Dear Tweeters,

On Sunday, I enjoyed a brief (4:30 to 7:00 P.M.) but productive
birding trip to Boundary Bay, B.C. I visited the foot of 96th Street
in Delta first, followed by a visit to foot of 112th Street.
Unfortunately, the tide was already falling when I arrived at the
foot of 96th; the high tide (13.5 feet) was at 3:15 P.M. However, it
did not fall very far, as the low tide was a high 10.8 feet (at 9:05
P.M.).
"The mansion", as it has been regularly called on the Vancouver
RBA tape, is a large house just inside the Boundary Bay dyke, about
500 metres west of the foot of 96th Street. It has always been one of
the best birding spots on Boundary Bay, in part because a pumping
station dumps water from East Delta ditches onto the mudflats, so
there is always some water next to shore, even at low tide.
This is traditionally one of the best localities around Vancouver
to find Stilt Sandpiper. Sure enough, after a brief search, I found
two STILT SANDPIPERS feeding in the mud and shallow water next to "the
mansion", among a flock of about 30 LONG-BILLED and 7 SHORT-BILLED
DOWITCHERS. The Stilts were about 30 metres away when I first spotted
them, but later they flew and fed within 5 metres of the dyke,
offering "crippling views" of this rare fall migrant.
Other shorebirds at "the mansion" included about 20 LESSER
YELLOWLEGS, one GREATER YELLOWLEGS, 25 LEAST SANDPIPERS, and a lone
KILLDEER. As usual, most of the hundreds of gulls present were
RING-BILLED GULLS. There was no sign of the Pectoral Sandpipers and
Sharp-tailed Sandpiper which had been reported in the previous couple
of days; if present, they were presumably feeding at the edge of the
salt water, about 300 metres away.
I then drove around to the foot of 112th Street, where a different
assortment of birds was present, The mudflats are much narrower at
112th than at 96th, even at low tide, and it is much easier there to
identify waterbirds out on the bay. Small numbers of COMMON LOONS,
RED-NECKED GREBES, HORNED GREBES and DOUBLE-CRESTED CORMORANTS were
scattered over the waters of Mud Bay. A flock of about 400
BLACK-BELLIED PLOVERS feeding on the mudflats took off, circled about
for a couple of minutes, and landed a few hundred metres farther west.
Other shorebirds here included about 10 KILLDEER and 15 LEAST
SANDPIPERS.
There were quite a few BARN SWALLOWS in this area, and the number
gradually swelled to about 60 before I left. Although this is a good
time and place to find Bank Swallows, I could not pick one out among
the swallow flocks. At one point, a loose flock of about 30 AMERICAN
PIPITS flew in a westerly direction along the shore.
The highlight for me was a GREEN HERON which I flushed from the
base of the 112th Street pumping station, and which landed on the
shore nearby, It proceeded to stalk, catch, and swallow a rather large
fish, although it took about 5 minutes of battering and readjusting
its grip on the fish before the heron managed to gulp it down. Somehow
I had managed to miss Green Heron in all my previous birding this
year, so this was a new species for my "year list" (along with the
Stilt Sandpipers). The evening light highlighted the bright colour and
intricate feather patterns of the heron, and I watched it for at least
15 minutes before finally heading homeward.

That's all for now!

Wayne C. Weber
Kamloops, B.C.
wayne_weber at bc.sympatico.ca