Black Rail, Alviso Marina County Park, CA, August, 2018

Another business trip to the San Francisco Bay Area meant another opportunity for adding a statebird or two to my CA list.  As with most of my trips, my birding time is limited to short treks after work, so targets need to be pretty close nearby.  With that limitation, and given that I’ve birded in the area quite a bit, my possibilities are usually pretty limited.  In fact, there were no possible statebirds at all on my last couple trips to the Bay Area.

Prior to this trip I set up an eBird Needs Alert for CA, and after wading through the numerous sightings of uncountable Egyptian Goose, Indian Peafowl, and many Parrot species, I eventually found a number of recent reports of Black Rails in Santa Clara County.  Black Rails have popped up on several of my previous CA Needs Alerts, but they were never close enough to be able to give them a try.  However, this time they were being seen at Alviso Marina County Park which is just 40 minutes from work, so definitely within striking distance.  I had my target.

Now it was time to do my detailed detective work.  Up to 5 Black Rails were being heard and seen (!) daily at this small park.  Many of the reports mentioned that the Rails were giving a growl call which I was unfamiliar with.  But that was one of the calls included in my iBird Pro app, so I was able to study this less typical call.  As for location, they were most often at the end of the shortest boardwalk “next to the Gatorade bottle”.  I found a map of the park on-line, and quickly found the location of the boardwalk, and a couple photos showed birds next to a Gatorade bottle that had been tossed into the marsh.  So I had a good handle on where to look and listen.  However most reports were in the early morning, and I wouldn’t be free to try for them until after work, so I was a bit worried whether the time of day would reduce my chances.  Nevertheless, I felt well-prepared to give this tiny, secretive bird a try.

Work was over right on time on my last day of the trip, and I headed south toward Alviso Marina County Park.  Luckily most of the rush hour traffic was heading the other direction, so I made it to the park pretty quickly.  I made my way to the short boardwalk, walked to the end, and spotted the Gatorade bottle down below. 

I had the right location, now I just needed the birds to cooperate.  I waited at least 15 minutes hearing no calls, nor seeing any activity in the marsh down below.  Did I need to be there in the early morning?  Then finally I heard a Black Rail giving its growl call off to the left.  Then a second bird joined in.  Eventually the calls were closer, seemingly right below me.  Then I started to hear a different call sounding like “keek keek keek”, similar to the cadence of the “kic kee doo” call, but all on one pitch.  And then I spotted a brief glimpse of a bird a few inches away from the infamous Gatorade bottle.

I was able to get this recording of the “keek keek keek” call on my iPhone.

CA was my 9th state for Black Rail, and the 4th time I’ve seen this elusive species (see my statebird map below).

With a couple hours of light remaining, my attention turned to a second possible target – Semipalmated Sandpiper.  One had been seen the last couple of days at Yosemite Slough, a restored wetlands on the waterfront in San Francisco.  I hadn’t brought my scope with me, but I thought maybe I could arrive at the right location, find other birders with scopes, and get views of the bird through their optics.  And since my hotel that night was close to the airport a short distance from Yosemite Slough, I figured it was worth a try. 

After a not-so-bad rush hour drive I exited Route 101 in San Francisco and started winding my way through the city on surface streets to get to the waterfront.  On GoogleMaps I could see 3 possible access points to the Slough – at the ends of Wallace, Van Dyke, or Griffith Streets.  But as I got closer to the area I left suburban neighborhoods and soon entered a really rough-looking industrial area.  I went right on by Wallace and Van Dyke Streets not wanting to stop even if there was access.  And at the end of Griffith Street I found a closed gate and chain link fence with a no trespassing sign.  That’s probably a good thing because even if I did find access there and left my car to go birding I’m not sure it would have been in 1 piece when I returned.  I quickly turned my car around and left the area, with no regrets.  There must be safe access to this spot from somewhere.  As it turns out the last sighting of the Semi Sand was the day before I was there so I probably didn’t miss it that day after all.

As I made my way to the hotel I reflected on that evening’s birding adventures - although I was happy to have added a new statebird to my CA list, bringing my total to 392, I was even happier to have returned from the San Francisco waterfront unscathed.

