Tweeters, Luhr Beach continues to amaze me this week. The birds glimpsed
this week only include: L/T Jaeger, Wandering Tattler, Surfbird, R/N
Phalarope, Sanderling, Black Tern, Baird's Sandpiper, and Brown Pelican
(second-hand reports)...all code 4-5 birds for Thurston County (some
consider Sanderling a 3, but if it is it's a pretty difficult 3). So these
amazing sightings brought Keith Brady and I out once again this morning to
look for some of the goodies that the Sullivans reported. We found a flock
of 8 COMMON TERN, about 15 distant phalaropes (almost surely Red-necked) and
large numbers of Western Sandpipers and Common Mergansers (see Sullivans
post).

Keith came back around 4:00 PM (I believe) and located a murrelet while
looking north from the pier. He watched this bird for about 40 minutes
before leaving the scene and was fairly sure that he had a LONG-BILLED
MURRELET (the only doubts came from it being such a tremendous bird and also
the memory of Steve M.'s post to Frontiers-of-ID last month about seeing
juvenile Marbleds showing characteristics of L/Billed). Unfortunately there
was no tape in his videocamera and the memory stick was malfunctioning (OF
COURSE!). He called me shortly after 5:00 and we were at Luhr around 6:00
PM with Steve Nord. It took 15-20 minutes to refind this bird, now loafing
(no diving) off to the west past some of the large posts in the water. At
first it was difficult to see any pattern due to the low angle of the sun,
but shortly thereafter the lighting changed to allow less sun directly on
the bird. We were able to see a very clearly marked Brachyramphus-type
murrelet showing a clean edge to the black that ran from the bill towards
the eye and straight down the side of the neck (creating a dark nape, no
collar). The bird also didn't show a "shoulder bar" (pointed black reaching
towards breast on sitting bird). The bill seemed long for the viewing
distance, though this is a subjective field mark. By the time Keith tried
to take video the bird was too far out.

When Keith watched the bird earlier he also noted that the underwing linings
were not completely dark, when he told me this fact he was unaware that this
was a field mark for Long-billed.

The three of us would appreciate any feedback (especially concerning Steve
M.'s article to Frontiers) about this bird...hopefully I've included enough
info.

Hopefully this bird will remain through at least tomorrow and others can try
for photo/video documentation.

Jason Paulios
Jpaulios at earthlink.net
Olympia, WA