After I finished breakfast I got ready and went down to the park. I walked through my neighborhood, while I was, I saw and heard an adult Golden-crowned sparrow singing in the cool cloudy morning.
I walked along the seawalk then I carefully slid down a rock to get to the beach. I walked around on the uneven ground. I saw a Greater yellowlegs standing by the water and a few shorebirds flying around. I walked out along the shoreline, I didn’t see any shorebirds on the shoreline but there were some flying by. I walked up to a pool and saw a foot long worm in it, I bent over and put my finger in the cold water to poke it. It curled up a little bit but other than that it didn’t move. I continued down the beach to the end of there park. When I got down there there were a lot of ducks around, mostly Northern pintails, Northern shovelers, American wigeons, Green-winged teal and Mallards, but there were also a few Buffleheads and other diving ducks. I walked out further on the beach to look at the gulls and shorebirds that were out closer to the waters edge. I got out there a ways and saw six dark bird by the water. At first I thought they were crows but as I got closer I saw that they were Hudsonian godwits which don’t show up here every year. I took some photos of them then slowly walked around them as not to spook them. I looked at the gulls and the other shorebirds. There were Black turnstones, Surfbirds, Rock sandpipers, Dunlins, a couple of Black-bellied plovers, Short-billed dowitchers, and a few Least and Western sandpipers. While I was out there on the beach watching the godwits a couple more flew in. One of the godwits chased another one around a bit, flopping its wings as it chased the other one.
While I was out on the beach I heard and saw a Lesser yellowlegs fly in and land up by the river. I walked up the beach to go look for it, while in the process of doing that though someone with a couple of dogs walked out by the river and scared all the bird that were up there away. So I walked back and calmly sat down on the beach to wait for the tide to come in so that the other shorebirds would come closer. While I did that a few flocks of Hudsonian godwits flew by, one of them even had nineteen! The tide came up further but a lot of the birds left as this happened. I walked up and sat down on a log at the top of the beach for a bit then I walked home.
On my way home I ate a tender watery Wild cucumber.
Hudsonian godwit
