Hello Tweets,

Today we woke up to clear skies after an extremely windy night and NO power! We decided to spent a few hours to go birding by making the decision to go to Point No Point in search of the Long-billed Murrelet. We left our neighbor still with NO power during the mid morning and many downed trees lined the streets,as well as several light post destroyed. We continued on our way to Point No Point and arrived there at 12pm. Conditions began fairly calm at Point No Point,then after 2pm conditions became quite windy with cloudy skies,but no precipitation.

We began our searches for the Long-billed Murrelet by scoping the offshore waters west and north from the lighthouse,as we stood along the upper beach just south of the lighthouse parking area. During this time we ran into several birders including Barry Levine that indicated to us that he saw the Long-billed Murrelet briefly,but well at 11am. We continued scanning the open water,where we observed good numbers of Marbled Murrelets and several other waterbirds species. At 2:30pm we located the LONG-BILLED MURRELET approximately 30 yards offshore just south of the lighthouse,where it swam with a single nearby Marbled Murrelet for excellent comparisons. We obtained good scoping views of the Long-billed Murrelet for 8 seconds,before it and the Marbled Murrelet dove and could not be relocated. The Long-billed Murrelet was observed from the original location we started scoping from along the upper beach just south of the Point No Point Lighthouse. We searched diligently,but unsuccessfully for the next 30 minutes for the Long-billed Murrelet in the vicinity that we last saw it by walking a short ways to the lighthouse.

The Long-billed Murrelet was easily separated by a Marbled Murrelet by showing complete and solid black areas along the neck to the head contrasting and separated white areas below along the throat to the upper breast. There was NO hint of any white on the collar as in a Marbled Murrelet. In overall structure the bird appeared more as a Common Murre,but showed an obvious shorter,thicker bill. 2 indistinct whitish ovals were noted on the back of the head,but we were unable to notice the white arcs on the eye. It was a most exciting bird for us to see,especially after 2.5 hours of thorough scoping and it was unclear where the bird came from at the prior time of the sighting. In complete sense the bird could be separated from both Marbled Murrelet and Common Murre and to mention there was no question of the bird's identity. A great sighting for Vic Nelson and for other birders to continue seeing on day 7! An excellent 15 page article about Long-billed Murrelet(with photos)written by Steve Mlodinow is accessible in the December 1997 issue of ABA's Birding.

A few other somewhat noteworthy species located during our visit to Point No Point included the following:

6 Red-throated Loons
13 Pacific Loons
1 EARED GREBE(observed at close range with a few Horned Grebes just off the lighthouse)
15 Western Grebes
15+ Brandt's Cormorants
8 "Black"Brant(observed flying offshore towards Whidbey Island)
1 Green-winged Teal
9 White-winged Scoters(along with a few Surf Scoters)
1 Merlin
1 Ring-necked Pheasant
14+ Sanderlings
1 Dunlin
1 Herring Gull
35+ Common Murres
10 Pigeon Guillemots
30 Marbled Murrelets
8 ANCIENT MURRELETS(observed flying west to east less than halfway between the Point No Point Lighthouse and Whidbey Island)
10 Rhinoceros Auklets
2 Yellow-rumped Warblers

A single STELLER'S SEA LION was observed just of the Point No Point Lighthouse for a short while before disappearing under the water,which was a nice mammal highlight for this location.

On our way home we spotted a NORTHERN SHRIKE perched atop a clump of alders trees along S.R.3 in the Clear Creek Valley,which seemed like a nice way to end our interesting day!


On a side note most of the birders we spoke with at Point No Point told us they had NO power too from various locations including Seattle,Poulsbo,and Olympia so we didn't feel too bad. On our way home we searched for gas at several location with most gas stations having NO gas or having a long waiting line. A few gas stations are open though,but overall gas supply seem very limited.



Good birding,

Ruth and Patrick Sullivan
Fircrest,WA
godwit513 at msn.com