Hello, Tweeters,

Yesterday (May 10) we held the Clallam Co. Birdathon for
International Migratory Bird Day. My group (with Dave and Julie
Jackson for owling, with Jerry Freilich during the rest of the day)
had an excellent count, seeing a total of 146 species. Our group's
efforts ranged from owling in the upper Dungeness before dawn to a
Cape Flattery seawatch by sunset. At least 50 people participated in
the entire count -- after we compile the data for all our counters,
I'll post a summary on Tweeters.

Our group had several interesting species, but our most compelling
observations were with western migrants in Neah Bay, which might
reveal a little about how screwy this spring has become.

In Neah Bay, after searching through the gull flock by the Makah
Senior Center (a nice assortment, including a 1st-year Glaucous
Gull), we continued further west along the edge of the Neah Bay
waterfront, along the access road to the Waadah Island breakwater.
In the short alders and brush along the shore, we encountered a
swarming flock of warblers unlike any I have ever seen, even more
intense than migrant fallouts I've witnessed on the Farallon Islands
and other areas of coastal California. The flock, densely
concentrated in a grove of alders, easily contained several hundred
birds, perhaps several thousand birds, all swarming through the
trees. No joke - it was huge! We scanned the birds closely with our
binos, looking at every bird we could identify. To our amazement,
every single bird we saw in the flock was an Orange-crowned Warbler.
No exceptions! Essentially none of them was singing; they instead
hopped frantically around in the trees, foraging like mad. I pished
and chipped a little, and the flock moved like a super-organism
toward me, tighter than the tightest Bushtit flock imaginable,
swarming in my direction at the edge of the trees. I'm at a loss to
best describe the flock - like Orange-crowned fleas on a dog's back?
Like Orange-crowned particles displaying Brownian Motion? A couple
Lincoln's Sparrows and a Fox Sparrow also poked out of the brush, but
the trees themselves were literally swarming with exclusively
hundreds of Orange-crowned Warblers. This was not your typical
bouncy warbler flock - it was weird!

Also in Neah Bay, the entire waterfront along the beaches, marina,
and breakwater for hundreds of yards was hopping with Savannah
Sparrows, in some places 10 or more birds every 100 feet. At Hobuck
Beach on the outer coast west of Neah Bay, Savannah Sparrows hopped
all along the beach and rocks. Even at Cape Flattery, on high scope
power we could see numerous sparrows hopping on the rocks of Tatoosh
Island, presumably also Savannah Sparrows. There were occasional
Golden-crowned Sparrows mixed in, but essentially all the migrant
sparrows were Savannahs.

To top this off, all along the trail to Cape Flattery we encountered
unreal numbers of Hermit Thrushes. Every 50 feet or so another
Hermit Thrush would jump in and out of the trail, sometimes two or
three together. I've walked that trail several times before, and I
recall Swainson's Thrushes singing in that salal understory, never
Hermit Thrushes. These numbers were way beyond your typical
reclusive breeding Hermit Thrushes. Again, none of them was singing
- only a few chuck notes along the way.

What gets me the most is that we observed such incredible numbers of
these typically early-spring western migrants in nearly the middle of
May. We have had Orange-crowned Warblers and Savannah Sparrows
singing on territories around Sequim since late March and early
April, so I assume that the birds we saw in Neah Bay are migrants
destined for breeding territories much further north. We had
beautiful clear conditions here on Thursday night to encourage
migration, but Friday night clouded up and yesterday afternoon the
weather at Neah Bay was downright ugly, with cold thick drizzly rain
as the front passed by about 5-6 p.m. By 7 p.m. the rain let up and
the cold wind shifted to the west.

Equally puzzling is the fact that yesterday we had a pretty good
representation of migrants typical of later spring around here,
including tanagers, MacGillivray's Warblers, Black-headed Grosbeaks,
Western Kingbirds, and even a Western Wood Pewee, so why in the world
are there still big numbers of Orange-crowned Warblers, Savannah
Sparrows, and Hermit Thrushes backed up at Neah Bay?

There were also sizable flocks of western warblers at RR Bridge Park
in Sequim yesterday morning, largely Orange-crowneds and Wilson's, so
I'm wondering if any of you saw anything equivalent in your birding
escapades this weekend.

Bob Boekelheide
Sequim







Bob and Barb Boekelheide
bboek at olympus.net



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