Broad-billed Hummingbird, San Francisco, CA, March 2018

My March business trip to the San Francisco Bay Area was around the corner, and I was looking forward to trying to do some early morning or late evening birding while in the area.  But as the trip neared my schedule got busier and busier, and most of my free time, even before or after the 9-to-5 hours, turned out to be limited.  I checked out eBird Needs Alerts anyway, and luckily there was 1 that I might be able to squeeze in.  And it was a really nice rarity at that - a Broad-billed Hummingbird in San Francisco.  This was a first county record, coming to a backyard feeder in downtown San Francisco.  The bird had been there for a while, and was seen daily.  But one recent post mentioned that Broad-bills in CA normally leave their wintering locations by mid-March, so that birder suggested anyone who hadn’t seen it yet shouldn’t wait too much longer.  So I planned to give it a try the first morning I was in the area, though time would be really tight so I could only wait maybe an hour for the Hummingbird to visit the feeder. 

The next morning it was a bit of a daunting task to maneuver around the San Francisco streets in the pre-dawn darkness, but I was able to find the correct neighborhood, and even find a place to park near the location of the feeder.  Directions on a few posts said to stand on 36th Street, and look to the 3rd fenced-in backyard to the east on Geary Boulevard.  I arrived at the viewing spot on 36th Street about 20 minutes before dawn, and in the dim light I looked to the east and could see the small back yards of the Geary Blvd. houses.  Several birders included photos in their eBird reports that showed the feeder attached to a tall tree in that 3rd yard, but others mentioned it was tough to even see the feeder.  So although it was still too dark to hope to see the Hummingbird, I figured I would use this time to locate the feeder and settle in to hopefully wait for the bird to appear.   

With a little searching in the dim light I found the right yard, then the tree that looked like the one shown in the photos.  And then just a couple seconds later I located the feeder.  And then to my surprise I thought I could see a Hummingbird on the feeder.  I looked closer and sure enough it was a Hummingbird, but which species was it?  Earlier lists had included Anna’s, Allen’s, and Rufous at the feeder, so I needed to try to make an ID in the limited light.  With a little concentration I could see that the bird was bluish-green below, and had a reddish base to its bill.  It was indeed the Broad-billed Hummingbird.  I continued to watch it as it fed, and then a minute later it flew off.  Boy was I lucky! 

Here is a photo of the small back yards and the location of the feeder.  Needless to say the Hummingbird is not visible.

I thought about staying to wait for the bird to return and get better views in brighter light after sunrise, but work was calling, and I decided to call it quits and head into the office.  My success made my commute through San Francisco rush hour traffic bearable – well almost.  If only all my searches were as successful as this one.  Earlier in the week my travels took me to Seattle where a brief early morning search for a flock of Common Redpolls was unsuccessful – my visit happened to be on the first day these birds were not seen after 2 weeks of daily observations. 

Broad-billed Hummingbird was statebird #391 for me in CA.  And I was surprised to see that CA was my 7th state for this species – of course in AZ where it is regular, and now 6 other states as a rarity (see my statebird map below).

Nazca Booby, Life Bird, San Diego, CA, February 2018

With business trips to southern CA and the San Francisco Bay area on consecutive weeks, I decided to stay out in CA and take the weekend “off” instead of flying back and forth both weeks.  Not only would it save my company some money, but it would also give me some birding time in the region.  For a few years I’ve been thinking of adding some vacation time to a southern CA trip to head to the Las Vegas area to work on my NV list, and this would be the ideal opportunity.  I set up an eBird Needs Alert for NV and there were indeed lots of possibilities for my NV list.  Things were coming together.

But just as I was starting to plan for NV I remembered seeing reports of Nazca Booby’s somewhere in southern CA.  With a bit of research on the eBird Rarities Alerts I found daily sightings of up to 4 Booby’s in San Diego Bay.  And then I noticed multiple sightings of Streak-backed Oriole in Tucson.  Both would be life birds for me.  Could I make a giant loop south to San Diego, east to Tucson, north to Las Vegas, and then back toward Los Angeles to fly north to SFO?  I wouldn’t be proud of my carbon footprint, but it was all possible if I made it a 3-day weekend, though I wouldn’t have much time in NV.  And of course it would help if my key targets (the Booby and Oriole) were cooperative.  So I started planning for all 3 parts of my trip.

Birders were principally reporting the Nazca Booby’s while standing at 3 locations on the west side of San Diego Bay, with sightings from land mostly being pretty far away.  The prime location to look for the birds seemed to be from Attu Avenue.  Given the distant views, some birders were renting boats to get closer looks at the birds.  The Booby’s were often reported perched on buoys, especially buoy #34, rather than in flight.  So with these details, and daily positive reports, I was optimistic that I could see one or more birds quickly with an early morning stop, and then head to Tucson for the Oriole.

