Hi Tweeters,

Today ended up being my only chance to hit the coast for spring shorebird migration this year. I didn't see anything unexpected species-wise but I was amazed at some of the numbers. At Bottle Beach high tide after picking through the flock of shorebirds I was looking at I realized a good sized ratio belonged to Red Knot so I started counting. I stopped at 200 birds and there could have been 50+ more in that flock. There was at least one other flock out of good observation range of the same size and another one about 2/3 size of the one I was looking at. If the ratios held there was probably over 500 knots on the beach.

Brown Pelican numbers at Westport must be well into the multiples of hundreds, wow! Got to watch some bathe and that was fun, it looked like they rinsed out their pouch too as part of the process.

Near Elma I saw a Turkey Vulture working on a deer carcass at a little past 7am. That must be some sort of early bird record for a TV. I'll bet it was feeding the day before on the same deer and roosted nearby so it didn't have far to go in the morning.

Kathy
Roosting in Kent, near Lake Meridian
(chukarbird at yahoo dot com)
Any driving directions contained within this message are given as a courtesy, beware, author is directionally challenged and will not vouch for them.