Friday, May 30, 2003

I crawled out of bed yesterday at the crack of dawn to go birding with the local Audubon club. Fortunately, it wasn't a long crawl - the club was birding at the Lagoon and the Inlet Mud Flats. Mere feet from our front door It was a totally perfect birding morning - sunny with superb light, absolutely still, and the tide was just going out. And boy, did we take advantage of the rare perfection. Lots of good birds: Dunlins Ruddy Turnstones. A Steph favorite - a very cool bird. Sanderlngs. These little guys were a bit confusing at first. We really thought they were Western Sandpipers. However, once we saw that they were they same size as the Dunlins, we realized that they were Sanderlings. Western Sandpipers are much smaller "Peeps" and their breasts are not nearly as white as the Sanderlings. See - it's this sort of minutia that we birders live for. Short Billed Dowitchers Hudsonian Godwits Savannah Sparrow. Their song is quite similar to a Red Winged Blackbird's. Just quieter. Lincoln's Sparrow. A very happy joyful song. Orange Crowned Warbler Common Snipe Lots of Bonaparte's and Herring Gulls The usual ducks It's clear (actually clarity is the problem) that I need new binoculers. My trusy Nikon's are now out of alignment and it will cost a few hundred dollars and a trip to the factory to get them realigned. At that price, it's probably better to just get a new pair of binocs. comment []7:16:51 AM

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