August 7th - Booby Prizes

Boobies

Late July and early August are an interesting time of year for the birds. Songbirds in the lowlands have usually quieted down. Ducks are changing plumage, becoming more cryptic. Migrating shorebirds are appearing in puddles and fields here and there. And high elevation spots are finally opening up for hiking and camping. 

In this particular year, a booby got lost. 

Boobies are birds from the tropics. From all I could find, this is the history of the world's six species in relation to the Evergreen State

Blue-footed - Two sightings seventy years apart in Puget Sound. 

Nazca - Never seen in state waters until recent years, but now seen in 3 of the last five years, including Puget Sound recently.

Brown - A single sighting in the last century, but quite a few in this one, throughout Puget Sound, along the Strait of Juan de Fuca, and out on pelagic trips. 

Masked - Hasn't come closer than Northern California. 

Peruvian - the most localized species. It's only rarely been seen north of Panama. 

And the star of our show. . . Red-footed. This bird had only been seen once before in the state, about six years back. They're widespread globally, but chance (and climate change?) had not yet conspired to bring any more than this single sighting. Then, in the last week of July, a juvenile was seen from a whale-watching boat in the Strait of Juan de Fuca. A few days later, and it was seen again further up the Strait, at Dungeness Spit. 

At this point, I don't know the whole story. Did people realize the bird might be seen again? They're such big, distinctive, clunky birds, I suppose it would only make sense to keep an eye out! And then again, the bird was seen in the waters near Port Townsend on the second of August. 

And then at some point, it landed on the roof of the Port Townsend Marine Science Center, and decided it was happy.

Time to Chase

This was not an easy decision! I made a trip to Yakima right about the time the booby arrived, and I had plans to hike Mount Townsend on the 11th. This bird could easily have departed as I kept my Yakima plans. . . could easily have departed as I returned home and got caught up on work. And at some point, it would be far too silly to run out to find the bird, just to return the next day. I also kind of needed to see more sightings for other birds that I might be able to relocate. A trip out for a single bird would have felt strange!

I kept thinking that I'd just combine it with my trip out to Mount Townsend. Find a bunch of birds up in the mountains, and then drag my son and nephew out to the waterfront to pick up a few more. But. . . sightings started to pile up. Herring Gull, Surfbird, Cassin's Auklet, Red-necked Phalarope, Parasitic Jaeger, Merlin, all added to two or three Barn Owl locations in the county. . . I had to make a run for it. I think on the morning of the 7th, I just cranked through my writing obligations and saw some of these sightings staring back at me. It was time to chase!

I landed in Port Townsend around 3:30-4:00 and realized. . . I didn't know where the building was. I stood there at Point Hudson, just up from downtown Port Townsend, and looked at some Heermann's Gulls. No giant booby plopped in the middle of them, and more importantly - no birders! I texted around and found out that the building in question was one I'd driven by a few times this year - out at Point Wilson. 

As I packed up, another birder saw me with my scope and camera. She asked if I'd seen anything particularly interesting, and I got her up to speed. She introduced herself as a master birder from the Seattle area and she'd not really heard about the recent sightings. So, we both hopped in our cars, and she followed me up the road to Point Wilson. 

This was a pretty easy bird (and still is, nearly ten days later as I type this, incidentally!). Lots of people gathered around the building, and the bird was resting, posing for us at length. This was the first booby species I'd ever seen, so it was nice getting to take in some of the simple things - the way it walked around (only occasionally) and some of the notable field marks, especially in terms of overall size and shape. 

Fun fact - one of the booby's most significant predators? 
Coconut crabs - 3-foot monstrosities that drag whole
birds into their burrows. I saw a video and am now scarred.

Nobody left while I was there. They stayed, cameras pointed at the bird, waiting for the money shot. At some point, I felt the call of all of those other bird sightings and continued to the end of the pier. Nothing too interesting out there, although I was finally able to get a few Purple Martins photographed. 

