Tweets,

Mary Ellen Ahearn & I came upon an adult Bar-tailed Godwit late today
(Sat 5 Aug) at the Ocean Shores Game Range. It was hanging out with ca
100 dowitchers and about a dozen whimbrel. The bird is a very vivid
pumpkin-orange on the underparts (from high on the neck to the very tip
of the undertail coverts), and a much more sober brown above. White
blotches crop out here and there in the dark orange underparts.
There is absolutely no hint of barring in the underparts. Most of
the upperparts are very plain. The tertials are dark brown/gray with
fainter, lighter edges, but no *hint* of any interior markings. Some, but
not all, of the scapulars and lesser coverts are very dark, with very pale
tan *dotted* edges. These feathers seemed a bit darker/less gray than the
tertials, median coverts, and lesser coverts. The primaries are deep
black and contrasted with the browner/grayer tertials. The tail is
barred black-and-white (seen when the bird moved his wings while
standing, and in flight). The bill has the standard upcurved godwit
shape, but even when it first came into view it seemed "too short." It
was roughly twice as long as the head, and the proximal 1/3 to 1/2 of the
bill is light in color (pinkish brown). The dorsal side of the neck is dark
and heavily streaked; this streaking continues ventrally in the
"shoulder" region as a sort of "shawl" that does *not* extend onto the
ventral side of the neck (which, again, is bright orange). There is an
dark eyeline separated by a light tan supercilium from a "cap" that is
an extension of the dorsal neck color/pattern. The sides of the face are
the same light tan, grading into the vivid pumpkin-orange of the underparts.
The bird is distinctly smaller, both in height and bulk, than the whimbrels
it was standing next to. At least some of the accompanying whimbrels were
adult (did not check them all). We observed the bird for at least 45
minutes.

The bird was on the "game range," north of the sand spit, on the N edge
of the tidal lagoon, about midway along the sand spit. We found it ca 6
pm, about 2 hrs before high tide.

Other shorebirds at Ocean Shores:

200 Short-billed Dowitchers, mostly adults showing at least some sign
of molt in upperparts, but a few juveniles. (mudflats N of Marina)
50+ Semipalmated Plovers, adult & juv
1 Ruddy Turnstone
65 Black-bellied Plovers
Least & Western Sandpipers

Also 2 Brant & 50 Caspian Terns, plus 8 Red-throated Loons in full regalia
very close in and showing off. Lots of Heerman's Gulls.

David Wright
dwright at u.washington.edu