Hi Tweeters,

This e-mail came to me from Andy Stepniewski. Andy thinks there is a good chance this bird is a Long-billed Murrelet. The December 1997 issue of Birding Magazine as a great article on Long-billed Murrelets written by Steve Mlodinov.

It sounds like a bird worth chasing.

Denny Granstrand
Yakima, WA


>From: <SueHoover at aol.com>
>
>>
>> Dr. Harold Stout called me this a.m. to report:
>>
>> "Yesterday about 5 p.m. I was out in a boat from the Brewster boat launch
>and
>> we saw a bird on the water. My son asked, "Dad, what bird is that?" I
>could
>> not say, but it looked like an auklet.
>>
>> The bird dove; we got closer and had good long look at the bird within 30
>> feet of us. I didn't know what it was.
>>
>> When I come home I studied the bird books, and it was a juvenile Marbled
>> Murrelet. There is nothing else like it. I suppose this bird hatched in
>the big
>> old trees high in the mountains, and came down the wrong river, coming
>here on
>> the Columbia on the East side of the Cascades.
>>
>> It was within about 100 feet of shore."
>>
>> Dr. Stout has been studying the birds of this area for 40+ years. His
>email
>> is midnite2 at televar.com
>>
>> Best to you all,
>> Sue
>>

* Denny Granstrand *
* Yakima, WA *
* dgranstrand at charter.net *
digiscoped bird photos on-line at:
http://osprey.bardill.net/gallery/