Subject: [Tweeters] Skagit big day, resending
Date: Apr 21 06:51:26 2014
From: Gary Bletsch - garybletsch at yahoo.com


Dear Tweeters,

If my?arithmetic is right, I think I just found 104 species of birds in Skagit County today, 4-20-2014.

Big misses included Belted Kingfisher, Mourning Dove, R-B Nuthatch, Brown Creeper, and Pelagic Cormorant. A flock of fifty or sixty Calidris sandpipers tormented me on the Samish Flats, too--I was pretty sure there were Westerns among them, but I could never get an ID. They would not settle down!

Good birds today included these:

Blue-winged Teal, one on Minkler Flats;

Cinnamon Teal, three on Minkler Flats;

Sora, birds heard on Minkler Flats and Butler Flats;

Black-bellied Plover, upwards of 150 on Samish Flats;

Lesser Yellowlegs, one at West Edison;

S-B Dowitcher, one on Samish Flats;

Bonaparte's Gull, a goodly flock off Samish Island;

Caspian Tern, one off Samish Island;

Short-eared Owl, four on Samish Flats, after a long time when I'd not seen any there;

Townsend's Solitaire, one at Corkindale, three at Marblemount Boat Launch;

Mt Bluebird, seven at Corkindale;

It was very pleasant seeing the shorebirds in breeding plumage out on Samish Flats. There are huge puddles in many fields--who knows what might turn up out there in the coming days!

Yours truly,

Gary Bletsch