Subject: Palm Warblers at Ocean Shores
Date: Mar 4 15:07:43 2003
From: Jason Paulios - jpaulios at hotmail.com


Today Gary Wiles and I attempted to owl Capitol Forest before dawn but the
rains put an end to that real quick. Determined not to waste the day, I
twisted Gary's arm and he gave in to a trip to the coast. Tired, but ever
vigilant, our heroes made it to Ocean Shores earlier than they have ever
been before.

The Jetty:
1 R/T Loon
2 Pacific Loon
10+ Western Grebe
W/W Scoter
Surf Scoter
Surfbird
Black Turnstone
4 ROCK SANDPIPER(noticed something about today's Rock Sandpipers, when they
were picking at the rocks and facing away from me, they seemed to show two
white spots/streaks: one stemming from the white at the base of the
primaries/primary coverts, and another from around the lesser/median covert
region...a sort of double "wing bar" pattern from a distance. They were
easy to pick out amongst the Surfbirds and BLTUs because of this double
white, while the other two had only white showing at the primary base while
foraging.)
Mew Gull
NO KITTIWAKES TODAY, not much activity at the jetty this morning besides the
rock pipers.

O. Shores Sewage ponds:
Lesser Scaup
1 Western Gull that had a pale iris, still had a yellowish orbital ring, but
it really stood out surrounded by the others.

Game Range scoped from Sewage ponds:
Black Scoter
Surf Scoter
2 R/B Merganser

Marina:
2 Common Loon
1 First-winter male C. Goldeneye (I don't see these often, was a nice bird)

Scotch broom thicket near Marina, directly across from Grand Canal:

2 B/C Chickadee
3 PALM WARBLERS

As we approached the dreaded (we've been here too many times) Scotch Broom
thicket, Gary said, "why don't we try looking over by that cattail marsh (by
the canal), I've seen Palms in that habitat before." Sure enough there was
one bird in the blooming willow at the edge of the canal! We watched him
pump and forage here for about a minute or two, it then flew across the road
into the Scotch Broom. We walked over to relocate and realized that there
were now two birds foraging at the bases and lower branches of the plants.
Gary went off after these two and I spotted a third off to the right towards
the hotel. After regrouping by this new bird, we watched all three take off
one at a time into another thicket. Most problematic was the lack of any
call notes from these birds, they seemed to respond to pishing somewhat, but
that could have been my imagination. They acted like Palms that we've seen
elsewhere in the US: foraging in shrub edges but occasionally going further
in the thickets (also foraging in willows-once seen at the top of a tall
willow), quite oblivious to our advances, constantly pumping the tail. In
flight they were obvious, yellow-rumped-like shape with bright yellow
undertail coverts and rump.

Good birding,

Jason Paulios
Jpaulios at hotmail.com
Olympia, WA



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