Birders,

I spent more than 6 hours birding at Point Roberts yesterday-- much of it at Lighthouse Marine Park, trying to find Ancient Murrelets, plus the Rock Sandpiper seen there on October 31st by Guy Pickavance. No luck on the sandpiper, but I did find 4 ANCIENT MURRELETS, which flew into a large feeding flock of birds about 250 meters off the park and promptly submerged (as is typical). It took me a few minutes to find them again, but I eventually had several good views of them. (Powerful scope needed-- 20x will not cut it!)

There was constant activity off Lighthouse Marine Park-- large mixed-species feeding flocks consisting mostly of GLAUCOUS-WINGED and BONAPARTE'S GULLS, PACIFIC LOONS, and COMMON MURRES. There were relatively few cormorants in the flocks (and only one BRANDT'S that I could pick out), and no Heermann's Gulls.

Other than the murrelets, birds of particular interest included:

11 BRANT, my first of the fall, in 2 flocks flying past the lighthouse
4 TRUMPETER SWANS, also my first of the fall, flying high over Lily Point, headed east and calling
A large flock of about 60 LONG-TAILED DUCKS off Lily Point, plus about 10 more near the lighthouse.
A EURASIAN COLLARED-DOVE just east of the marina was only my second sighting ever for Point Roberts. Some places are not yet overrun by this species!

Wayne C. Weber
Delta, BC
contopus at telus.net



-----Original Message-----
Subject: eBird Report - Point Roberts, 5-Nov-2011

Point Roberts, Whatcom, US-WA
5-Nov-2011 10:30 AM - 5:00 PM
Protocol: Traveling
10.0 mile(s)
70 species

Brant 11
Trumpeter Swan 4 flying east, high above Lily Point
Gadwall 4
American Wigeon 40
Mallard 15
Northern Shoveler 2
Northern Pintail 8
Greater Scaup 50
Harlequin Duck 12
Surf Scoter 60
White-winged Scoter 25
Black Scoter 2
Long-tailed Duck 70 mostly in one flock off Lily Point
Bufflehead 10
Hooded Merganser 14
Red-breasted Merganser 12
Red-throated Loon 2
Pacific Loon 100
Common Loon 15
Horned Grebe 25
Red-necked Grebe 1
Western Grebe 6
Brandt's Cormorant 1
Double-crested Cormorant 20
Pelagic Cormorant 25
Great Blue Heron 5
Bald Eagle 5
Cooper's Hawk 1
Red-tailed Hawk 3
Peregrine Falcon 1
Killdeer 7
Black Turnstone 7
Sanderling 30
Wilson's Snipe 1
Bonaparte's Gull 150
Mew Gull 10
California Gull 5
Glaucous-winged Gull 600
Common Murre 60
Pigeon Guillemot 3
Ancient Murrelet 4
Rock Pigeon 8
Eurasian Collared-Dove 1
Downy Woodpecker 1
Northern Flicker 3
Northwestern Crow 15
Common Raven 1
Black-capped Chickadee 4
Chestnut-backed Chickadee 1
Bushtit 10
Bewick's Wren 2
Pacific Wren 3
Marsh Wren 2
Golden-crowned Kinglet 12
Ruby-crowned Kinglet 2
Hermit Thrush 1
American Robin 20
European Starling 80
Cedar Waxwing 1
Spotted Towhee 8
Fox Sparrow 20
Song Sparrow 15
Lincoln's Sparrow 4
Golden-crowned Sparrow 6
Dark-eyed Junco 2
Brewer's Blackbird 2
Purple Finch 3
House Finch 8
Pine Siskin 1
House Sparrow 2

This report was generated automatically by eBird v3 (http://ebird.org)