Tweets -
With Michael out today, Brian and I headed up the weekly walk. The 10 of us gathered realized pretty early on that Michael might well have snuck in yesterday and removed a good portion of the park's birds -- it was eerily quiet for much of the day. We seem to have hit a trough in the surges of migrants and local birds. Weather was refreshing -- cool, low 60s, and misting for much of the walk.

Despite the overall quiet, we did have some nice surprises as ever:

Great Blue Heron as with last week , some young on the nest again, rumbling away
Green Heron 2 , one immature at the lake platform, 1 adult at the Rowing Club pond looking sharp
Virginia Rail 1, decent views at lake platform
Sora 1, even better views, at lake platform
Greater Yellowlegs 1.fly-by at lake platform
Caspian Tern 1, fly-over in dog area, I think the first in ~2 months and I think our latest sighting ever at Marymoor
Pileated Woodpecker 1, early across the slough
Pacific-slope Flycatcher 1, at Rowing Club, our only flycatcher of the day
Swainson's Thursh only 1 seen, but before dawn I had several flying over giving their migration call note - first time this season for that.
American Robin making the list only because the total number was about the same as Swainson's Thursh - fewer than 10 all day - wow.
Lincoln's Sparrow 1, first of fall, at viewing mound - it looks like next week is typically the week they arrive at Marymoor very consistently, so a little early
Western Tanager 1 or 2

The rail show was the highlight of the day -- I'd heard Virginia Rail early at the lake platform, so we played for it while out there as a group, and one responded. When we went to look for it, we found a rail. Despite my trying to turn it into the heard Virginia Rail for a bit, wiser minds prevailed and said 'nope, that's a Sora' -- it ended up giving us amazing looks, and eventually the Virginia Rail came out to join it for less excellent but still good looks. Double rail views in one place!

We had a couple small flocks of mixed passerines - not the warbler flocks of recent weeks though- A few Black-throated Gray Warblers, a couple Warbling Vireos, Yellow Warblers, and nearby Common Yellowthroats, but none of the other warblers we might normally come across.

Notable misses show the changing of the season - No Black-headed Grosbeaks, no Western Wood-Pewees, probably no Willow Flycatchers [I heard a plausible 'whit' call repeated several times, but didn't think it was enough to be confident enough to count it]. No Owls, no Gulls, and a dip on Bushtit

For the day, we came up with 54 species.

Matt Bartels
Seattle, WA