Tweets - the heavy fog was actually high enough up this morning for good
waterbird viewing under it. That said, I didn't find anything of note
working Dumas Bay, Dash Point Pier, Brown's Point, and down Marine View
Drive into Tacoma. By the time I got to Point Defiance, the sun was shining
broadly. Still nothing of note really.

I made my way all the way out to the last viewpoint where you can still see
north from atop the bluffs, and pulled out my scope yet again. After about
a half hour of intermittent looking (interrupted 3 times by 3 different
woodpecker species), I happened upon a tan-brown backed gull WAY out there.
I might have not even paid attention to it, except that it chose that moment
to flap its wings, and I saw the large black triangles at the wingtips.

I spent much of the next half hour watching it, always at extreme distance,
and saw it flap a few times and fly a short distance once. Man, in flight,
there's no question about species with a SABINE'S GULL, is there.

Made my day.

Oh - at Sportco Ponds in Fife, there were only about a dozen geese, by they
comprised 3 species - CANADA, CACKLER (minima subspecies), and a lone
GREATER WHITE-FRONTED GOOSE with an injured wing.

== Michael Hobbs
== Kirkland, WA
== http://www.marymoor.org/birding.htm
== http://www.marymoor.org/BirdBlog.htm
== birdmarymoor at frontier.com