Where: Eastshore Park (you may know this location as "behind the Emeryville Chevy's" or "that area you can see as you approach the Bay Bridge but how the heck do you get over there?")
When: High Tide. The sandpiper buffet is all covered up with water, so they have nowhere to go but the narrow strip of rocks lining the water's edge: conveniently, less than three feet from the paved path. Easy pickins!
Tom's getting good at digi-binoc-ing; can you believe I didn't even crop these photos? Nice work Tom! We saw three main kinds of shorebirds here:
1) Willets (not pictured here, but whenever I say their name, I say it like the witch in Willow...)
2) Marbled Godwits:
It certainly looks like it has all its marbles.
3) Whimbrels: They have a cool skunky striped head and a "whimbrsical" name.
We found a kingfisher acting like a hummingbird, flying from high perch to high perch:
Yesterday I was contemplating what birds I would like to look for in 2010, and the first thing I thought was, "it would be nice to see another loon." And the very next day, BAM. Looney Tunes.A super sweet look at what I think is a juvenile Pacific Loon. Looking at the Sibley illustration, the stripey back seems to indicate a young bird.
The loon was paddling along, and periodically it would dip its face underwater, while continuing to swim forward.
(It dipped a bit more under than this photo shows.) We concluded that maybe it was looking for fish before committing to a longer dive. In other words, a lazy loon.Finally, near a series of saint-candles someone left lit among the rocks, we found a little group of least sandpipers. At least I think that's what they are. Tiny and yellow legs... small enough to fit in your mouth.
Apparently in the birdwatching world, these little dudes all look alike, and as a group they are just called "peeps." Unlike the marshmallow peeps though, these probably wouldn't look very dramatic when microwaved.