Then again, the Oriole was a different story.  It was coming to a feeder in a suburban yard, but not very reliably.  In fact one birder posted that he finally saw the bird on his 11th try!  That post made me dig a bit deeper and I was able to start to find negative eBird reports for that hotspot.  As my trip neared I saw no positive reports for the 5 days before my birding weekend, and several negative posts.  Typically birders will post if they see the target, but often won’t post if they miss it.  So no positive reports at all was probably bad news, especially for several days in a row.  Should I pass on the Oriole and “just” make it a San Diego and Las Vegas trip?  I waited until the last night of work but again only saw negative posts.  So at that point I revised my itinerary to head out early morning to San Diego, and then make my way to Las Vegas, skipping a try for the Oriole.

I arrived at Attu Avenue on the west side of San Diego bay as it was just starting to get light, and then made the short walk to the shore.  The bay was full of waterfowl – diving ducks, Brant, Aechmophorus grebes, and more.  But I was there for the Booby’s, so I quickly focused my attention on finding the buoys that were their preferred roosts.  From what I could tell from the eBird posts, the buoys would be northeast of my location, and likely on the far side of the bay.  Plus recent photos of the birds’ favorite buoy 34 had the broadside of a large gray ship in the background.  So I started to scan in that general direction and began to find buoys in the area, but it was still pretty dark so I wasn’t seeing numbers on them.  Then as I continued to pan a bit farther to the north I came upon a ship that looked like the one in the photos.  And sure enough there was a buoy in front of it.  I was in the right general area.

As I started to settle in and wait for sunrise I relooked at that buoy in front of the ship – wasn’t there a large pale bird on the lower level of the buoy?  I zoomed in to the fullest extent of my 50x eyepiece, and sure enough it looked like I might have my target bird roosting right there on the buoy.  But it was really far away (I later estimated 1.25 miles), and still pretty low light so I couldn’t be sure - basically I was seeing little more than a white dot in an all dark background.  But a couple minutes later the bird stretched its wings and I could see the diagnostic white body and leading edge of the wings, with black wingtips and trailing edges.  It was indeed a Nazca Booby!  Or maybe more accurately, either a Masked or Nazca Booby.

I continued to watch the buoy and could see the Booby move around a bit.  And then a bit later it was finally light enough for me to see the number on the buoy – it was #34 – its favorite.  A bit later the Booby stretched again, and then took off flying south down the far side of the bay low over the water.  As I continued to stay with the bird a second Booby joined it.  It must have been perched on another buoy nearby.  I watched them both for the next several minutes, diving a couple times, and generally making their way south.  Eventually both birds disappeared to the south at the closed end of the bay.  I decided to head down that way to Grand Caribe Shoreline Park hoping to re-find them perched closer nearby, but I could not relocate them.  Perhaps they headed out to the open ocean for their breakfast.  Or perhaps they had turned around and headed back north.  I thought about heading back to Attu Ave. to try to see if they had returned there, but given my plans for NV, I decided to make an early exit and head off to the Las Vegas area. 

But then again, with success finding the Booby’s so quickly, should I head to Tucson for the Oriole after all?  I quickly checked all the websites – there were no updates on NARBA, eBird, or the AZ listserve.  So although I was disappointed to pass on another possible life bird, it was indeed on to NV.

As I started the drive from San Diego I started to reflect a bit on my Booby sighting.  The key field mark to tell Nazca from Masked Booby is the bill color – orange to red for Nazca and more yellowish for Masked.  It was certainly not possible to see bill color when I had the one bird perched on the buoy.  And even though the 2 birds were a bit closer when they flew by, they were still maybe three quarters of a mile away at their closest point.  So I still couldn’t see bill color even then.  Other birders seemed to lament the same issue in their reports on eBird, which although the listed ID was Nazca Booby, several included comments that indicated bill color couldn’t be determined.  At least there were some photos of the birds seen at close distance with definitive IDs (when birders were on a boat out in the bay).  And there were no Masked Booby’s reported in the bay.  So although I couldn’t eliminate Masked Booby, I guess I could go with the Nazca Booby ID as many other birders did at least based on strongly circumstantial evidence. 

Nazca Booby was my Continental ABA bird #751 and Lower 48 #730.  And I can’t forget it was a new statebird for me in CA - #390.

