Bald Eagles are close to a sure thing along the tideflats at East Gardiner. Look for a white head against the dark treeline, or a heavy brown shape standing out on the mud at low tide. Adults need five years to grow the white head and tail, so the mottled brown birds are young ones, not another species.

Our most reliable big wader - a tall blue-gray bird standing motionless at the water's edge, often on an old piling. Patience is the entire hunting strategy. Wait long enough and you'll see the strike.

A tall, all-white wader with a yellow bill and black legs. Less predictable than the herons, so scan the flats and river edges rather than staking out one spot. The lacy plumes along its back are breeding feathers - the same feathers that made egrets a target for the hat trade and helped start the conservation movement.

You'll usually hear the dry rattle before you spot the bird. Watch for a big-headed blue-gray shape on a branch over the water, hovering and then diving headfirst after small fish. Unusually among birds, the female is the more colorful one - she wears a rusty belly band the male lacks.

A slim gray shorebird on bright yellow legs, picking through the shallows. Noisy, with a ringing three-note call when flushed. Numbers peak during spring and fall migration, when small groups gather and squabble on the flats.

Sooty black seabirds with bold white wing patches and brilliant red feet, usually loafing in groups on pilings around the harbor. They nest in rock crevices and in dock and bridge structures, which makes this a seabird you can watch from shore. In winter they molt pale and mottled and look like a different bird entirely.

A small diving waterbird that winters on the bay. For most of that stretch it's plain gray and white. Catch one in late March or April as it molts into breeding plumage - golden ear tufts, red eye, rust-colored neck - and it's one of the most striking birds on the coast.

Unmistakable: huge and prehistoric-looking, cruising in single file just above the waves. They move north to the Oregon coast after nesting farther south, so late summer and fall are the best months. Nearly wiped out by DDT last century, they're a genuine conservation success story.

A tiny copper-orange hummingbird whose throat flashes molten gold when the light catches it. Males arrive as early as late February, well ahead of the females, and will defend a feeder against birds many times their size.

Lemon-yellow with a flame-orange face and black wings - the most tropical-looking bird you'll find in an Oregon backyard. The bright ones are males; females are a soft yellow-green. Look high, in the treetops.

A tiny, restless, brilliant yellow warbler, the male capped in neat black. Two short windows rather than one long season - it passes through in spring, then again heading south in late summer, and doesn't stay to nest.

Every photograph in this guide was taken here by Rebecca Bartow, a Reedsport native, wildlife photographer and avian enthusiast. Her work can be seen and purchased at Mindpower Gallery in Old Town Reedsport and at the Umpqua River Lighthouse Museum & Gift Shop.