KUOW72%
How Puget Sound birders can see 'The Bird with Flaming Red Feet' for themselves this summer 26%
By Katie Campbell0%
6/8/2026, 4:03:09 PM
BS Summary: This article contains 24 faulty reasoning types, including Attempt to Sell a Product or Service, Appeal to Emotion, and Optimism Bias, with Anecdotal as the most egregious example at 18.3% saturation with 286 hits. Analysis detected 1,971 faulty-reasoning hits from 1,561 analyzed words, generating a BS Score of 38.1% and a BS Rank of 26% (15,245 of 20,473 articles). This article is better (less manipulative) than 74.50% of the article peer group.
The KUOW Book Club is reading Maria Mudd Ruth's "The Bird with Flaming Red Feet: Seasons with an Uncommonly Common Seabird."
Rather than sharing our interview with the author at the end of the month, as we typically do, we're releasing it now.
That's because the titular bird, the pigeon guillemot, will be nesting close to the shores throughout the summer.
Listen to the interview or read on for tips on how to see them.
Subscribe to the KUOW Book Club newsletter here
Summer means a few things to me: gardening in my p-patch, swimming after a bike ride, and, above all, reading outside.
Soft grass or sand at my back, sun warming me, birdsong all around.
Heaven.
This month's book club pick is perfect for a sunny day by the water, as long as you don't keep your nose buried in the pages for too long.
You might just miss the star bird if you're not paying attention.
Pigeon guillemots show off their flaming red feet, legs, and mouth linings during courtship displays.
"[The pigeon guillemot is] a bird that's hidden in plain sight, and I lived in Puget Sound for 25 years and never saw this bird," author Maria Mudd Ruth said.
"Or maybe I did and didn't know what I was looking at, never gave it a thought.
Then, once I started watching them, I realized they are fascinating, entertaining, playful, social, communicative, right near the shore, easy to see, easy to identify."
That sounds like a recipe for being wildly popular, or at least widely known, around Puget Sound and all along the Pacific Coast.
Yet Ruth and other birders knew nothing about them.
"I think people are focused on more rare and offshore birds, generally speaking," Ruth guessed.
"They're almost kind of like pigeons, common, and you overlook them.
They're abundant or they're just far enough offshore that you're not really watching them.
There is another bird in this family of seabirds that people are very familiar with: the iconic puffin."
As a puffin fan (I happen to have a little wool puffin at my desk), I can imagine it would be unfair to be in the same family.
After all, it's easier to spot the bird with a flaming red beak than the bird with flaming red feet, especially when those feet are often underwater.
WA's famous (fictional) octopus hits Netflix with 'Remarkably Bright Creatures' movie
Ruth has had plenty of time to notice those feet, though.
In 2013, she joined a community science program that began a decade earlier, when environmentalists Frances Wood and Phyllis Kind established the Pigeon Guillemot Breeding Survey on Whidbey Island.
Volunteers flocked to help them learn about the pigeon guillemot, and soon, the program had expanded into the Salish Sea Guillemot Network, which now has about 250 volunteers keeping tabs on the birds.
And that's important because the pigeon guillemot's health is indicative of the environment around it.
Washington state declared it an indicator species in 2014 as part of an effort to monitor the health of the Puget Sound ecosystem.
"Scientists are studying the birds at sea, essentially doing a population count.
But if the population drops, they might not know why," Ruth said.
"So, we're collecting that data to say, 'Hey, our observations are telling us these birds are doing well in the nest.
They are mating.
They are getting enough food.
[If the population is dropping at sea] maybe we have too many bald eagles, or maybe we've got a lot of beach walkers.'
How can we maybe modify those behaviors to help the guillemot survive?"
Ruth and her fellow volunteers will be watching over their charismatic friends this summer, and birders across Puget Sound can join them.
Here's how:
Sign up to volunteer.
If birding is your thing, consider formally signing up to volunteer with the Salish Sea Guillemot Network.
"We always welcome new volunteers to the sites to just experience the guillemot and to help with the data, and sometimes our colonies are so busy that we really need extra hands," Ruth said.
"The Bird with Flaming Red Feet" is a great primer on what to expect if you do decide to volunteer.
Ruth documents the chaotic fun of trying to keep track of a flock of guillemots as they seem to play just offshore.
"I know we're not supposed to anthropomorphize, but this bird seems like it's having fun," she said.
"It seems joyful.
It seems really happy to be together in a colony and enjoying the sun and the water and the bluffs and the beach."
