"That … is not a Red-tailed Hawk" … the day's most memorable utterance, by Alan G, from atop our Big Sit location this last Saturday (yes, we stayed within our 17 foot diameter circle). The youngster, a light morph Broad-winged Hawk, gave us fabulous looks as it soared and kettled and circled over the bluff - not once, not twice but in 5 circuits over close to an hour. No question, this (for us an ultra rare) lovely raptor will be chalked up as the highlight (here's our eBird list with some so-so photos
https://ebird.org/checklist/S120343220 <
https://ebird.org/checklist/S120343220> … P.S. this young BWHA has continued to show daily over Disco, including yesterday), but equally joyous was spotting folks with familiar field marks trucking along, heading up to our sandy hill. All on a near-perfect day (fog early on and a slight orange cast to views as well as photos due to wildfire smoke). On top of all that, we merrily engaged a steady stream of the public (what-the-heck are you looking at … whales?) into a chance to mold tomorrow's bird-nutties!
Celebrate, all who joined the South Meadowlark's 14th Annual Big Sit, for minutes or hours… great camaraderie (and yes, snacks too). Owls eluded us at both ends of our 11 hour vigil! Notwithstanding, it was a very fine day spent among very fine folks … and birds (52 species).
Elaine
elc at uw dot edu
Seattle
From: Elaine Chuang <
elc at uw.edu>
Sent: Sunday, October 2, 2022 11:50 AM
To:
tweeters at u.washington.edu <
tweeters at u.washington.edu>
Subject: [Tweeters] The Big Sit! (2022) … Sat, October 8 at Discovery Park
Greetings to birding friends in the Seattle area and beyond. For those unfamiliar, the The Big Sit! <
https://www.thebigsit.org/> was founded in New Haven, Connecticut in 1992 and is conducted annually for fun, internationally in fact. Without question, this is birding's most sedentary event (also designated The Big Snack by Neil our founder). This year, veteran devotees (AS, KS, AG, EC et al) are again joining together for an autumn dose of Community Science and Camaraderie over birds. Specifically, the South Meadowlarks will take up our posts in the required 17-foot diameter circle, from pre-dawn until who knows when on Saturday, October 8. The goal is to identify as many species as possible by sight and / or sound (to date, our team record is 56 species), and per the rules, participants cannot venture outside of that tiny circle.
We can be found at Discovery Park's South Bluff, Sand Dunes this coming Saturday. Stop by to say hi, encourage the team, get involved in the fun and maybe help find a birdie or two...
Elaine
elc at uw dot edu
Seattle
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Elaine