When I opened the Merlin app yesterday morning, the Black-billed Magpie was depicted as “Your Bird of the Day.” The Black-billed Magpie is a bird that is common in Montana but not in the Central Valley of California where the Yellow-billed Magpie is what people call Magpies. I started out the morning at Moose’s Ranch where we shot Black-billed Magpies from Moose’s hide. Then, in the afternoon, we drove to the nearby Lee Metcalf National Wildlife Refuge that was set aside as a refuge for the protection of migratory birds in 1964. There, we encountered this Black-billed Magpie shortly after we arrived yesterday afternoon. I’m not sure what it was eating but the Magpie seemed to enjoy it.