Category: Pierce County

Sanderlings Stuck Around for Me Today

Bruce and many others have been seeing a small flock of Sanderling’s at the Chamber’s Bay Beach Access area for the last week or so, and I thought I’d likely miss them, but my first chance after getting back today I went and tried. I was thinking maybe they had vamooshed but no, after a modest walk north from the steps there they were, roosting and foraging in the driftwood and debris near the back of the beach. They flushed to the water as I walked up on them. I believe this is second time in Pierce for Sanderling for me, prior in the same place, but I didn’t have them on eBird, so as far as record keeping it’s a Pierce County first for me.
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Also had a Lincoln’s sparrow further down the beach in the trees by the RR tracks. 2 FOY birds there for me today.

Shorebirding in Pierce Heating Up

Least sandpiper in foreground, Western on the left, and Baird's in upper right.
Least sandpiper in foreground, Western on the left, and Baird’s in upper right.

Mid August is here and the juvenile vagrants are starting to show up in Pierce County. Yesterday I got out intending to do the usual Levy Pond, Fife Saddle Creek Oxbow, and 56th St. Stormwater Ponds loop, but got stalled at Levy Pond where I found a Solitary Sandpiper, and wanted to take plenty of time to assure myself of the ID and get photos good enough to convince eBird.

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Today I took Kay back to Levy Pond to see the SOLS without success but instead we found a Baird’s Sandpiper, another really good Pierce Co. bird. This was a Pierce lifer for me. I contacted Bruce and he got there just after I left, and he had the Solitary. After success finding the Black Phoebe at the Fife Saddle Creek area Kay and I headed back to spend a while visiting with Bruce and Peter W. but the SOLS seemed to have gone back into hiding.

Love this view highlighting the very long wings, crossing behind the tail.
Love this view highlighting the very long wings, crossing behind the tail.
Baird's Sandpiper
Baird’s Sandpiper

From there we headed for Brown’s Point to look for alcids, Common Tern, Parasitic Jaeger, and have a sit in the sun, but on our way Bruce called to tell us about a Semi-palmated Plover at Middle Waterway. We pulled a u-turn, headed there and found that FOY Pierce species. Overall a great 2-day, low effort shorebirding time.

Semi-palmated plover
Semi-palmated plover

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The Fife Sha-Dax Oxbow is Perfect Mud

Today birders of Pierce, King and likely other counties descended on the Fife Oxbow wetlands off 39t St where the Snowy Egret was relocated and Eastern Kingbird, Black Phoebe, Lesser Yellowlegs and more were found. I worked all day, but after dinner in waning light donned my rubber boots to check out the area. Usually this area is underwater, but this “fall” it has dried up perfectly to make a muddy shorebird mecca. As described, rubber boots are mandatory, but it is walkable, and on arrival I had 3 Lesser Yellowlegs, 6 Greater Yellowlegs, a Long-billed Dowitcher arrived soon and I enjoyed a muck about.
Definitely a place to monitor this season.

Muddy area at Fife Oxbow Wetlands
Muddy area at Fife Oxbow Wetlands
Lesser Yellowlegs
Lesser Yellowlegs

Sunrise Mt. Rainier Today

Bruce Labar and I birded Sunrise today, going from the parking lot, up the upper trail to Frozen Lake, then the trail to Fremont Lookout, and then back via the trail through the Sunrise campground. Overall a sunny, very warm day with little breeze. Views terrific, birding overall pretty slow.
The best birding of the day was on the lower areas. From Frozen Lake to Fremont Lookout and back we saw almost nothing. Best bird in that segment was an adult and this Juvenile American Pipit by a snow patch near the lookout.

Juvenile American Pipit
Juvenile American Pipit

On the way up we did see three Mountain Bluebirds, Pierce County FOY for me, along with one Nashville Warbler (a first time Pierce County bird for me) On the way back through the campsite we got into several mixed flocks that responded well to pishing and owl whistles, and had really nice looks at several more Nashville warblers, along with Townsend’s, Orange-crowned, Audubon’s YRWA and many Mountain chickadees, Dark-eyed juncos and Cassin’s finchs.
Here are some photos of the NAWA and other cool sights of the day.

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Great Day, Great Birds, Bad Photos at Lake Eleanor Trail

Kay, Ken and I headed to the Grand Park Trail shortcut from FS 73 (exactly 10 miles from Hwy 410 to the trailhead) and had a terrific day. On the walk up the trail was moderately wet in places, but an overall easy hike. Nothing too special until after Lake Eleanor. We did get to hear many singing Hermit thrush, several Brown creepers, lots of Mountain chickadees, and at the lake has Vaux’s swifts. Not too far up from the lake while scanning through a flock of chickadees and nuthatches Ken spotted a perched larger bird that we managed to get good enough looks at for a positive ID of Pine Grosbeak. This was a first ever Pierce County bird for Kay and me, second for Ken (last one maybe 30 years ago though). Photos were terrible as the bird was perched fairly high up in a bright sky window in the trees, making it very backlit and dark overall. We did see the size, shape, all gray underparts, little white spot on the face, and greenish head and nape coloration through scope and binos looks. Here are the best of lots of terrible photos.
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We had ta pair, male and female later on up the trail as well as another single bird. Each time we hoped for a Black-backed woodpecker, but it wasn’t the day for that species for us. We turned back just before the climb to Grand Park primarily because of starting thunder claps and dark clouds rolling in. We came across a family of Gray Jays just before we headed back.
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We kept trying for Black-backed as well as N Pygmy Owl on the way down, without success, and got back to the car just as the thunder storm struck with heavy hail and one close loud thunder clap. A great day.
On the way home I took Ken out to get the Red-eyed Vireos I heard the day prior on a bike ride on the Orting Trail, FOY birds for Ken and a nice way to end the day.

