Hi
Sorry for the belated report, but this bird confused me. As noted below,
there is also a report from yesterday in Victoria, BC. I'd be interested in
any further comment, because it's an interesting bird. Description below.

Also present were three pale 'white-not-yellow' HORNED LARKS (arcticola?),
two peeps which I'm inclined to think were SEMIPALMATED SANDPIPERS (let me
know if you have an opinion (photo on ebird, link below)- I need to study
the pics more). Again, there's an ebird report from Victoria in the last
week.

Along the Wa'atch River Valley were tens of warblers, mostly YELLOW and
WILSON'S, but with my FOY MACGILLIVRAY'S.

The weather was wet and nasty.

http://ebird.org/ebird/view/checklist?subID=S10800930

Brewer's Sparrow description: Found on upper Hobuck beach a hundred yards
or so north of the northernmost part of the campground among dispersed
Spartina (?). There were quite a few Savannah Sparrows scattered in this
area of the beach and I was looking at them carefully. This bird
immediately stood out because it was grayish (rather than yellowish/
brownish) and on first glimpse I saw a distinctive eyering suggesting
Vesper's Sparrow, a species I've wanted to see at Neah Bay. But it didn't
feel right... The sparrow was not cooperative, basically down in 'furrows'
by vegetation so difficult to see. It flushed once, now reminiscent of
Clay-colored Sparrow!, and flew low and a short distance but at least where
I could see part of it. I hastily snapped a few photos, noting a very gray
collar, unstreaked below, pronounced auricular margin, and an indistinct
gray supercilium. It flushed again and landed out of sight. My attention
was diverted (by the horned larks), then I returned to try and find it.
This time it flushed to the top of a bush on the more mature dunes. Now I
was really confused! In flight I had become somewhat convinced of
Clay-colored Sparrow, but on landing I could see that it lacked the facial
pattern, particularly of a summer bird. Brewer's? OK for Spizella (long
tail, size) and certainly the eyering, but the bill looked big and the
overall tone too gray and dark. What about other unstreaked-below-sparrows?
Perhaps I was wrong thinking it a Spizella? Well, I mentally went through
Black-throated (probably should have a black throat), Sage (isn't Sage
streaked below?) err... Then it flew, not to be seen again.
In my defense of the photographs, it was dark and rainy and the bird was
not cooperative.
In the time since I've conferred with Brad and examined the photos. I'm
comfortable with a species ID of Brewer's Sparrow (interestingly there's an
ebird report of one in Victoria on 5/21/12, the day after this one. I also
feel that some features suggest taverneri, especially the overall tone,
gray supercilium, and large bill.

Cheers,
Nigel
--
Nigel Ball
Bainbridge Island
206 715 8030
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://mailman1.u.washington.edu/pipermail/tweeters/attachments/20120522/ae525aba/attachment.htm