juvenile, Least Sandpiper

Over the past two weeks there has been three obvious waves of birds pasing through Seattle. A couple of days after my last report the numbers of least sandpipers declined with only one or two birds making an appearance then on the 16th the numbers of bird jumped suddenly with 13 birds present at Montlake Fill. Quite a few of the birds seen were very agressive, chasing other birds around and apparently holding small territories on the patches of mud where they fed. I presume these birds were males, still showing some of the elevated hormone levels that occur while breeding. Now today the first of the young birds of the year arrived.

Along with this juvenile Pectoral Sandpiper, three dowitchers also made an appearance at Montlake Fill. Adult waders in Autumn have rather worn feathers and this makes life very difficult when trying to distinguish between long-billed and short-billed dowitchers. Call is the easiest way. Long-billed dowitchers give a sharp 'keek', often repeated several times while Short-billed dowitchers give a softer 'tu-tu-tu'. One way of separating the adult dowitchers by plumage is by looking at the feathers on the upper flanks near the base of the neck. Long-billeds are more barred and short-billed are more spotted. 'More' is a relative term and with a lot of variation between individuals it is only possible to tell a few birds apart.

However the birds present this evening gave some good examples of the differences that can be seen with one bird obviously a short-billed dowitcher (it also called a few times just to make sure) and one obviously a long-billed (again calling to settle the point). The Recent Photos section contains pictures of all three birds including one (slightly fuzzy) shot of the two species feeding side by side with the differences in barring and spotting clearly visible.

While wader migration has been rather good this year, with 5-10 least sandpipers passing through Montlake Fill on a daily basis the opportunities to photograph them have been rather limited. I spent a couple of hours looking into whether the heat haze was distorting the pictures I have been taking and it indeed is the source of the problem with the rippling effect clearly visible through camera's LCD veiewer on the warmer days and early in the evening.Temperatures in Seattle have been in the mid to high 80s (Fahrenheit) for the past two weeks or so and by the time it is starting to cool down around 7pm the light is fading so taking photos has been rather difficult. Getting up early in the morning is the obvious solution however with clear skies and light northerly winds very few birds have been stopping over at dawn to rest at Montlake Fill. On several visits I have heard least sandpipers calling as they flew high overhead which onlycompounded my frustration. I have also been waiting for high tide to occur in late afternoon so I can head north to my favourite set of ponds on the Samish Flats about 120Km north of Seattle. The water levels have been falling fast so it will be a race to get some pictures before they dry out completely. High tide tomorrow is at 4pm, perfect for catching the last of the evening light. I wait with baited breath...