Subject: Our weekend
Date: Sep 24 06:32:42 2001
From: Constance J. Sidles - csidles at mail.isomedia.com


Hey tweets, Many thanks to all those who responded with my request for a
weekend "best-birding spot." Your suggestions were wonderful and gave us
many destinations besides the one we finally picked. The decider for us was
the possibility of seeing a sharp-tailed sandpiper, so we headed down to
Ocean Shores.

You will never believe this, but we saw no shorebirds at all there. None,
nada, bupkiss, zippo. We did see a few killdeers at Bottle Beach (took a
wrong turn, as we often go to Westport and that's where the car thought we
were going this time too), and a couple of black-bellied plovers. My
husband said our experience reminded him of the time he hiked out to Sand
Point to surf for three days and never got in the water. Not that he didn't
get wet. He got soaked from a howling storm that drove him to huddle at
night under a miniscule overhang. He also got chased by a mama bear with
two cubs, which was memorable but not fun. Of surfing, there was none.

We didn't have to huddle under an overhang, luckily. Instead we found a
delightful hangout at Iron Springs, a resort with lovely cabins overlooking
the ocean. When we opened the windows, we could hear the pounding waves all
night long. Our cabin came equipped with a fireplace (and wood), but we had
to wait until quite late at night to build a fire. It seems the cleaning
staff turned on the thermostats to warm up the place, and we had to cool it
down before the fire made any sense at all. Which wasn't very sensible
either, but it was highly romantic. For dinner, we ate at the Green Lantern
tavern, a locally famous watering hole that had excellent pub food. The
tavern had two lit signs proclaiming its name as either the Green Lanter or
the Geen Lantern. Take your pick.

We did see some pretty fabulous birds, despite our glaring deficit. Off the
Game Range were parked 5-10,000 sooty shearwaters, resting in a flotilla
that stretched as far as the eye could see. I think they must have been
grounded by a lack of wind. When we first saw them, they were close in to
shore. They floated farther out gradually as the tide changed, and then
when the wind picked up, they were gone. We've seen such a large collection
once before, off La Push. It happened when we were beginning birders many
years ago. The flock was so far offshore that we couldn't tell what the
birds were, so naturally we got into a big argument. My husband settled it
by paddling his surfboard right into the flock. He said the din was
tremendous, and birds were skimming right over his head. When he got back
to the beach, he described the birds as "dark seagulls with funny things on
their noses," so then of course we knew they were shearwaters.

We also saw a huge flock of cedar waxwings and several warblers in
migration, including yellow-rumped, yellow, common yellowthroat, and
black-throated gray (looking spanking-white, black, yellow and gray in
almost spring-like plummage). Warblers are my very favorite bird and have
been noticeably thin on the ground at the Fill, so seeing them in good
numbers on our trip was a treat.

If anybody else went out to Ocean Shores this weekend and did see a
sharp-tailed sandpiper, I don't want to hear about it. Please label the
subject in your post with some code word such as Bingo or Neener neener and
I will know to delete it without reading. Thanking you in advance, Connie,
Seattle

csidles at mail.isomedia.com