Sunrise Mt. Rainier Today

Today I finally got my first Mt. Rainier hike in, getting to Sunrise about 8 AM and hiking up the top trail to Frozen Lake, going a bit toward Burrows Mountain until snow stopped me, then going about half way to Fremont Lookout until entering a cloud and turning back.
Highlights were great looks at Hermit Thrush in the picnic area first thing:
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Overall not much in the meadows down low, but a singing Cassin’s Finch male was on one of the first trees as I started up the trail to Frozen Lake:
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Soon I had close up looks at a Mountain Chickadee who came right in to a Pygmy Owl imitation whistle:
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When I got to Frozen Lake a Horned Lark popped right up close in:
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Then just a little ways up the trail to Burrow’s Mountain a bird was singing loudly in flight. I managed to get on it and saw an incredible flight song of American Pipit. It went on for over a minute, the bird circled up and up, then “parachuted” down a bit then landed. It came right up close and I managed photos:
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I heard several Clark’s Nutcrackers calling from over the hill on the left heading up toward Fremont Lookout. On the way down overall less birds and lots more people.
On the drive down I got nice looks at Townsend’s Warbler, a singing male at one pullout, and at the next stop has at least 6 MOCH, 2 YRWA, DEJU, and HETH all come in to a Pygmy Owl whistle, and the mobbing action was fun. A safe ride home, and 5 FOY Pierce county birds made it a good day. Still have MOBL, GRJA and woodpeckers to try for next.

JBLM Today for NOBO with Ken

Today Ken and I got out in Pierce to look for Northern Bobwhite at the site it has been seen last month. We initially tried to use Google Maps which took us through Roy to a blocked entry onto JBLM, then circled around going in the Roy Gate, past Chamber’s Lake, Left onto East Gate Rd then backtracking towards Roy to the spot. We parked, walked along Muck Creek a half mile or so, and back with no NOBO heard or seen, but then as we were giving Sophie a chance to tinkle I heard one sing a few hundred yards further down the road. We walked down, heard it sing repeatedly, and eventually one flew past us across the road. This was a FOY ABA bird for both Ken and me, and a first time Pierce bird for me.
From here we decided to go back to Chamber’s Lake to see if the Bank Swallows seen by Michael yesterday were still around, and sure enough on likely the same wires near the lake were maybe 100 swallows, at least 4 of which were Bank swallows.

Bank Swallow at Chamber's Lake JBLM
Bank Swallow at Chamber’s Lake JBLM

From here we cut back across East Gate Road to 8th Ave. and onto area 15 where we hoped to find Vesper Sparrow. We had one bird we think may have been a VESP but it was wet (raining then) and we got only backlit looks and just could not firm the ID enough. No success at relocating after it flew, or maybe success at a true ID as another species, but no confident IDs of VESP. We did see lots of Chipping sparrows, and saw a Western Kingbird. Likely an early returning migrant, but we wonder if maybe a breeding bird or juvenile.
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Western Kingbird at Area 15 JBLM
Western Kingbird at Area 15 JBLM

Anyway after this we tried driving a ways down the road flanking area 13 looking for VESP but no luck.
It was great to see Ken again after my month in CA and good to be birding on home turf.
Caroline our niece is visiting so probably not much more birding this next week.

Friday at Paradise

Today Ken and I headed to Mt. Rainier. On the way we stopped at Kreger Lake to see if the Sora and American Bittern I heard yesterday were still calling. It was yes on the AMBI and no on the Sora. On the way through Elbe we stopped to add American dipper to Ken’s Pierce County year list.
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Then we headed to Mt. Rainier and Paradise. At Longmire on the way up I heard what I thought was a Townsend’s warbler, but it came down close and at first glance we thought we had a Hermit warbler. On close study though it had black streaks on the flanks making it a Townsend’s – Hermit warbler hybrid. I battled my new camera to get a photo when it was right in front of us, but managed one good enough for ID higher in a tree.
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At Paradise birding was really slow, and we didn’t get what I though were gimme FOY Gray Jay and Mountain chickadee. On the way down we made several stops, and at one a Sooty grouse was booming. At the bottom we took time to walk around the wetlands at Longmire, and while we were looking at Turkey vultures soaring, hoping one would be a Golden eagle, Ken spotted three Black swifts high up and we got nice long looks at these.
Here are couple of my other favorite photos.

Marmot worming up on the pavement
Marmot worming up on the pavement