Vultures? Or? Unusual ‘flyover’ in the West Seattle sky

A strange afternoon in the sky over West Seattle. First we were checking out reports of low-flying – or, at least, loud – aircraft; never did solve that mystery. Then (likely not related, but who knows?) came several reports of an unusual flock of large birds, reported in the 4 and 5 pm hours. Two reports came with photos – above, John sent a very-high-resolution picture (see the original by clicking the much-cropped version we show above); and this one, from Bill, who grabbed his camera fast and is pretty sure they’re vultures:

We asked Bill why he believes they’re vultures; his reply:

I’ve seen them as far north as Lopez Island. Don’t know what they’re doing around here this time of year. I used to see them regularly when I lived in Oregon’s Willamette Valley. That’s all I can think that they could have been. Any birds of prey don’t congregate like this as far as I know. I wish I could have been able to have taken more definitive pictures, but they were just too far away. A friend of mine living down on Beach Drive sent me an email; he saw them as well and also referred to them as vultures.

Visitor October 9, 2011 (6:38 pm)

Turkey Vultures congregate during migration. Kettles such as this are taking advantage of updrafts to make the flight south to California and Mexico using less energy

smokeycretin9 October 9, 2011 (6:38 pm)

Oh no! It’s a sign!

WSB October 9, 2011 (7:22 pm)

You guys are awesome. Never mind the bird ID… somehow I did not previously know that “circling flock in air” was called a kettle. Learn something new every day. Thanks for the responses, thus far and yet to come … TR
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P.S. to Smokey – You laugh. That’s the way my mind works. Have read way too many apocalyptic sci-fi novels.

Margaret Barrie October 9, 2011 (6:48 pm)

We live one block south of Camp Long and we saw the birds too. The birds looked like eagles, soaring up in a spiral formation for gliding really long distances. My son thinks that they could be condors. We saw a lot of eagles on our rail trip to Canada just north of Everett. These were eagles coming south from the north heading west towards Vashon Island or the Pacific ocean. There were as many as 70 birds over our ridge around 4:30 pm October 9, 2011.

clark5080 October 9, 2011 (6:49 pm)

Turkey Vultures

mrsB October 9, 2011 (6:54 pm)

I don’t think they’re turkey vultures (most common kind) because they don’t exhibit the usual vee-shaped wing formation. TVs are extremely distinctive and hard to misidentify.

westseattledood October 9, 2011 (6:58 pm)

I am gonna’ guess turkey vultures. They have unique soaring behavior. They migrate to So. America. Don’t know if ornithologists are still researching them, but about ten plus years ago there was a Turkey Vulture Migration Project which established migrations.

WestSide45 October 9, 2011 (7:47 pm)

This was a mixed flock of Turkey Vultures and buteos, probably Red-Tailed Hawks. I saw them from the golf course and followed them for about a half mile, until they were out of sight. Most of the birds were vultures.

westseattledood October 9, 2011 (7:51 pm)

well since WSB loves the guessing so much :), here’s more turkey vulture tidbits.

The last half of October is when huge numbers move through on their way south — but the REALLY BIG numbers (kettles) use a southbound route that goes over the Olympic Peninsula. This was a pretty small group in comparison.

Also, people, myself included, can confuse TV with Golden Eagles and Condors. But Condors rarely, if EVER, are sighted around here as far as I know. Maybe one hundred years ago in OR, but not here so much and very unlikely with that many birds. It’d be rare to sight a single condor even in Oregon. Golden Eagles are dark and look similar -until you see their movement in flight – it can be confusing at a distance.

They have really unusual, distinctive behaviors as well as having a great sense of smell for a bird – as one could imagine…though one might not want to get too vivid of a mental image. Know mean? ;)

Julie October 9, 2011 (8:04 pm)

Hmm. I always heard a group of birds circling called a “gaggle”. Is that just a soaring pilot’s term, or does it refer only to groups of birds thermaling, and these were circling, but not thermaling?

Dan October 9, 2011 (8:08 pm)

Thanks for the keen (eagle?) eyes, WSB readers! We saw them from Morgan Junction after 4 – it was quite a sight!

