Subject: Iona Is. Settling Ponds & Jetty, 6/30/96
Date: Jun 30 23:33:54 1996
From: Michael Price - mprice at mindlink.bc.ca


Hi Tweeters & OBOL:

Conditions: 1.15 PM--8.45 PM PDT; temp 24 C, humid; wind variable: calm,
to NW 20 km/hr to SW 30-35 and calm again by evening; high overcast in
advance of incoming weak Pacific Low; visibility unlimited with that
unusual clarity that sometimes accompanies a slow-moving warm front
preceding rain, effective horizon 15-20 km; tide: very low, flood to very
high by late aft.; sea state: NW light chop to SW moderate chop.

Highlights:

The Olympic Mtns. visible at sunset with a clarity I've never seen, a
distant glowing wall of snow and rock across the southern horizon.

>From an average of 40-70 a day for the last several weeks, the Caspian Tern
population shot up to *289*, all but 25 standing on the sand megaripples
exposed at the far end of the Iona South Jetty at low tides. One was
standing on another's back...nothing x-rated, just standing there; passes
the time if you're a tern, I guess.

What's left to say about Peregrines? One scruffy first-year bird (small, so
I'm assuming male) pitching at swallows to work off its irritation after I
disturbed it from its lamp-post perch on the Arthur Laing Bridge cycling
by. An immaculate adult (pretty big, no buff/cinammon wash on underparts,
so I'm guessing a Peale's Peregrine from one of the Gulf Islands eyries)
that blasted every Calidris sandpiper out of the NE settling pond at the
Iona Treatment Plant in two frighteningly playful visits. A long slanting
stoop caused an explosion of gulls a couple of kilometers away.

Western Sandpipers beginning to pour in: 500 or better in the NE settling
pond on this high tide, with 219 roosting at low tide on the rocks below
the observation platform at the extreme end of the jetty. Both groups
included about 60% Definitive Alternate-plumaged birds.
The arrival Lesser and Greater Yellowlegs there last Sunday have moved on.
Turnover for southbound migrant Westerns and Least is five days, average;
might be same for yellowlegs.

It's late--just gonna hit high points.

Settling Ponds

Also present: Vic Smith, Karen Irving, Tom & Meg Brown, Hilary Maguire,
Danny Tyson.

Western Sandpiper 500+
Semipalmated Sandpiper 2
Least Sandpiper 4
Greater Yellowlegs 1
Killdeer 20 2 chicks
Spotted Sandpiper 6 3 pr. Northern Shoveler 3 2m, 1f
with 5y
Peregrine Falcon 1 ad
Belted Kingfisher 1
Vaux's Swift 1


End, Iona South Jetty

Common Loon 1
Double-cr. Cormorant 58
Corm sp. 19
Great Blue Heron 33
Mallard 2 pr.
Gadwall 21
Greater Scaup 21 17m 4f
Black Scoter 1 f
Surf Scoter 18
White-winged Scoter 27
Scoter sp. 28
Bald Eagle 1 ad
Western Sandpiper 219
Ring-billed Gull 4
California Gull 89
Glaucous-winged Gull 19
Gull sp. 14
Caspian Tern *289*
Northwestern Crow 1
European Starling 3 jv

That's it. Cheers.

Michael Price The only alien planet is Earth.
Vancouver BC Canada
mprice at mindlink.net - J. G. Ballard