August 31 2019 - Ain't No Red-Necks Here

Redneck:  (slang, derogatory) A poor, rural, usually white and male, person from the Southern United States or parts of the Midwest and northeast, especially one who is unsophisticated and backward; sometimes with additional connotations of being rude, racist, and/or arrogant.

Well, I’m not rich; I am a white male; I've worked on a farm or two, although I’m currently a suburbanite; and I’ve often been identified as unsophisticated and backward.  Mom was an Okie.  I can be rude and arrogant, especially after a few whiskies . . .   But, I vehemently deplore racism.

But, that’s not what this Redneck is all about . . .

I drove over to the Coast this morning.  I was raised to not call it “going to the Beach”, because, unlike littoral areas elsewhere in the country, the Pacific Northwest has beaches, rocky headlands, estuaries, and tidepools.  The “beach” is often pretty boring; around here, the water’s cold enough and the wind’s usually cool enough that you may as well just find something more productive to do than just sit on the sand.

Today, what drew me to the Coast was a search for the bird reported as a Little Stint last weekend, then subsequently confirmed as a Red-Necked Stint after reviews of photos.  The bird had been seen as recently as this Tuesday, so there’s a chance that it still might be hanging with the flocks of Western Sandpipers and Sanderlings at Copalis.

As I approached the mouth of Cranberry/Connor creek, I saw people with spotting scopes who turned out to be Andy and Ellen Stepniewski, Brian Pendleton, Marcus Roening, and Heather Ballash.

This is a Least Sandpiper . . .

We scoped the shorebird flocks pretty well, but only found the ‘usual’ Western and Least sandpipers and Sanderlings in the ‘peep’ flocks.

. . . hunting for prey in the beach wrack.

A “Stint” is any one of the small shorebirds in the genus Calidris, and it takes a bit of patience to work through the flocks to identify the several species - and hopefully find the odd rarity.

The gulls and shorebirds were scattered a time or two when an immature peregrine Falcon tried to find a weak, sick, or unaware prey.  The falcon was unsuccessful while we watched several attempts.

Flocks of migrating loons offshore, and of Whimbrels along the beach, treated us with some nice views.

Other than that, it was a pleasant enough day for birding.  These gulls enjoyed their Dungeness Crab brunch

We Birders searched for quite a while, but ultimately all “dipped” on the Stint.  I returned to the parking lot at Griffiths-Priday State Park, and enjoyed a lunch at the Green Lantern before heading back to Olympia.

Whimbrel

Griffiths-Priday State Park eBird Checklist is Here

The Peregrine Falcon

June 2 - Colorado River at Matagorda

We got up around 7:30 and again ate at the motel’s breakfast nook.  After we got our things together, we returned to Matagorda Bay to take another kayak trip, this time in the river.

Eurasian Collared-Doves were at the kayak rental

 . . . and Barn Swallows were building nests in the rafters

At the kayak rental, I asked Sammy about the little burrows and mini-“chimneys”.  He noted that they were mud crabs Panopeus obesus, which live in burrows, under shells or among the sea grasses in salt marshes and all along the Texas Coast.

Thousands of these holes were in the lawns and shoreline

We launched straight into the river and paddled down to the jetty at the mouth first, where there was a nice flock of Pelicans rooting.

We turned back upstream toward the north end of Tiger Island, and checked out some of the side channels.  There is little to no current in the Colorado River here, and we were more influenced by tide and breeze than the force of the river.

Marty

There were the usual gulls, egrets, grackles and Willets to see.

I was surprised to see a single Whimbrel tucked in along a tidal channel, working little crabs out of the mud.

It was getting hot,

so we returned to the Park after about 2 ½ hours, and returned the kayaks.

I had noticed yesterday that there was a little wetland between the east jetty and the beach, which attracted a number of terns and gulls, and thought that I should scope it out today.

The flock had Royal, Sandwich, and Least Terns, and Laughing Gulls

As Marty and ‘Becca went down to the beach, I set up my spotting scope to scan through the birds.

Then, away from the madding crowd of terns and gulls, I noticed a shorebird staring at me.  It was a Wilson’s Plover, which was my ABA Life Bird No. 611.

The Wilson’s Plover is a fairly common, although declining, species that nests along the U.S. Atlantic coast from Virginia south, and along the Gulf Coast all the way to South America.

This bird is banded.  I'll report the band to the Bird Banding Lab and let folks know about it

There’s a Pacific coast population, however they don’t get much north of Baja California, so I’d never seen one before.  Kind of like a big-billed Killdeer, but pretty distinctive.

We headed back toward Houston - Clear Lake, and checked back into the Candlewood Suites.  Marty and Becca are attending the North American Prairie Conference tomorrow, so we had supper and went to bed fairly early.

Colorado River eBird Checklist is Here

Matagorda Bay Nature Park beach eBird Checklist is Here