Subject: [Tweeters] Ancient Murrelets & Red Phalaropes
Date: Dec 28 17:18:58 2005
From: Brad Waggoner - wagtail at sounddsl.com


Tweets,

Ancient Murrelets:

A few boat trips and many, many scoping attempts from the shores of
Bainbridge Island this Fall have not produced an Ancient Murrelet until
today. I finally located one flying near Blakely Rock. It landed, or more
appropriately "dove-in", briefly. It then flew on further south and out of
sight. Vic Nelson reported some off of Point no Point today and with Sam
Terry's report from Fort Flagler yesterday perhaps some are finally moving
into the Central Sound. We had plenty flying offshore from the Dungeness
Spit on the Sequim CBC a little over a week ago. I believe we counted over
200 during our shorter than normal lunch break at the tip of the spit. I
believes this was consistent with our last few years. I just find it
interesting that Ancient Murrelets were such a difficult find here in the
Central Sound earlier in the season. Any explanations out there in
Tweeterville?

Red Phalaropes:

Vic Nelson called me this morning to report that he had a couple Red
Phalaropes off of Point no Point. Although I have been looking, I have been
unable to find any off the shores of Bainbridge Island. The darn wind events
have kept me from making a search by boat. I hope to try in the next few
days if Mother Nature allows. As I have not noticed Phalarope reports
further north than Point no Point, I wonder if these birds have moved up
from the south as opposed to being "blown-down" the Strait of Juan de Fuca.
Again, I would love to here some thoughts.



Brad Waggoner
Bainbridge Island, WA
mailto:wagtail at sounddsl.com