Hello Tweets,

Today my mother and I enjoyed a great birding day in both Pacific and Grays Harbor Cos. along with good weather and several notable highlights. Our main purpose was to check as many Canada Geese flocks as we could from several locations including the South Bend-Raymond areas,Bay Center and near Tokeland. We encounter relatively good numbers of Canada Geese at many location from areas from the above locations including good numbers of "Dusky","Cackling" and a few other races of Canada Geese. We thoroughly checked and scanned through the geese flocks in hoping to relocate the Bean Goose,which could possibly reoccur,but today we had NO luck. The highest densities of Canada Geese were noted along Hwy.101 west of South Bend between MP 50 and 51, the open fields along S.R.105 east of the Willapa Airport,and also a notable group of Canada Geese along S.R.105 at MP 16 near the Cedar River. Our last notable flock of Canada Geese was noted in the open fields east of Tokeland observed along S.R.105. We were able to locate two notable goose species for the day that included: 5 Greater White-fronted Geese with 4 Snow Geese along Hwy.101 between MP 50 and 51 west of South Bend. Throughout the day we encontered several other highlights to be listed below. Our day began along Wenzel Slough Rd. at 9:15am,where we able to locate 5 SWAMP SPARROWS that were very active,visible, and calling with several nearby Song Sparrows along with he adult White-tailed Kite that contines from this same location. We continued to the South Bend area,then travelled south to Bay Center along ay Center Dike Rd.,where we located a single calling SWAMP SPARROW,but overall this location was rather slow. We travelled back north to the Raymond area,the onto Tokeland at slow outgoing tide,where we located the large flock of large shorebirds at the Tokeland Marina that were actively circling over the area before they finally calmed and anded on two of the wooden docks. Continuing north we checked the beach at the end of Midway Beach Rd. that were littered with scattered groups of shorebirds of 6 species,incuding 20 Snowy Plovers. Near the end of our stay we observed a pair of Peregrine Falcons harassing the shorebirds with an additional Peregrine Falcon that flew off to the south alone. In the late afternoon we briefly checked areas along Ocosta Third Street near Bottle Beach that were very flooded,but 4 Barn Swallows were actively foraging over the area. A list of our additional highlights follows below at selected locations:

Red-throated Loon
1 at Tokeland

Red-necked Grebe
2 at Tokeland

Tundra Swan
3 along Wenzel Slough Rd.

Trumpeter Swan
16 along S.R.105 at MP 16(Cedar River Estuary)

"Black"Brant
120+ off Tokeland at Willapa Bay

White-tailed Kite
6 adults along Hwy.101 between MP 51 and 52(west of South Bend)
1 along Wenzel Slough Rd.

Rough-legged Hawk
1 light-morph bird along Hwy.101 at MP 51

Black-bellied Plover
25 along S.R.105 at the mouth of the North River

Greater Yellowlegs
8 along S.R.105 at MP 16(Cedar River Estuary)

Willet
14 at Tokeland

Whimbrel
2 at Tokeland

Marbled Godwit
450+ at Tokeland

Western Sandpiper
135+ at Midway Beach Rd.

Least Sandpiper
65+ at Midway Beach Rd.

Dunlin
30 along S.R.105 at the mouth of the North River
4,500+ at Midway Beach Rd.

Long-billed Dowitcher
20 at Tokeland
1 along Ocosta Third Street


Mammals:

1 Long-tailed Weasel along Hwy.101 south of Artic in Grays Harbor Co.


Good birding,

Ruth and Patrick Sullivan
godwit at worldnet.att.net