Tweets,
I stopped by the west end of the sewage lagoons at about 9:00 Am I also
saw only one Elegant tern among 55 Caspians. I met Ruth Sullivan at about
3:00 when the terns were roosting on high tide, we counted 85 Elegants and
56 Caspians.
Shorebirding was only average today, Damon Point and the game range
contained most if not all the shorebirds. The pond on Damon Point was very
productive. Totals were 86 Dowitchers w/ about a 3:2 Short-billed to
Long-billed ratio. There were 12 Least Sandpipers, 18 Western Sandpipers,
1 Semipalmated Sandpiper and 7 Greater Yellowlegs. About high tide large
flocks ~200 each flew by about 9 or 10 flocks and they looked like mostly
Westerns.
Again I would say that to get the best look at the Elegant terns go to the
east end of the game range at about high tide.

Scott Downes
sdownes at u.washington.edu
Seattle WA



On Sun, 20 Jul 1997, David Beatty wrote:

> Saw just one Elegant Tern on Sunday among a roosting band of about 50
> Caspian Terns about 4 hours before high tide at a sand spit east of the
> Ocean Shores sewage lagoon in the game range.
>
> But I ran into Ruth Sullivan who said she counted 156 Elegants on Saturday
> in the same place at high tide. So I would suggest that if you are coming to
> see these birds plan accordingly.
> DJ Beatty
>
>