked together and got through the process of steps for the City to acquire the old railroad route. The Trail, which is now for walking and biking, began as a railroad route back in the 1880s when Seattle was desperate for rail transportation of merchandise and raw materials.
Wedgwood in Seattle History 