Hi Tweets

For many years I've looked at the distant North Jetty at Iona Island from
the South Jetty or from the end of Point Grey, and seen the mobs of gulls
and other seabirds at its tip. Very difficult to access, about a 4-5 km slog
through loose sand, then a 1.5-2 km clamber over riprap. Nasty stuff and a
nasty little trek. Bright side of it is that hardly anybody ever goes out to
the tip and so there's *no dogs* to scare off the wildlife. So screw it, I
decided to stop wondering and go out there, see what it was like. Went at
high tide, and hoped the ebbing tide would create a big rip just off the
tip, and attract the big flocks of Bonaparte's Gulls and terns, and who knew
what-all could be riding along with them.

Well, the species list below is a bit of a truncated one. About 300 meters
short of the end, I hit an unexpected slippery patch and took a kamikaze
dive into the rocks and ended up really thrashing my old Velbon tripod (I
left my old pal out there on a high rock after thanking it for the many
years and so many great birds). The old Kowa's okay, I think (and so are the
bins, thank heaven for rubber armor!). Luckily my leg wasn't broken, just
badly bruised. Boy, that was some long scramble back to my bike. They sure
won't be using me as an ankle-sock model anytime soon. Got some good birds
anyway to take my mind off the bite. The following were all out on the Iona
North Jetty itself.

Red-throated Loon 1 jv
Common Loon 29 mostly ads in Pre-Bsc molt
Horned Grebe 24 mostly jvs
Red-necked Grebe 6 5a 1jv
Eared grebe 2 1a Bsc, 1 jv
Western Grebe 83
Aechmophorus Grebe sp 125
Double-cr. Cormorant 18
Great Blue Heron 7 6jv 1a on logbooms
Canada Goose 47 somewhat wary, cld be migrants
Mallard 2 2m
American Wigeon c60
Black Scoter 6 6a m
Surf Scoter c5,-6,000 constant N->S flow
White-winged Scoter 5 5m
Common Merganser 126 1 flock, apprx 75jv, 30+ ecl. m
Red-Br. Merganser 37
Sanderling 16 11jv->Bsc1, 5 Def Bsc molt
Long-billed Dowitcher 2 Bsc
Parasitic Jaeger 4 2a light-morph, 2jv
Bonaparte's Gull c1,200 c900 at jetty tip
Heerman's Gull 1 Bsc 1; unusual in Vcr waters
Mew Gull 45
Ring-billed Gull 35
California Gull 6
Glaucous-w. Gull c30
Gull sp. c300 mostly large gulls
Common Tern 5
Sterna sp. 12
Northern Flicker 1 m hybrid
Northwestern Crow 1
Golden-crowned Kinglet 5 in Scotch broom well out on jetty, migrants
American Pipit 4
Northern Shrike 1 a *beautiful* adult
European Starling 5
Savannah Sparrow 6 on rocks at jetty end
Song Sparrow 5 " " " " "
Lincoln's Sparrow 2
Sparrow sp. 2
Meadowlark sp.* 2
House Finch 5 all jv

*
oh sure, they're virtually certain to be Westerns, but over the years I've
come to have a profound distaste for identification by assumption, and
unless I hear a call note or song (there seems to be precious little ID
literature out there to help separate the meadowlarks; I can't find anything
which gives me enough plumage details to separate --or even age properly--
migrant and wintering meadowlarks here), I don't feel right in calling them.

Like Al Jaramillo, I firmly believe vagrant Eastern Meadowlark is a good
possibility. I think that we'll never know about until we really scrutinise
these migrants instead of invoking the lazy-making 95% Probability rule
(e.g.-- since there's a 95% chance or better that they're Western
Meadowlarks, that's what they are).



Michael Price If asked "What is Man?" a biologist might
Vancouver BC Canada answer, "Well, 99% a Chimpanzee..."
mprice at mindlink.net -The Economist