Tweets,
Doug & Pipper Watkins and my wife Jo and I went down to spend the
weekend at Ocean Shores. On Friday as Jo and I were driving down, Pipper
called to say they were looking at a nice Lapland Longspur at the southeast
corner of the Hoquiam STP. When Jo and I got there the LaLo was still there.
It was with Savannah Sparrows at the west end of the large gravel patch at
the very end of the east most drivein.
On Saturday we had nice looks at the Bar-tailed Godwit at Tokeland and
then went to Midway Beach. We were behind the Watkins and were delayed by a
policeman stopping us for speeding (46 miles in a 35 hour zone). Jo talked
nicely to him and he let her off with a warning. At any rate, by the time we
got to Midway Beach, Doug was off hiking in the rain to the north. We waited
and he reported that he had seen 8 Buff-breasted Sandpipers, two Snowy
Plovers and a Baird's Sandpiper about 1/2 mile to the north. He and I went
back and found 5 BBSa's, 2 Baird's but no Snowy's'. The wind was blowing
fiercely and it was raining. Thru all of this skiffs of sand were blowing.
Nasty but good birds!
When looking for Snowy Plovers there, I should point out that they are
frequently in the ling of debris at the high point of the beachwhere the
tide has reached its upper level. Of course sometimes it tops this and
leaves water in where we found the birds in this report. The last time I was
at Midway when we got back to the car some kind soul had put a note on the
windshiield that they had seen two Buff-breasteds in the pool just to the
south. They were gone but we did have two Pectorals there that day == pond
dried up this Saturday.
Bob Norton
norton36 at olypen.com
Joyce (near Port Angeles), WA