Hello, Tweeters,

Bob Kiernan from Idaho and I were lucky enough to spend Sunday morning
(9/5) enjoying Sequim and Dungeness Bays. We did not find the Ruff
where it was last seen on Thursday, 9/2, but there was a lovely
juvenile Sharp-tailed Sandpiper with a couple Pectorals and about 10
Leasts at the small muddy pond containing concrete blocks to the east
of Helen's Pond. At Dungeness Landing Co. Park (Dungeness Bay
Oysterhouse) one juvenile American Golden Plover flew in with about 140
Black-bellied Plovers and 25 Short-billed Dowitchers.

At least four begging murre chicks and their fathers have made it into
Sequim Bay.

I'm wondering if others in western WA perceive this to be a relatively
poor breeding year for swallows. At the Dungeness River Audubon Center
this spring Violet-greens visited nest boxes but never laid eggs.
Late August and the first week in September usually bring large flocks
of swallows to forage along the Dungeness River and the shore of
Dungeness Bay, but this year, even though all five expected species are
present, their numbers are very reduced. Are aerial insect populations
similarly low, perhaps because of the dry conditions? Or am I all wet?

Bob Boekelheide
Sequim



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