Before moving to Napa, I hadn't lived in a place that was for the birds. But Napa County is a rich haven for avian life.

On Saturday morning, I drove down to American Canyon, and at the edge of the Southern Crossing saw a great egret on the south shoulder of the road. This did not strike me as a smart spot for an egret, but on my way back home a few hours later I saw it safely on the north shoulder, so things seemed to be working out.

Last weekend the wild shriek of peacocks startled me in the pre-dawn hours as I skulked about on the Napa Valley College campus, cleaning up after Grad Night, the safe and sober party for all graduating teens. After sunrise, a saw a mama peacock and two babies by the NVC administration building, perhaps preparing to sign up for summer school.

NVC and environs offer great bird diversity. Yes, peacocks and chickens have made the central campus home, but the school also borders the Napa River. Walkers along the river trail in adjacent Kennedy Park routinely encounter egrets, majestic great blue herons and waterfowl of all sorts. It is hard to go a few steps along the trail near the Kennedy Park boat ramp without hearing the distinctive croak of red-winged blackbirds flitting about in the brush.

Between Kennedy Park and the college, a pond offers more routine avifauna. Every day, slow-moving ducks and geese lose out to selfish, aggressive seagulls in the race for stale bread tossed out by visiting families.

Just across the highway, birds seemingly free to do what they please choose to live behind a barbed-wire fence at Napa State Hospital. While on a tour of the facility a few years ago I was startled to see what looked like an Egret Tree, with white mounds of feathers resting seemingly on every branch of stately trees within the high-security zone of the hospital.

Upvalley, just south of Whitehall Lane, I recently noticed a row of three tall pines that line a private drive. As I inched north in heavy Highway 29 traffic, I watched a raptor settle at the very top of the tallest pine. From there, he or she had a view of the valley that would be the envy of any balloonist -- without having to risk a bumpy landing later in Alston Park or on a Browns Valley cul de sac.

I couldn't distinguish what species it was, but "Birds of Napa County," an excellent guide written by Hermann Heinzel and published last year, notes that eagles have a habit of hanging out among the pines.

Leafing through the book I saw drawings and descriptions of many familiar creatures, including the turkey vultures that eye me hopefully as I jog along Thompson Avenue, the grebes that bob in Lake Hennessey and the culprit that has been keeping Register columnist George Carl up at night -- the Northern Mockingbird, whose name is just as descriptive in Latin: Mimus polyglottos.