I was able to drive down to the Thomas Ponds south of Kent yesterday
afternoon and arrived just after 5pm. The light was fantastic as the
sun sank in the western sky and illuminated the entire wetland area,
afternoon is definitely the best time for pictures. Several birders
were already on site trying to get better angles on a group of birds
sitting on the border of the reeds on the nearest shore to the
Frontage Road. I was told that at least one Sharp-tailed Sandpiper
was in the group along with several Pectorals and 2 Dowitchers. I
could barely make out three of the birds while I was standing next to
the yellow fire hydrant, but then I decided to stand on top of it and,
given the fact that I am over 6 feet tall, that gave me enough height
to see over the reeds quite well.

Sure enough there were 3 sandpipers I could see well and several more
that were more obscured, along with the Dowitchers to the left. Even
with binoculars it appeared that one of the three birds had more
rufous in the cap, more white on the supercilium particularly behind
the eye, and more buff on the chest.....all field marks I had been
told to look for with juvenile Sharp-taileds. Another birder was kind
enough to lend me his mini-scope and then I could clearly see that the
bird in front was a Sharp-tailed. In good light and with the Sharp-
tailed juxtaposed against the Pectorals, the rufous cap and white
supercilium are very pronounced on the Sharp-tailed. Furthermore the
chest of the Sharp-tailed had some slight streaking on the very sides,
but none in the center and an overall buffy tone, whereas the
Pectorals behind it clearly had more streaking on the chest on the
sides and in the center and overall the chest color was grayer than
with the Sharp-tailed. It may have been slightly smaller with a
slightly shorter bill than the two Pectorals nearby, but that
distinction was very slight.

As the birds started to move around a bit, I moved down the road to
the right and got some good looks at more of the birds and could make
out 2 Sharp-taileds and about 3 Pectorals. The group milled around
for several minutes, doing more preening than active foraging, and
then took off across the 167 just after 5:30PM with a few more
Pectorals that I couldn't see before.

Two Yellowlegs were out farther in the water, a Great Blue Heron was
perched on one of the snags, and at times a Northern Harrier would fly
up to the farthest snag, usually scaring up a flock of Dowitchers when
it did so. Several Wilson's Snipe (3-4) were on the far bank closest
to the road and 2 more were on the muddy spit where people have
gotten the best looks at the Sharp-tailed Sandpipers.

I waited until the sun got below the hills to the west (around 6:00pm
or a little after) and in that time we had a group of about 7-8
Dowitchers fly in, and several groups of Cackling Geese fly over (one
was quite large, easily 150 birds). The Sharp-taileds and Pectorals
did not return in that time and I left around 6:15PM.

Thank you to everyone who helped me track down my life Sharp-tailed!!

-Nathaniel Peters

ncpeters at uw.edu