JanS October 9, 2011 (8:09 pm)

Westside45…a new word for me besides “kettle”…”buteo”..never heard that before…live and learn, huh…

metrognome October 9, 2011 (8:13 pm)

actually, they’ve heard about the viaduct closure and they are getting ready to feast on the carcasses of drivers who enter the void, never to return … or it has something to do with the filming of ‘The Hobbit’ in New Zealand and their GPS is out of whack.

John Hinkey October 9, 2011 (8:16 pm)

I’m the one that submitted the picture (though they named my wife, Karen, as the submitter. Some of the birds looks much larger than others – like an eagle, but w/o the white head of the larger birds.
They were in a tight spiral for a few minute over towards Harbor Island, then came over our house until they all decided to make a long-ish line heading South.

Turkey Vultures eh? This is the first time I’ve seen this in my 21 years in Seattle. Kind of exciting.

WSB October 9, 2011 (8:17 pm)

Sorry, John, will fix. E-mail address had both names on it and I obviously pulled the wrong one! – TR

smokeycretin9 October 9, 2011 (8:19 pm)

I get freaked out by the flock of crows that heads East every monday evening just before sunset.

Something is very disturbing to me about some birds and their behavior.

pigeonmom October 9, 2011 (8:23 pm)

My dog doesn’t smell THAT bad!
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or does he? ;-)

Neva October 9, 2011 (8:43 pm)

Could this not just mean that there is something big and dead and the vultures are hungry cause that is what they do? just sayin…

WestSide45 October 9, 2011 (8:59 pm)

After circling above the golf course the kettle split up with one part of the group heading south rapidly and another chunk of it following a couple blocks behind. I counted 50+ birds in total. I saw no eagles, either Bald or Golden, in the group. This would be a good time of year to try and pick out a Broad-winged Hawk or a rare accipiter (Northern Goshawk) but they got away. Alas . . .

Eddie October 9, 2011 (9:07 pm)

I heard the other (military jet??) flyover and when it seemed to stop very abruptly and then start up again, I rushed outside to see what it was. I wasn’t the only neighbor doing that.

I checked “The Blog” repeatedly because I knew it would know. Maybe not right away, but the answer will come forward!

Owlish October 9, 2011 (9:32 pm)

Why would birds and their behavior disturb anyone? They are fascinating!

Turkey vultures, quite clear from the second photo.

LyndaB October 9, 2011 (9:34 pm)

Man, I would have loved to have seen this!

I’m going to call my peeps my “kettle”. Lol.

Rick October 9, 2011 (9:35 pm)

Aaah, my ex and her relatives have returned. Caww caww pick the carcass, caww caww

smokeycretin9 October 9, 2011 (9:48 pm)

“only one CARRION?” said the buzzard at the airline gate. :)

Kevin Wooley October 9, 2011 (10:04 pm)

I’m pretty sure they are eagles. Saw similar group last weekend while over along hood canal on the Olympic Peninsula.

nmb October 9, 2011 (10:14 pm)

I saw them above I-5 down near Federal Way around 1:00pm. My first thought was “something big just died”.

metrognome October 9, 2011 (10:54 pm)

smokeycretin9 — you *should* be worried; a flock of crows is called a ‘murder’.

Jordan October 9, 2011 (11:46 pm)

We saw these at the Renton Landing around 1 and they hovered over Boeing for about 25 minutes before a low flying plane flew through them and they moved on.

Cc October 9, 2011 (11:47 pm)

I didn’t find an answer to the jets. Anyone know why so many flew over? Some were military for sure. I ave also been checking the blog for answers.

WSB October 10, 2011 (12:40 am)

Aviation answers aren’t easy to find. Sometimes we never find out. If I find out anything tomorrow, I’ll certainly post it, and if anybody out there knows, would love to hear it, but I’m not terribly hopeful by this point. – TR

Noelle October 10, 2011 (12:09 am)

I heard the crazy jet type noise too. I thought it might be a military fly by or something. Sad to say, I missed seeing the birds. Hmmm a lot going on in our little old West Seattle!

