Hello Tweeters,

To follow-up on Gary's posting, I had a Sharp-tailed Sandpiper at Eide Road yesterday morning. I didn't post it then because if flew off with a flock of Western Sandpipers and we could not relocate it.
We also encountered hunters as Eide Rd. at 7:00 a.m. as we arrived before high tide. It was the first day of goose hunting season. Hunters were stationed along the west side of the new estuary having walked into the wetlands from the parking area at the Davis Slough. We heard gunshots from there. It was a bit scary at first, but they moved their location farther from the road and we felt more comfortable walking along the dike. Later as we neared the end of the new dike, we heard more gunshots from two other locations to the south. Most shots seemed to miss their targets, but we did see a couple of geese fall from the sky. Once the shooting started over 600 geese flew off to the east well out of range of the hunters. There are long lulls between bursts of shooting as the hunters have to wait until the geese are in the proper location for shooting.
As we walked back to the car a couple of hours later, we met the hunters from the Davis Slough area walking along the dike. They said they were changing their location and could legally hunt from that side of the estuary and were going to walk into the wetlands to the south of the end of the dike. They said they would be quite a distance south and are required to fire their guns away from the roads and any houses. They added that we would be safe on the dike.
I'll add that Eide Rd. has provided good shorebird viewing in the four trips we have made there on July 25, August 8, 25, and September 5. Yesterday in addition to the Sharp-tailed Sandpiper, a life bird for me, Canada Geese, and Ring-billed Gulls there was a large flock of about 3,000 Western Sandpipers, 2 Baird's Sandpipers, at least 30 Semipalmated Plovers, a Lesser Yellowlegs, many Killdeer, and six Greater White-fronted Geese. A Franklin's Gull was reported but we did not see it.
Gary's and the other postings I have been reading show there is good fall birding right now. Enjoy it!

Andy McCormick
Bellevue, WA



From: Tweeters On Behalf Of Gary Bletsch
Sent: Saturday, September 05, 2020 9:52 AM
To: Tweeters Tweeters <tweeters at u.washington.edu>
Subject: [Tweeters] Skagit Sharp-tailed Sandpiper

Dear Tweeters,

There was a Sharp-tailed Sandpiper at the Fir Island Game Range yesterday, Friday evening the fourth of September. Please excuse the late notice; Yahoo Mail is no longer functioning via Microsoft's browser, for some reason.

Last night was the first time this shorebird season that I have witnessed the phenomenon of "shorebird boats" at the Game Range. This usually happens in the evening this time of year, when the main pond is full of water, and shorebirds ride around on slowly floating logs, often at close range and with excellent lighting. Over the past few weeks, I have seen a very few logs with small numbers of sandpipers on them; last night was the real naumachia. The species involved included both yellowlegs, both dowitchers (mostly Short-billed), Pectoral Sandpipers, the Sharp-tailed, and even a Wilson's Snipe. Best viewing is from atop the dike, facing east, with the viewing blind--the one with the ludicrously low ceiling--at one's back.

Hunters have told me that the Early Goose Season begins today, the fifth, and lasts five days. Luckily, the part of the Game Range where the shorebirds float by is within the "safety zone." Birding at Jensen Access, the Samish Nineties, and other WDFW accesses might be a challenge for a few days.

As I sat in my car in the boat-launch parking lot, tallying the list and listening to the radio as the Mariners beat the Rangers, I heard what was almost certainly the "quock" of a Black-crowned Night Heron, a species once fairly common on Fir Island, and now virtually absent for the last ten years. I turned off the motor and jumped out, but never heard it again. It pays to stay there until dusk.

Yours truly,

Gary Bletsch
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mailman11.u.washington.edu/pipermail/tweeters/attachments/20200906/611e8e94/attachment.html>