And although I’ve never been to Attu (in Alaska), I guess I can now say at least I’ve birded Attu Avenue…

Baird’s Sandpiper and Northern Gannet, August 2017 - Can you Guess the Unlikely Location?

If you had to guess – what state would I be in to add both Baird’s Sandpiper and Northern Gannet as new statebirds in August? 

Baird’s Sandpiper is a rather common migrant throughout the middle of the country, and a rarer but regular migrant elsewhere across the US.  As shown in my Baird’s statebird map below, I’ve seen this species throughout most of its regular migration range, except for LA.  Plus I need it in several southeastern and southwestern states, and NY, where it’s a rarer migrant.

By comparison Gannet is typically only seen in summer along the north Atlantic coast, but is a regular winter bird throughout the Atlantic and Gulf coasts.  I’ve seen Gannet in each of the Atlantic coast states but only in the Gulf in FL and AL. 

So perhaps the most likely single location to add both of these birds as new statebirds would be LA, though it would require a very rare summer sighting of the Gannet.

But the real answer is – I was birding in CA, and added both stakeout birds to my CA statelist in August 2017 at the end of a business trip to the San Francisco bay area.  Now for the story –

An extremely rare Gannet had been reported recently at Devil’s Slide County Park, most often seen perching on Egg Rock off-shore with Cormorants.  This is likely the same Gannet that was found earlier in the year farther down the coast at Ano Nuevo State Park, which preferred to perch on a rock some 2.2 miles offshore among a colony of Western Gulls.  That is except for the day I was there in March 2017.  At least Egg Rock was much closer to shore – a mere 1,400 ft or a quarter mile away.

Up to 4 juvenile Baird’s Sandpipers had been reported at Venice Beach a short distance south of the Gannet location.  I had birded that spot back in March, finding a pair of Glaucous Gulls to my CA list, plus finding an impressive flock of 23 Snowy Plovers.  The Baird’s were reported near the outlet of Pilarcitos Creek. 

My plan was to finish my last day of my business trip, and in route to the SFO airport, first stop at Devil’s Slide.  Then I would head south to Venice Beach, accessing the beach from the end of Venice Boulevard, and then drive to my hotel near SFO.

I arrived at Devil’s Slide right on schedule in the late afternoon, and walked right to the spot where I could see Egg Rock.  It was a cloudy day so I wouldn’t have to contend with looking into the western sun.  Plus earlier I had traded e-mails with local birders to make sure the rock was close enough to be able to spot the Gannet with binocs.  That was all good news.  The bad news was that there were almost no birds perched on the rock at all – at most only about 25 Cormorants and obviously no Gannet, presumably because the birds were out feeding instead of roosting.  So I began to scan the water in the area hoping to find the bird foraging nearby.  The water was covered in an impressive number of Murres, Cormorants, and gulls, but still no Gannet.  I continued to search the water and the rock for about an hour, but the best highlight was 3 whales that passed by quite close to the coast. 

Having no luck with the Gannet, I decided to head south for a quick try for the Baird’s, and then come back to Devil’s Slide for a second attempt at the Gannet.  Just 15 minutes later I had parked my car at Venice Beach and walked toward the mouth of Pilarcitos Creek.  But there were no shorebirds in site.  And in fact there was no habitat that would support foraging Baird’s.  Nothing looked like the habitat in the photos I had seen on eBird so I figured I must be in the wrong spot.  I looked to the south and saw much better habitat in the stretch of the creek that paralleled the coastline.  But how do you access that area?  On GoogleMaps I could see what looked like a trail leading to the coast from the end of Beach Avenue so I decided to give that a try.

After a short drive I was on Beach Avenue and sure enough found a trail heading to the coast.  And soon I was on top of the bluff looking down to the creek bed.  I quickly spotted some shorebirds down below me but they were just Western Sands, Semi Plovers, and Killdeer.  Now I was wishing I had brought my scope to look farther south.  I continued to walk a bit farther south and got a different viewpoint and quickly spotted a larger peep standing on a drier part of the creek bed – a Baird’s Sandpiper!  Although I wanted to stay to look for the other Baird’s, it had taken me an hour to find the right spot at Venice Beach, and I still needed to make a second try for the Gannet.  So I decided to head back to the car, but first got this distant picture of the Baird’s holding my phone up to my binocs.