And really, you don't have to be a capital "B" birder to volunteer.
Ruth, surprisingly, doesn't consider herself a birder, not exactly.
"I like focusing on one bird at a time," she said.
"I just didn't think there was kind of room for someone like me, who was really a very casual birder and somewhat obsessive on one particular bird. ...
I guess I'm a one-bird birder."
'May all women be intemperate.'
Seattle author Sonora Jha's new novel is for anyone who wants to live big
Head to Bainbridge Island.
Pigeon guillemots participate in colony-wide water games which mix courtship and competition.
If you want as close to a guaranteed guillemot sighting as you can get, Ruth said hop on the ferry to Bainbridge Island.
"These birds love to nest in and hang around ferry terminals, in the infrastructure there," she said.
"They're kind of urban that way.
They don't need pristine, far offshore habitats like a lot of other seabirds."
Bainbridge might be the easiest place to find them, but they're all over Puget Sound this time of year.
While they spend much of their time at sea, they're mating, nesting, and hatching their young near the shores this time of year.
In addition to Bainbridge, Ruth said you can find them at the Ballard Locks, Alki Beach, Shilshole Bay Marina, and Olympic Sculpture Park.
Just be sure to give them space.
Ruth said they seem to tolerate humans well enough, much like the pigeon they share a name with, but disturbing them onshore could interfere with their nesting.
"[If you're on foot] just sit down and watch, and don't walk through the colony on the beach," she said.
"If you're kayaking, we think kayaks are quiet and just moves right through, but you can really disturb the birds that way.
And if they flush off the beach, move away, you've disturbed a really important behavior."
"This is not their territory," she added.
"They're only on land during the summer very briefly, so while they're incubating their eggs and while they're feeding their chicks."
Sasha LaPointe: The 'reservation riot grrrl' who's learning to be a 'language warrior'
Look to the waves, the skies, the bluffs.
Now that you know they're out there, you might just spot a pigeon guillemot without trying very hard.
The early morning at high tide is best, Ruth said, but they're around throughout the day.
High tides increase your chances of spotting them, as they reduce beach exposure and bring the birds closer to their nests without having to leave the safety of the water for long.
Carry your copy of "The Bird with Flaming Red Feet" to interpret any trills or calls you hear.
The book is beautifully illustrated with calligraphic interpretations of their many vocalizations and their corresponding postures.
They might alert you to other critters in the area, like eagles.
Ruth and her fellow volunteers keep a "what elses" list, documenting all the life around them in addition to the pigeon guillemot.
Over three months, our "what elses" have included two young deer high-stepping through the shallow water as they walked down the beach.
A flock of Common Murres flying down the inlet.
Western Flycatchers feeding insects to the juvenile Brown-headed Cowbird they were (unwittingly) raising.
A family of Red-breasted Mergansers and a lone Double-crested Cormorant catching fish.
Lion's mane jellyfish and sea stars stranded on the beach.
Jumping salmon and squirting clams.
An American Robin showing its offspring how to hunt the tiny sand fleas jumping all over the beach.
Scuttling inch-wide yellow shore crabs you could easily miss, even on the slowest of beach walks.
We've seen Belted Kingfishers patrolling the beach, American White Pelicans resting on the far shore, as well as river otters, harbor seals, sea lions, white-sided dolphins, and a pod of orcas swimming close to shore.
These wildlife observations aren't part of the official guillemot survey, but it seems disrespectful to leave the beach without acknowledging the presence of these other precious lives.
THE BIRD WITH FLAMING RED FEET, PAGE 27
The experience of volunteering with the survey has made Ruth more observant, of the guillemot and so much more.
"Yes, you are looking for pigeon guillemots, and you are watching carefully, you are collecting data.
But you can't help but see all these other things sort of in the periphery," she said.
"Everything starts moving, and you realize how dynamic and energized and alive everything is.
It's the air, it's the water, it's the sand, the tiniest things."
Listen to more from Maria Mudd Ruth on KUOW's "Meet Me Here" by hitting play above or by subscribing to the show wherever you get your podcasts.
Speakers
4speakers43%attributed speech891writer words
Voice mapSelect a segment to jump to its words
Selected voice
72%flagged-word coverageMaria Mudd Ruth
591 attributed words88% of attributed speech73% writer coverage
Attribution is sentence-level. Pattern percentages are calculated only from words assigned to that voice.
Loading…
Loading…
Loading…
Loading…
Analysis
Hover over highlighted words in the article to view the associated bias or fallacy analysis.