I'm not holding myself to photographed-only birds this year, but I've had fun trying to get as many as possible, nonetheless. Some of the pictures over the course of the year have been a little fuzzy. . . or a lot fuzzy! Time, of course, is one of many things I could spend to improve this situation - waiting for better angles, adjusting settings, etc etc. But I trust the numbers. By this I mean. . . I trust that this internal sense I've got, the sense that I should get moving along to the next bird, to help try to reach numerical goals during the year, is going to lead me to some interesting birds, and (more importantly) some beautiful places. 

In this case, it wasn't even all that far that I traveled - just up to the lighthouse. Here, I set up the tripod and scope and watched the water for about as long as I've ever set up and watched water. 

Rhinoceros Auklets. There were so many of these over the course of the afternoon/evening! They'd fly by in the fives and tens, while some closer in towards the shore would just sit there and fish, coming up with bills full of silver. 

Gulls. . . Heermann's and California, and an assortment of hybrid gulls. I tried to pick out some Herring Gulls on the shore, but to no avail. I also watched the distant piles of gulls on the water, hoping that I'd eventually catch a Parasitic Jaeger out there. Bingo! My 181st species for the year coasted by and made a couple harassing dives towards the gulls. I didn't trust my camera at this distance, so I stayed on it to make sure I could get a good look at the coloring, especially the dark cap. 

Jaegers, comically, are a species I still haven't seen from King County! I try to make sure to find at least one or two new species each year in my home county. Once I've done that for the year, my chasing (especially into and through Seattle to Discovery Park) is kept to a minimum. For birds that come through in August and September, it just means that I'm usually content to let them pass through. Some year I'll add them! 

Red-necked Grebe - nice August surprise

Then I got the real boobie prize for the day. See. . . I'd had my heart set on setting up a little cruise off of the coast to look for Cassin's Auklets, Tufted Puffins, and other birds. It just didn't happen. A fishing charter was willing to do the trip during an evening, but they were extremely busy until late August, when chances for some of those birds would drop off. Cassin's Auklets, in particular, were my target, given the sheer numbers of them that nest in that area in summer! 

But I got one here! Marbled Murrelets and Rhinoceros Auklets had been flying past the point. In particular, as it moved into the evening hours, there was a big movement of Rhinos, with hundreds of them heading past. Marbled Murrelets also occasionally flew past - usually in pairs or threes, much smaller, and showing some warm brown tones. Then I got a little charcoal softball passing through my scope. I got on the bird and followed it, getting good enough lighting on it to feel good about size, shape, and coloring - Cassin's Auklet! (182). 

This was a bird that, with encouragement, I paused on for a while. Could it have been a juvenile Rhinoceros Auklet? The size and speed of the bird made that a fairly easy no. Could it have been a Marbled Murrelet? I looked harder on this one, trying to pull up images of any murrelets that might show the same coloring at all this time of year. Looking back through sightings during the last few weeks was also encouraging, and a fairly good birder from the area had two August sightings in recent years. 

Surf Scoters

Fun bird! I have a far better sighting from years back, when a bird landed on the deck of a cruise ship and scurried around looking quite confused. I'm sure I'll have better sightings in the future as well. But for the day, this was a nice find. 

Eating 

I finished my day with a meal at Tommyknockers. It somehow didn't sink in that they are almost entirely making Cornish pasties. I've not had one of those in my life, so when I ordered "bangers and mash" in a hurry as they neared closing, it hadn't quite sunk in that they would be taking some bangers, taking some mash, and wrapping it up into a little pocket. I'm not 100 percent on them still. That's a statement about pasties, not Tommyknockers! I think there was caraway in there? A seasoning I've just never warmed up to. But I was able to get a glass of wine from Marrowstone Vineyards, a Sangiovese that was absolutely delicious.

Getting Eaten

Uncas Road is one of those Barn Owl spots, so I thought I'd settle in and watch the sky darken, hoping to hear and/or see my first Barn Owl of the year. Oh boy. So many mosquitos. I got fairly well eaten alive. No Barn Owls, but it was fun getting to hear a Common Nighthawk pass overhead shortly after civil twilight had passed. 

I returned home over the Tacoma Narrows, and the person in front of me covered my toll. Not a bad day.