Twenty minutes later I was back at Egg Rock, but unfortunately there were still just a few Cormorants perched there.  Then I spotted a bit of white on the rock which was most likely just a partially obscured Western Gull.  But since it was the only white bird there I focused on it to be sure.  Just as I was concentrating on the Gull the Gannet flew right through my binocular field – between me and the rock.  I watched it fly around near Egg Rock for the next 5 minutes, though it never landed.  I was able to get several videos of the bird holding my phone up to my binocs – here is the shortest one.

I have to ask myself how would a Gannet get to the CA coast from its regular range in the Atlantic?  Would one fly to the Pacific via the Arctic?  Or would it perhaps take a more direct but landlocked route somewhere across North America?  Who’s to say.

In any case, sure is nice when it all comes together, especially for the extremely rare Gannet.  And adding 2 new birds brings my CA statelist to 389. 

3 California Statebirds in the Bay Area, March 2017

Another business trip to the San Francisco Bay Area in March meant another opportunity to add a couple birds to my CA statelist.  The eBird CA Needs Alert included several possibilities in the general area, including several gulls like Glaucous and Lesser Black-backed, not to mention one real rarity – an adult Slaty-Backed.  And then there was a Laughing Gull and several Black-legged Kittiwakes, though I didn’t need these species for my CA list.  I really enjoy “gulling”, so this was looking like it could be a fun trip.  Plus there was an Emperor Goose that had spent the entire winter at a golf course in the area.  But none of the birds were in the immediate vicinity where I would be working, so it would be tough to squeeze in time to chase after these targets before or after work.  So instead I decided to take most of a day off work, allowing me to bird a bit farther afield.

Now came the pick-and-shovel work of researching the sightings.  The Emperor Goose seemed like it would be easy – a quick stop at the Sharp Park Golf Course in San Mateo County would yield this rarity hanging out with a small group of Canadas.  (Though many of the eBird posts incorrectly gave its location as the ocean beach nearby.)  Most of the gull sightings were in several locations around Half Moon Bay, like the Denniston Creek mouth, Pillar Point Harbor, Pilarcitos Creek mouth, and Venice Beach, all also in San Mateo County.  And since gulls will move around a lot, stops at each of these locations were likely in order.  I’m not sure I ever found any specific directions or locations for any of these hotspots in the eBird posts, but with some GoogleMaps research I’m pretty sure I found each spot and was likely good to go. 

But just as my trip neared there were no more posts of sightings of the Slaty-backed.  And then the posts of the Emperor stopped, including one on the listserve where a birder specifically looked for the Goose unsuccessfully.  At least posts for multiple first-year Glaucous Gulls and Lesser Black-backs of all ages continued, including one post of an adult Lesser with a photo of an extremely dark bird seemingly darker than the graellsii I’m used to seeing in the East.  And then came posts of a Gannet being seen at Ano Nuevo State Park.  So I nixed my planned stop for the Goose, and decided to start at dawn at Denniston Creek Mouth at the northern end of Half Moon Bay, work my way south gulling along the way, and then eventually get to Ano Nuevo to try for the Gannet.  Although that might only be a half-day of birding, I had several conference calls I also needed to take for work that day, so that would fill up my day.

My first stop was the spot described in eBird as the Denniston Creek Mouth.  With my GoogleMaps research I could easily see the mouth of the creek just to the west of Pillar Point Harbor, but wasn’t sure how to access it.  I assumed the right approach was to scope it from the western end of the parking lot at the harbor, so I arrived there shortly before dawn to give it a try.  The tide was quite low, and there were about 300 gulls along the beach and at the mouth of the creek actively bathing.  Plus there were many coming and going, so I was likely at the proper spot.

Now the challenge was to sort through the dizzying array of species (and hybrids!) to try to find my targets.  Check out these phonescoped photos of a small portion of the flock in the distance in the early morning sun. 

The first target was Glaucous Gull – all of the sightings had been of first-year birds so I needed to find a larger gull which was mostly white with very white wing tips, and a dark-tipped pale bill.  In the East a bird like that really stands out.  But on the West coast, finding a very pale Glaucous among a sea of not-so-pale immature Glaucous-wings was a much taller task.  And then when you throw in the pale, though admittedly smaller, Thayer’s into the mix, it’s an even greater challenge.  This flock featured numerous immature Glaucous-wings and several Thayer’s, but I couldn’t locate a Glaucous.