JanS October 10, 2011 (12:09 am)

saw something like this up in Sedro Wooley about a week and a half ago..we assumed it was young eagles getting ready to fly to warmer climes…

westseattledood October 10, 2011 (1:36 am)

Some Alaskan golden eagle do migrate, along with other similar eagles and hawks. Having only these very distant shots to guess with, I see tiny heads on big birds-that’s a marker for vultures. Eagles’ heads are proportional to body, TV’s are not. But folks could be seeing other eagles and hawks or kettles of vultures in other locations. It’s October and there are lots of flocks of migrating birds moving around.

long camper October 10, 2011 (3:53 am)

It’s a sign west Seattle is doomed when they tear down the viaduct.

Scandinavian October 10, 2011 (7:00 am)

I heard and saw the “noisy” jet from atop Genesee Hill. It was a white military type fighter aircraft.

Bryan C. October 10, 2011 (9:04 am)

Deffinately Turkey Vultures. The behavior you are seeing is how the birds gain altitude. It is called catching a thermal. A thermal is a hot air pocket. The heated air as you all know rises and the soaring birds like vultures, eagles and Buetos(buzzard hawks/buzzards)need them to gain altitude. When they get up where they want, off they go in search for food. In colder weather when thermals are less frequent it is not at all uncommon to see many birds in one. As birds are intelligent enough to see others rising on a thermal it will attract them over so they can catch an “elevator ride” up. It is not uncommon to see more than one species at any give time as well.

svenskiseattle October 10, 2011 (11:32 am)

I saw a few stragglers yesterday that looked like eagles but recall seeing a large group of what I assumed at the time were vultures flying right above Admiral Way SW last year. Great to have some confirmation that vultures actually can come by the city.

Mitch October 10, 2011 (12:13 pm)

I live atop the Duwamish Greenbelt, a little north of Boeing Field, and see military jets fly in and out all the time, my guess is for maintenance. I’ve even seen a couple of Stealth fighters, one only a couple of months ago. They’re actually fairly quiet and the ones I’ve seen were flying at treetop as they headed out low over Eliot Bay. The traditional fighter jets, of which I’ve seen many, usually show up on weekends, usually Saturdays, and swoop almost straight down from out of nowhere, at around Harbor Island, and glide low and fast into Boeing Field. And they’re extremely loud when they land, although not so much when they leave.

I had my binoculars nearby when the white jet flew by on Saturday and have never seen one quite like it. My guess is that it was a private Soviet Era fighter jet – it looked like kind of a beater – which may explain the noise.

As a side note: I’ve lived in several other WS neighborhoods and have always heard really loud jet engine noises coming from Boeing Field at night, and I realize now it’s the same noise the fighter jets make on Saturday mornings. So I’ve concluded that there’s probably far more military aircraft activity in the area than we’re aware of.

Gotta run. There’s some guys in dark suits and sunglasses at the front door and they don’t look like Mormons.

Steph in WS October 10, 2011 (12:17 pm)

I had seen them yesterday around 3pm flying over Louisa Boren park on Capital hill. There were about 6-8 large raptors of some kind. Never had seen that there before. Might be same group if they were traveling south.

JaeRae October 10, 2011 (12:38 pm)

Around 4:30 or 5 yesterday afternoon, I swore I saw a larger bird pick a titmouse off my bird feeder!! No one believed me. Could it be related? I am a mile SW of the Alaska Junction.

ohmygosh October 10, 2011 (2:05 pm)

JaeRae, that was likely a hawk, they hunt at bird feeders.

heather October 10, 2011 (2:43 pm)

damn, I knew I should have put that emergency kit together…

edward October 10, 2011 (9:49 pm)

saw one fly over today while working on a roof in windermere, at first I thought it was a young eagle, but it was not mottled, it was sleek, black and grey, flew over a few crows (they split fast)and the ‘vulture’ merged with 10-15 others to catch updrafts on lake washington

Sorry, comment time is over.