Tweets - At the county line ponds on SR-26 in Grant County today, there was one Western and one Least Sandpiper, along with one Red-necked Phalarope, on the north side of the road.

On a small rock island on the south side of the road were two shorebirds that I can't give a positive ID on, but here's what I saw:

- Appeared slightly larger than the Western Sandpiper.
- Predominantly medium-dark gray, with no brownish tones
- Bill straight, medium length. Seemed similar to a longish Western (relative to the size of the bird) in length, but without any hint of droop. Bill seemed too short and straight for Dunlin.
- Pretty much all of the feathers on the dorsal surface (definitely the scapulars and tertials) had darker centers and lighter edges, with the dark areas about slate gray and the edges slightly lighter
- Face fairly dark, with an obvious (but not sharp) pale supercillium
- Legs and bill appeared black
- Streaking on the upper breast, white bellied

So, what they appeared like, to my eye, were juvenile WHITE-RUMPED SANDPIPERS.

Unfortunately, they flew before I could determine more, and I was completely zoomed in on the scope at the time, so they just vanished from view in a blur, and I couldn?t spot them in the air when I raised my head. We couldn?t find them again after that.

Thoughts? I realize that it would be highly unlikely to have WRSA in E. WA. at the end of September...

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