While poring through the flock I noticed a second-year bird that caught my attention.  In this plumage the mantle is a reasonably uniform color like that of an adult, but the wing feathers are mottled more like a first-year bird.  The first thing I noticed on this bird was its mantle which was much darker than the adult California and Western Gulls in the flock.  Now that it had my attention I keyed in on size and shape – a bit bigger than California, and very long-winged.  I was starting to like this bird for a second-year Lesser Black-back.  But if so, it might well be a bird of the intermedius race.  I was only able to watch it for a couple minutes before it either disappeared in the flock or more likely flew off to the harbor.  Although I would have rather ID’d an adult Lesser, I was happy with calling this bird a second-year Lesser Black-backed Gull. 

CA was my 28^th state for this species (see my statebird map below) – not bad for a bird that not too long ago was considered to be a rarity from Europe that birders would search for principally in the northeast.

 
I spent more than an hour birding the creek area, and felt like I was seeing the same birds over and over again, so I decided to head south to the next locations.  Though I admit I was a bit concerned whether I had effectively birded the adjacent eBird hotspot labeled Pillar Point Harbor.  I assumed birds tied to the harbor hotspot were coming and going from the Denniston Creek mouth location, but with no details I couldn’t be sure.

A few minutes later I arrived at the Half Moon Bay State Park, where after paying the $10 daily use fee, I parked in the parking lot ready to make the walk north to the next two hotspots – Pilarcitos Creek Mouth and Venice Beach.  In my earlier research on GoogleMaps I could see that these two locations were just a couple hundred yards apart on either side of the mouth of Pilarcitos Creek.  That put them about a mile north of the State Park parking lot, but I hoped that a 2-mile roundtrip walk on the beach would be worthwhile.  As I made my way north I could see two flocks of gulls up ahead on the beach, so I was optimistic.

For some reason it took me quite a bit longer than expected to reach the gulls; maybe it was because I couldn’t find any hard-packed sand to walk in.  But when I finally arrived I found just 100 gulls in a tight flock on the south side of the creek mouth.  And north of the creek was an even smaller flock, and it was a bit too far for good IDs.  A quick scan through the nearer flock didn’t reveal anything of interest.  But like my stop at Denniston Creek there were always birds coming and going.  So I decided that since I had dedicated so much energy to birding this location, I may as well stay a while and hope that a rarity would drop in.  About 30 minutes later a fisherman came walking south down the beach and flushed all the gulls.  And worse yet, he decided to fish in the exact spot where the flock of gulls had been roosting.  I waited a few more minutes but the entire flock was gone.  Ugh…

On my way back to the car I met up with a local beachgoer who mentioned that all the rains that winter had actually resulted in the mouth of the creek shifting nearly a half-mile to the north.  Another reason why it took me longer to get there than expected.  I was feeling pretty sorry for myself during the long slow walk back when all of a sudden I flushed a small shorebird practically at my feet in the soft sand.  Then with another step a couple more flushed from underfoot – they were Snowy Plovers.  I stopped and carefully scanned the beach and counted 23 Plovers (plus 1 Sanderling), 1 bird each nicely resting in a depression in the sand made by a footstep of a recent beachgoer.  I took this photo of the birds on the beach using my iPhone with no magnification – can you pick out the Plovers?

Plus I was able to get some phonescoped shots of these cooperative birds, which turned out really nice if I do say so myself.

A nice consolation for what was otherwise a long and fruitless walk. 

Next I was on to Ano Nuevo State Park to try for the Gannet.  Well actually I wasn’t heading to the State Park itself, but instead to a pullout along Route 1 a short distance south of the park which would afford distant views of Ano Nuevo Island.  The Gannet was being seen perched on the island among a colony of Western Gulls, and sometimes plunge feeding in the cove near the island.  But I left out one key detail – the island was 2.2 miles away from pullout.  (I said the views were distant!)  Although viewing conditions were ideal, even with my Swarovski maxed out at 50 power the gulls were just barely identifiable specks.  And although I spent 45 minutes looking for a white speck twice the size of the gull specks, I couldn’t find the Gannet among the gulls.  Of course the bird could have been out of view on the far side of the island, or maybe off foraging somewhere else.  Or maybe I just wasn’t using enough imagination.  In any case, it was pretty disappointing.

