Thursday, February 14, 2013

Fourth Post 2.14.13

Dungeness Bay & Dungeness Landing ~2pm
  • Lincoln sparo [x4].
  • Savannah sparo [x2].
  • Myrtle [Yellow rumped] warbler [x3].
  • Audubon's [Yellow rumped] warbler [x4].
  • King & Queen fishers [x5].
  • Merlin [x1]; this was a very light plumed bird [Prairie?]; it came in low from the E across the tideflats, made a darting but not serious pass at a horde of Dunlin, then flew on W out of sight over Cline's Spit.
  • Peale's peregrine [x1] sat in a snag off the W end of the mouth at Dungeness River.
  • Beagles / 11 adults and 16 juvys were in the area; there was a lot of interaction between adults and younger birds; several times these interactions got physical with adults pummeling a juvy.
  • Red tailed hawk [x4] / a lot of talking between what appeared to be pairs.
  • Harrier / 6 females, 2 males working the area from back along the river, across the tide flats, and out over Graveyard Spit.
  • Great blue heron [x13] / several birds working the tide flats, but the rest were on the S face of Graveyard Spit resting, preening, and doing the heron stand.
  • Waterbirds were the usual kind: however there was a pair of Black scoter off Cline's Islet - this was the only unusual waterbird sighting.
  • Ring billed gull [x1] wandering the tideflats looking for edible tidbits W in the cove at Cline's Spit along with Mew gulls.
  • Oddly, there were no loons on the bay.
  • Except for a few Horned, grebes were also absent.
  • Shorebirds were of the Black bellied plover, Dunlin, and Sanderling kind; nothing else.
At dusk in the marshes SE of 3 Crabs
  • T'was a four owl dusk: the 3 Crab's Snowy was perched on roof peak of the little cabin at end of Pettitt lane; Barns [x2] were hunting grass fields; a Short ear was working the same area as the Barns but at a higher elevation; and a Great horned was talking GHO talk back in the woods along the river.
  • 117 Trumpeter and 5 Tundra swans came in from the W to Les Jones' marsh for their overnight gathering.
  • Brant! This was odd. Nine geese flew E to W over the marsh, then turned NW over Abernathy road flying out towards the mouth of Dungeness river; they were very noisy. Why odd? Cuz Brant are rare away from their home on the water where they fly low and stay off shore. 
  • Virginia rail [x1] talking kadicka kadick. . .  sounding like two rocks with cracks clack-scraping  together. 
  • Flicker hybrid / this bird showed a red malar and a thin red bandanna nape.