On Friday at the BLM office there was a PALM WARBLER in about the same
place I had seen two earlier in the week- maybe it'll stay around for a
while, they have overwintered in that general are several times.
Down to Curry on Saturday and Sunday. Pretty foggy all day Saturday. I
found at least three LAPLAND LONGSPURS at Floras Lake, mixed in with pipit
flocks (why that, pipit, is the name of our new dog, one my wife choice
without input from me!). In the thick fog I found a single PALM WARBLER at
the Blue Silos on the way out.
The most awe inspiring sighting was the CA GULL flock at Brookings that
Alan C. commented on. On Sunday morning I counted a slick of 2,000 a little
upriver from the jetties, another 1,000 resting on the north jetty, and
another thousand in the air and on the water at the end of the jetty.
Pretty darn cool. I managed to miss the Trikes Alan found, a great Curry
bird, species #410 for Curry.
Saturday afternoon late I was east of Gold Beach up near Snow Camp. In the
large burn area there were BAND-TAILED PIGEONS by the score. In one spot I
had a couple hundred in about thirty different snags covering several
acres. They were just perched up in the very tops of the snags, five to
ten a tree. They were feeding low in the California coffee berry bushes in
the burn area- on the berries of course.
Today while walking with Pipit on the beach on the north spit, we flushed a
juvie PACIFIC-GOLDEN PLOVER, a lifer for her I think, not sure where she
was at her first three years but I bet she never saw one of these before ; )
Happy birding!
Tim Rodenkirk
back in drizzly Coos Bay