It was now only mid-day, and I had a bit more time before my next work call.  Should I spend more time trying to find the Gannet, go back to search for more gulls, head somewhere else to bird, or just call it quits altogether?  Ending my birding day this early was my least favorite option, especially since I had only found one of my targets.  And more scanning for that distant Gannet wasn’t exactly my cup of tea.  Then I remembered Needs Alert reports of a reliable Red-naped Sapsucker inland in Santa Clara County south of San Jose.  I hadn’t originally planned on trying for this bird since I had thought I was going to spend the entire day on the coast.  But since I had some time on my hands, I decided to head inland to give it a try.

I was heading to Almaden Lake Park, and specifically the southern end of the park to the Los Alamitos Creek Trail.  The posts mentioned the bird was being seen in pepper trees adjacent to the Arroyo Picnic area.  In fact one even mentioned its “favorite pepper tree”, with a photo showing the bird perched on a large branch full of sapsucker holes.  I wasn’t sure what a pepper tree looked like, but I would think it would be pretty easy to find the tree with all the sapsucker holes.  After about an hour’s drive I arrived at the park and just as I pulled into the parking lot I could see the covered picnic area mentioned in the posts.  Soon I was standing at the picnic tables looking for trees with sapsucker holes.  But after a couple minutes of quick searching I came up empty. 

Then I did a quick Google search for images of “pepper tree” on my iPhone.  And now that I knew what pepper trees looked like, I realized there was a small grove of maybe a dozen pepper trees between the parking lot and the picnic area.  I had walked right past them!  So I headed back to those trees and began to find sapsucker holes in most of the trees.  And just a minute later I got a glimpse of a woodpecker flying between the trees with large white wing patches.  With a bit of patience the bird came into view on a trunk above me and it was indeed the Red-naped Sapsucker.  If I had completed my detective work properly and figured out what a pepper tree looked like in the first place I may well have found the bird even quicker. 

Although it’s nice to get the Red-naped as a winter rarity in central CA, I still need it in in its regular breeding range in eastern OR and western MT – two areas where I still haven’t birded.  CA is now only my 2^nd state (in addition to AZ) where I’ve seen all 4 Sapsucker species. 

Once again I had some free time, so I reached out to local birder Peter Metropulos who had given me some advice as I was preparing for my trip.  He offered to do some coastal gulling with me late in the day, so we met up at Venice Beach to try that area again.  But this time we met at the parking lot to Venice Beach, rather than taking the long hike from the State Park.  With a short walk we were on the low bluff overlooking the beach and could see a small flock of gulls a short distance to the north.  So we repositioned ourselves to be closer to the flock and soon were looking almost right down on the birds.  A first scan didn’t reveal anything unusual.  But then we both almost simultaneously picked out a first year Glaucous Gull – in virtually pure white plumage. 

And then just a minute later I spotted this second Glaucous, which was just a bit darker than the first gull.

Neither of these birds were in the flock when we first arrived – with all those birds coming and going we were very happy with our timing.  CA was my 20^th state for Glaucous Gull, several as a winter rarity.

Later we found this dark gull which we dubbed a “charcoal gull” – perhaps a Western Gull still in juvenile plumage?  But who knows…

With 3 new CA birds my statelist now stands at 387 – would be nice to get to 400 someday.  And I ended the day with 10 gull species which I believe is a personal daily record.  Sure was fun spending all that time with those challenging gulls out West.  I said I love gulling…

Short-tailed Shearwater – New Lower 48 Species, Monterey, CA, November 2016

My work travels regularly take me to the San Francisco Bay Area, and on several recent trips I’ve squeezed in a bit of time to go birding.  On those trips my birding has been limited to brief stops nearby, typically to chase after a local rarity.  For instance on my July 2016 trip I was able to add Indigo Bunting to my CA state list – a bird that had been spotted just an hour’s drive away. 

But as my November 2016 trip neared quite a number of potential meetings fell through, and it turned out I had an entire day free.  Although I could have flown home a day earlier, incurring significant airline change fees, instead I decided to take the day off and bird somewhere in the Bay Area.  So I set up an eBird Needs Alert to see what possible new statebirds might be around.  Unfortunately nothing popped up locally.  Then I thought about maybe heading up to Point Reyes.  Although I hadn’t been there in many years, I fondly remembered birding the varied habitats at the National Seashore.  So maybe I could spend a day of casual birding there, doing an extended seawatch there as well.  Then there was a post of a Glaucous Gull seen on the peninsula, so there would be at least 1 possible statebird to chase after.  So I packed my scope and binocs and developed a plan to spend a day birding a short distance north at Point Reyes.

