Tweets,

A few shorebirds were hanging around at Ocean Shores yesterday.
In general, diversity and abundance seemed kind of low for late
April (an exception to this was a roost of 300+ Marbled Godwits).
Here is a breakdown of shorebirds and other migrants by locality
(numbers are minimum estimates):

Oyhut Game Range. Oyhut Spit remains connected to the mainland on
its eastern end.

44 Greater White-fronted Geese
70 Brant
5 Black Turnstones (4 in alternate plumage)
3 Sanderlings
20 Dowitchers (all individuals we identified were Short-billed)
24 Caspian Terns
100 Western Sandpipers
50 Dunlin (2/3 or more in alt plumage)
20 Whimbrels

Mariner Court Mudflats.

50 Marbled Godwits
25 Whimbrels
40 Dowitchers

Catala Spit.

6 Black-bellied Plovers (2 in alt plumage)
30 Dunlin
200 Western Sandpipers
10 Dowitchers
2 Killdeer

Bill's Spit. High tide. These numbers probably include some of
the birds seen at Mariner Ct. a few hours earlier.

300 Marbled Godwits (seems like a good showing for spring)
25 Whimbrels
20 Dowitchers
1 Long-billed Curlew (a very pale individual)

------

We stopped at Bowerman basin on the way home (about 1 hour past high
tide). A few small flocks of peeps and Dunlin were in the air, but
that was it. We ran into a couple of NWR personnel who said that
earlier there had been about 400 Western Sandpipers, some Dunlin, a
few Semipalmated Plovers, a yellowlegs, and 4 white-fronts.

David Wright
Seattle, WA
dwright at u.washington.edu