Hey tweets, my husband and I were out Bottle Beach way on Sunday,
taking advantage of the gorgeous sunshine and still air. We managed to
catch the beach on the incoming tide, which is not always easy to do -
the tides here seem not to conform to the tables, at least not the way
we read the tables. My theory is that Bottle Beach is a place out of
time and tides, kind of like Brigadoon, only more frequent. No question
that it's magic, at any rate.

Someone has been hard at work improving the entrance trail, digging up
the blackberries and laying down a thick coat of chips, which were
churned into deep mud by the increased foot traffic. The sparrows
didn't like the new conditions as much as before, and we saw pretty
much nothing but blackbirds on the walk in.

When we got to the beach, the tide had turned and was oozing in.
Dunlins were everywhere - we estimated at least 5,000. Also present in
good numbers were Marbled Godwits and Black-bellied Plovers, as well as
a big flock (37-plus) of Brants out in the water. I settled in to wait
for the water to push the birds closer, which it obligingly did. As the
birds began to argue over who got to squat on the stubby remains of
pilings, and who had to get wet feet from the water, I got very good
looks in perfect light of all the individual feathers of each
complaintant. Then I noticed that one bird looked different. It was a
Rock Sandpiper, much to my amazement. It was picking at barnacles on
the only "rock" on the entire beach, a piling that was thickly covered
by barnacles and seaweeds. What a treat to see this bird on a sandy
beach, in such good light. Usually when I see a Rock Sandpiper, it's
through the haze of salt spray drying on my glasses.

As the tide continued to push the birds closer together and most of the
Dunlins settled in for a beak-into-back nap, a Merlin suddenly burst
out from the trees. Up went the whole flock, flashing dark/light in a
moving cloud that continually changed shape. The Merlin herded the
flock from above for a few minutes, but everyone was healthy and
strong, so the falcon eventually gave up and disappeared back into the
brush. The event made me realize that you've got to have good nerves to
be a Dunlin because you must go from sleep to stark terror in one
nanosecond. Woody Allen wouldn't last a single season. - Connie Sidles,
Seattle

constancesidles at gmail.com