Although the Spring Migration of Shorebirds is rapidly coming to a close, we spent Monday and Tuesday of this week on the Washington Coast and saw quite a few birds. Being frugal, we usually just drive up for the day and come home in the evening, but the tides weren’t very cooperative this week, with high tides at 8:15 pm on Monday night and another high tide at 7:00 am. If we had gone home Monday, it would have been nearly midnight before we could get home. If we had tried to get to Bottle Beach by 7:00 am we would have had to leave before 5:00 am; I love my birding but not that much.
As it was, we could take a leisurely drive to Ocean Shores to start the day, even though I didn’t expect to see too many birds there. We didn’t, but I always enjoy seeing Turnstones, particularly Ruddy Turnstones in breeding plumage.
The most common bird of the day was the Semipalmated Plover,
but there were many small flocks of sandpipers like these two Sanderlings in non-breeding and breeding plumage.
Best of all, the weather was delightful, sunny with light winds. We got in a 3-mile walk to start the day, followed by a visit to our favorite Ocean Shores art gallery and a hearty lunch at the Galway Bay Irish Pub. We saw enough birds that I knew we would get a good showing at Bottle Beach during our evening visit, so we checked into the newly remodeled Saltwater Inn and took a short rest before walking the marina looking for loons, pelicans and other migrating birds.