Hello all, Keith Brady and I decided to see what was happening out at Weir
Prarie and ended up birding at quite a few Thurston County locations today.
Started at the two Weir Praries, then scoped East and West Bays in Olympia,
then Nisqually (during the heat of the day, not much around. Only did the
interior boardwalk and first stretch of the McAllister Trail) and Luhr
Beach, then Mud Bay/Madrona Beach RD and finally ended at Black Lake
Meadows. We were done by 4:30 PM and ended up with 106 species seen during
the day. We didn't see many common birds such as: Winter Wren, Bushtit,
both Yellowlegs, Bittern (which has been a gimme at Nisqually lately), Vir.
Rail, etc...
Best birds were:

WEIR PRAIRIE
5 N. BOBWHITE (calling)
2 California Quail
2 R/B Sapsucker
1 WESTERN WOOD-PEWEE (First bird of spring for us)
9 HAMMOND'S FLYCATCHER (probably more, they seemed almost common)
1 Hutton's Vireo
Warbling Vireo
9 House Wren
2 pairs of Western Bluebird
American Pipit
1 Townsend's Warbler
MacGillivray's Warbler
3 Western Tanager
1 VESPER SPARROW
Chipping Sparrow (abundant)
1 B/H Grosbeak
W. Meadowlark
Red Crossbill
Evening Grosbeak

WEST BAY
4 Barrow's Goldeneye
1 Osprey (on nest at Priest Point)
1 PEREGRINE (in the nest box at the marina, she took off during our watch
heading towards Capital Lake)

NISQUALLY NWR
Cinnamon Teal
B/W Teal
a few Hooded Merganser (one hen w/chicks)
1 N. Harrier
1 Sora
3 Warbling Vireo
NO Swainson's Thrush (we tried hard for this species, should be more around
any day now. We DID hear many Song Sparrows with 'whit' notes strewn
liberally throughout their songs - one had three 'whit' notes in a song.
Also others may have heard many at Nisqually today, but actually that was
just Keith and I whistling throughout the interior boardwalk area!)
Yellow Warbler
Wilson's Warbler

LUHR BEACH
C. Loon
1 Horned Grebe
1 Brandt's Cormorant
G. Scaup (I've been impressed with the numbers of congregating Scaup here
this spring)
1 Common Goldeneye
20+ Caspian Tern
Purple Martin

MUD BAY/MADRONA BEACH RD
9 BLACK-BELLIED PLOVER (three or four in alternate plumage, very sharp)
Dunlin
Western Sandpiper
Least Sandpiper

BLACK LAKE MEADOWS
Osprey
2 R/T Hawk
Killdeer (our only one of the day!?)
2 B/T Pigeon
2 VAUX'S SWIFT (our first of the season)
1 N. Rough-winged Swallow
CEDAR WAXWING (small flock, our first of the season)
1 MacGillivray's Warbler

Jason Paulios
Jpaulios at earthlink.net
Olympia, WA