Tweets - Nine of us birded another gorgeous morning away. It's a rough
life, but someone's got to do it. This is the beginnings of the summer
doldrums at Marymoor, but we still managed a pretty good day and a pretty
good species list.

Highlights:

GREEN HERON - we had many sightings all up and down the slough, and from
the lake platform, we watched 3 individuals come and go, at one point all
landing in the same willow.

VIRGINIA RAIL - got great looks at a hatch-year bird as it walked the
whole far shore of the main pond at the rowing club. We then went down to
the dock, and upon our return, we watched it walk the far shore in the
opposite direction.

RUFOUS HUMMINGBIRD - saw 1 juvenile male, plus one or two quick flybys, so
some are still around.

VAUX'S SWIFT - always a few around in the summer, but today we got to see
some flying quite low and close

HAIRY WOODPECKER - female with 1 or 2 DOWNYs in a tree near the start of
the boardwalk. I think everyone ended up seeing this bird, but it managed
to move rather continuously in such a way that almost nobody could see it
at any given moment. There was quite a bit of chasing between the
species, and lots of cries of "I've got it - no, it's the Downy".

BARN OWL - Houston Flores, who is working at Marymoor, mentioned to me
that he saw owls near the velodrome parking lot last Saturday night after
the concert.

PURPLE MARTIN - Brian Bell went over to E. Lk. Samm Pkwy early this
morning and found 1 on a nest box at the NE corner of Lake Sammamish.

TREE SWALLOW and VIOLET-GREEN SWALLOW numbers were very high, and many of
the birds were juveniles, making for difficult IDs. It seems to me that
we've had more VGSW juveniles than ever before. More TRES too, but that's
not to surprising because of the great success of the nest boxes at
Marymoor.

SWAINSON'S THRUSH (around 20) and RED-EYED VIREO (1) sang beautifully for
us, but absolutely refused to be seen. A WARBLING VIREO at the rowing
club allowed me a good look, but moved away when the others came to see it
too. We've been hearing 1-2 REVI and 1 WAVI each week this year, and no
Cassin's Vireo. We've had better years for vireos. YELLOW WARBLER
numbers have also been low, though we've had 1-3 males each week (1+ at
the rowing club, 1+ at the lake), and today we had a female from the lake
platform.

DARK-EYED JUNCOS - we had fun watching juveniles and adults around the
mansion area. I loved the sound of disbelief in Megan's voice upon
viewing the juveniles -- "Those are juncos? They look like sparrows!"

Surprising misses: NO CANADA GEESE, only 5-6 Mallards, and no other ducks
except 2 HOODED MERGANSERS at the rowing club pond. No gulls. No
Red-breasted Sapsucker for just the 2nd time since late March.

The Hardhack (Spirea douglasii) is in full bloom, the Purple Loosestrife
and Garden Loosestrife are just beginning to bloom. Lots of dragonflies
at the rowing club pond - at least 4 species, and probably more.

I'm gone on vacation for the next 4 weeks - Brian Bell and the merry crew
will continue in my absence.

For the day, 53 species. For the year, still at 122.

== Michael Hobbs
== Kirkland, WA
== http://www.scn.org/fomp/birding.htm
== hummer at isomedia.com