As my trip progressed and my vacation day approached, I started to notice numerous posts of several species I needed for my CA list from organized daily seawatches on the Monterey peninsula.  It was a longer drive than I had planned for, but the targets included one species that would be new for my Lower 48 list (Short-tailed Shearwater – seen once before in Alaska in 1987), and one potential Lifebird (Flesh-footed Shearwater).  Not to mention sightings of Manx Shearwater and Tufted Puffin “only” as potential CA statebirds.  Now it seemed that the potential targets justified the longer drive, so I changed my plans and decided to join the local counters for a day-long seawatch at Pt. Pinos in Monterey. 

I arrived at the point a bit before sunrise, and fondly remembered that I had birded here a couple times before – most recently in 1987.  It was sobering to think that my most “recent” trip here was nearly 30 years ago.  I snapped these 2 shots of the sunrise as I waited for the light to improve a bit.

A few minutes later I was joined by Skye Haas who was the counter for the seawatches.  Skye commented that the best migration flights have occurred with northwest winds.  Unfortunately that morning there was at best just a light breeze, and it was out of the northeast.  As a result the day started slowly, with just a few flocks of Pacific Loons passing overhead, along with the regular gulls, cormorants, and pelicans. 

I was especially focused on the more distant horizon to look for shearwaters, and soon started to pick up an occasional Black-vented Shearwater.  I had only seen this species once before on a seawatch near Los Angeles in 2008, so it was nice to see this species again.  We also began to see an occasional Fulmar pretty far out.  Most Pacific Fulmars are all dark birds which look a lot like Sooty Shearwaters, especially in the far distance.  By comparison, most Fulmars on the Atlantic are paler birds, making ID a lot easier.  Skye gave me some good tips for separating these 2 similar species here on the Pacific.  Occasional Red Phalaropes were nice too, but certainly to be expected on these seawatches. 

But all of this meant it was turning out to be a pretty slow day.  Several times Skye lamented how slow it was.  Just my luck – my only day available for the seawatch and the weather wasn’t cooperating.  That just meant I needed to look even harder for my target birds. 

It was now mid-morning and we still just had a few of the regular migrants passing by.  Then I noticed a larger dark shearwater flying south.  I got Skye on the bird which luckily wasn’t too far out so it gave us good views.  I saw some paleness in the wing linings, and since I thought Short-tails had all dark wing linings, I thought it was going to be a Sooty.  But Skye pointed out that Sooty’s have much paler wing linings, and this bird was actually a Short-tailed Shearwater.  After it passed by I went back to my Sibley guide and sure enough realized that the underwings of a Short-tailed are a bit paler than the body, though still a lot darker than a Sooty.  I guess if it had been farther out I wouldn’t have seen any paleness at all.  And soon thereafter a Sooty Shearwater passed by flashing its underwings which looked white by comparison.  A great study on these dark Pacific shearwaters – and many thanks to Skye for the ID tips.

During the slower times of the day I took a few breaks from the seawatch to take a couple photos of cooperative birds nearby.  These Brewer’s Blackbirds were occasionally joined by a male “Bi-colored” Blackbird.

This Western Gull was most cooperative.

And this was a nice collection of Brandt’s and Pelagic Cormorants on some nearby rocks.

Not to mention this nice scenery shot.

I stayed at Pt. Pinos until about 3 PM before calling it quits after more than 8 hours of seawatching.  Selected totals recorded during my stay included -

Pacific Loon - 1,620

Northern Fulmar - 14

Sooty Shearwater - 2

Short-tailed Shearwater - 2

Sooty/Short-tailed Shearwater - 1

Black-vented Shearwater - 276

Red Phalarope - 463

That was undoubtedly the most Pacific Loons and Red Phalaropes I’ve ever seen in one day, and only the second time I’ve ever seen Black-vented and Short-tailed Shearwaters.  And of course I was happy to have added Short-tailed Shearwater to my Lower 48 list (#727) and to my CA statelist (#384). 

But although those might seem like nice totals, it’s all relative.  Check out these totals from two days earlier, in just one hour of seawatching from this same spot –

Pacific Loon – 2,274

Northern Fulmar - 43

Sooty Shearwater - 17

Short-tailed Shearwater - 22

Sooty/Short-tailed Shearwater - 23

Black-vented Shearwater - 257

Red Phalarope - 32

Plus –

Black-footed Albatross - 1

Pink-footed Shearwater – 2

Shearwater sp. – 75

Tufted Puffin – 1

If only there had been a bit of northwest wind the day I was there…