Delta Naturalists Society

It was pouring with rain when I left home but eased up on the drive into White Rock. I haven’t been that far afield for birding for over a year. At the pier, I met up with Pam Mason, Liz Stewart, Janet Heavyside. and Brian Roberts. Brian is one of our regular “from away” visiting birders.

We walked fairly quickly to the end of the pier as theshoreside seemed to be mainly Canada Geese. A number of other ducks werescattered on the water including White-winged Scoter and Surf Scoter, as well as Mallard and Wigeon. At the pier end, Liz spotted a Black Turnstone and I scoped out the deeper water where some Horned and Red-necked Grebes were diving among Common Loon. It was generally rather quiet bird-wise, apart from a large flock of pigeons being fed as usual by a woman on the pier.

We decided to go on to Blackie Spit where we were looking forward to finding the Lapland Longspur spotted yesterday. The rules for the Spit have changed and now everyone has to keep to the central path. We obediently did this and after spotting a couple of California Gulls in the Ring-billed Gull flock, we encountered another woman searching for the Longspur. At that moment, up popped the obliging bird in the grass in front of us, giving us awesome views. We eventually strolled on to the end of the Spit where we checked out the giant flock of (32) Caspian Terns on a far mud bank and a few Greater Yellowlegs, Common Loons and gulls that were also visible.

I got distracted by a bird that I could not recognize: it wasn’t a gull, not a tern and not a duck. It took a while before we realized it was a Jaeger swimming on the ocean. We were not sure which species – Parasitic or Long-tailed. It gave us neat though distant views and then flew to a mudbank. Liz managed to take identifiable photos and it turned out (thanks Melissa Hafting @bcbirdergirl; http://daretobird.blogspot.com) that it was an adult Parasitic Jaeger. The secret id clue is its pot-belly!

After that we walked back down the spit and met Roger Kenny and Mike Bayliss who had been sat in the car waiting for birders to show up. Poor birder recognition meant they missed us earlier! Anyway, they got to see the Lapland Longspur because there it was beside the path again feeding on fallen seeds on the ground. Brian’s Merlin app on his phone picked out an American Pipit for us, without being asked, I’m surprised it was the only one we heard as there should be lots around.

Despite the weather improving, we were all a bit chilled from the birding so decided to call it a day as the tide went out. Two awesome bird species and a nice group of friends to bird with.
Anne Murray

Photos on flickr