Wednesday Jetty Count for
the South Jetty of the Columbia River, Clatsop Co., OR
21 Aug 1997 0850 to 0950hr

Tide:low
Weather: mostly sunny
Wind calm; Temp 60F


Method: One hour (timed) station count 100m west of "3 rocks" on
top of SJCR using 20x60 Bushnell spotting scope and 8x50 Bushnell
binoculars. Birds were sorted as to flyby, sitting on beach, sitting
on ocean or sitting on river.

flyby beach ocean river total
Common Loon COLO 1 1
Pacific Loon PALO 5 5
RT Loon RTLO 1 1
loon sp. 3 3
Sooty Shearwater SOSH 18 18
Brandt's Cormorant BRCO 56 56
Pelagic Cormorant PECO 26 26
DC Cormorant DCCO 24 18 1 43
Brown Pelican BRPE 32 11 43
Northern Shoveler NSHO 7 7
Surf Scoter SUSC 60 60
White-wing Scoter WWSC 3 3
Black Scoter BLSC 2 2
Parasitic Jaeger PAJA 5 6
POMARINE JAEGER POJA 1 1
West Gull WEGU 30 83 113
GW Gull GWGU 1 1
WxGW Gull WExGW 10 10
Ring-billed Gull RBGU 1 1
California Gull CAGU 10 30 40
Heerman's Gull HEEG 22 15 37
gull sp. 30 30
Caspian Tern CATE 4 19 23
Elegant Tern ELTE 36 6 42
Black Turnstone BLTU 1 1
Sanderling SAND 6 6
Common Murre COMU 1 1
Pigeon Guillemot PIGU 7 7
Rhinocerus Auklet RHAU 2 2
Marbled Murrelet MAMU 1 1
alcid sp. 1 1
Barn Swallow BARS 12 12

Notes:The most impressive news this week is the quantum jump in
ELEGANT TERN numbers. They were actively fishing in the ocean and
river attracting many jaegers. There are at least 6 PARASITIC JAEGERS
in the area 5 of which appeared during the timed count. The 6th, a
intermediate phase adult, was seen about 10min before I started the
clock. Of those that appeared durring the count, 1 was a light phase
adult, 3 were intermediate phase sub-adults and one was a dark phase
juv/sub. The POMARINE JAEGER which was seen at one point being chased
by two Parasitic Jaegers was a light phase immature.

A running account of this and other seawatches is available at:
http://www.pacifier.com/~mpatters/bird/enso/jetty.html


--
********************************* I am but mad north-north-west;
* Mike Patterson, Astoria, OR * when the wind is southerly,
* mpatters at orednet.org * I know a hawk from a handsaw.
http://www.pacifier.com/~mpatters -ws