Hello Tweeters,

Today at 4AM Vicki Biltz and I ventuered down to Yaquina Head in
Newport,Oregon for finding the Blue-footed Booby.We was not so sure after
reading all the messages and a boat trip was offered at 12PM yesterday to
look for this bird.We found out today that no one on the boat saw this
bird,and the booby was always flying to the south where he was out of sight.
Also the bird was sitting on the outside tall rock where he stayed for som
time.I was reading all the messages from OBOL yesterday,even sowe made our
mind up to going to find this bird.

We went to the first lighthouse called Yaquina Bay Lighthouse,where we run
in to a nice birder what told us,he watched the booby since 9AM it was now
almost 10AM,so it took ussix hours to get to the spot where the Blue-footed
Booby was.It is hard to believe,but this bird was sitting and preening at
the left side of Colony Rock maybe 100 yards away .It was unbelievable to
get this bird at an instant presented high on the rock I good view. We
stayed there and watched and taking photos from 10AM to 11:30 AM. The whole
time this bird preened and stretching his wings way out(hoping for good
photos at this position)At the end before we left he was sitting down on the
same rock.

Gerald Lilli descibed this bird as a second year bird,and I must agree with
the bird had a white rump,the bill was bluish gray wth the eye blending
in,the feet are also kind of darker blue not as bright blue as an adult
..Noticed the top of the head was brown with a white on the forhead had a
smal stripe.It is not an adult either a juvenile,so it had to be a second
year bird. The booby was sitting all alone the whole time we watched this
bird away from all the cormorants and gulls.
We are both was so exited to watch this bird so close and so long what was
basiclly the longest time it been watched since he arrived since
Saturday,how great can birding get.We made the trip back in fife hours for
some reason on a short cut taking Hwy. 20 than Hwy.34 coming out Exit 228.

Ruth Sullivan
Tacoma