FreeLists / va-bird / [va-bird] Brown Booby - YES

["Henry Brooks" <hbrooks-1@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

I decided to take the rest of the day off after checking the release of the 
weekly oil statistics which my team produces.  I left Alexandria about 11:30 am 
getting to First Landing Park a few minutes before 3 and met up with two other 
birders on the boardwalk by the Visitors Center next to the beach.  From that 
vantage point only the closest set of pilings showed the birds on them clearly, 
but there was no Brown Booby there, so I trudged off about 200 yards to the set 
of pilings near Fort Story with one of the birders while the other went on the 
base.  I set up about 50 yards from the pilings on the beach, just above the 
high tide mark. I checked the pilings there from 3:20 to 3:45 and only Brown 
Pelicans, gulls and terns were on them.  At 3:45 there was a big commotion as a 
bird came in and caused some of the Pelicans off their perches.  I checked the 
pilings about where this occurred, and then I spied a bird about 2/3 the size 
of a Pelican on a piling about halfway out.  It was not on a high piling, but 
one about a half the size of the biggest.  It was facing me and it was not 
standing, but sitting down on the piling.  The bill was clearly seen except for 
its legs which were under it, and the color pattern was that of the target 
bird. I handed the Swarovski scope to the other birder and they concurred that 
the Brown Booby still resides at Fort Story.  The birder who went to Fort Story 
could only see the back of the bird, and could not see its head or bill.  Only 
by coming around to First Landing Park were these details seen.

Henry Brooks
Alexandria