Temps in the 50s, mostly cloudy, Wind WSW 15-20 mph

The wind has picked up, so although the temps remain in the 50s, it feels much colder.

No new species today. This is typical after 4 or 5 days here. You get most of the local birds and are waiting for the next influx of migrants.

Migrants are definitely moving. More geese were flying by today and the shorebird numbers changed (see below). Just no new species.

Gray-crowned Rosy-Finches have found several of the feeders that I have seeded, but no vagrants, yet.

Again, the action was centered on Clam Lagoon.

When I walked out to the peninsula this morning, I had 12 Western Sandpipers.

One of the things I love about the Clam Lagoon Peninsula is that the shorebirds that feed out there are frequently very tame. I guess they have not yet learned how dangerous we are!

Today was no exception. I approached the flock slowly, moved over to the shoreline to get better lighting, planted my tripod and started taking photos.

As I snapped away, the flock just kept feeding and working their way along the shoreline towards me. As they got closer, I had to reduce my zoom length until I could no longer focus on them!

They were literally only 5 feet away. I AM NOT exaggerating!

They stopped, looked at me, I moved back off the shoreline, they said “Thank you” and continued down the shoreline.

Only on Adak!

Notice in the photo above the angle at which I am looking down on them as they got closer.

When I returned later in the afternoon, the Sanderlings had returned (or a new flock arrived). There were 33 of them.

Also, the Western Sandpiper flock had grown to 13.

Plus, the Red-necked Stint joined the flock again.

The Peregrine is still hanging around the lagoon area.

There was one Short-tailed Shearwater in Kuluk Bay below the Palisades, but none at the Seawall.

I did not walk the marsh edge today. I expect to tomorrow. I did walk a small portion of Contractors Marsh, but didn’t find anything.

In addition to the photos above, I made two videos with my cellphone today. You can tell birds are close when you can do that…

One is of the Western Sandpipers https://vimeo.com/601554821

The other is of the Sanderlings. https://vimeo.com/601546088

As usual, I can upload these videos, but I cannot download them to confirm they are working online. So, if you watch them successfully, please let me know. Thanks.

Temp in the 50s, mostly cloudy, sunnier in the afternoon, wind NW 10-15 mph

Lapland Longspurs are in abundance this time of year — gathering in flocks, flying up from the roadside, and just being nuisances. This one stayed still long enough for a photo.

As Isaac once answered us when we asked how soon the longspurs leave in the fall “Not soon enough!”

There are daily flocks of Aleutian Cackling Geese flying over.

I went down to Finger Bay today and had 11 Black Oystercatchers there. No other birds of note, but the salmon run has started. The creek had some salmon in it, but not the thousands to come over the next few weeks. And the creekside is not yet festooned with rotting salmon carcasses.

I added two White-winged Scoters at the Seawall.

The stint saga continues. It now appears that the bird with the Sanderlings on Monday was a Red-necked and the one with the Western Sandpipers yesterday (and today!) is probably the same bird.

And the Least Sandpiper is still here.

The Western Sandpiper flock is now 12.

But the most fun for me so far this trip has been seeing the Short-tailed Shearwaters close to shore at the Seawall. I love pelagics. I think they are some of the neatest birds in the world. But I have had so many experiences with seasickness on boat trips to see these birds that many of the experiences were less than enjoyable!

So I take great pleasure in seeing (closeup) pelagic birds with my feet firmly planted on solid ground (ground that doesn’t move — except for the earthquakes…).

So here is a photo gallery of the Seawall shearwaters.

They were constantly flying and diving. They would take short hops over the water and plunge under — very similar to the many alcids out here. I always thought of shearwaters as skimmers — picking up food near the surface. So this was interesting to watch.

The group from Tennessee left today, so I will be birding alone on the island until Gabi and Michelle arrive on Saturday.

The trip list is 44.

Temp in the 50s, mostly cloudy, rain starting after 8 pm, winds light and variable.

Another interesting day.

First, the stint from yesterday has been confirmed as a Red-necked.

Anyone who has followed this blog knows that my stint identification skills ain’t!

At best my odds of getting an ID correct are 50/50 (and that’s being kind).

But as long as I have a camera and friends who have much better shorebird identification skills, the correct ID will eventually be made.

While Tennessee headed down to Finger Bay, I checked out all of the vagrant passerine habitat (spruces and willows) as I worked my way north.

Still no vagrant dickey birds…

All of the action today centered on Clam Lagoon (really?).

I walked out the peninsula and had a flock of ten peeps. It looked like 2 Red-necked Stints and eight Western Sandpipers. I took a bunch of photos to confirm my first impression later. Note: I don’t carry a scope on these forays — relying on my camera, instead. So any preliminary ID is through binos and viewing the photos on my camera’s screen.

Later this morning, when Tennessee got back within radio range, I alerted them to the birds. They had arrived at Clam Lagoon and the gals were walking the marsh edge, while the guys drove the truck up to the peninsula to start from that end.

They told me they had just flushed a Sharp-tailed Sandpiper, so I headed their way and joined the walk.

Earlier, after walking the peninsula, I had walked the marsh edge, but didn’t find any shorebirds. However, a Peregrine flew over.

A quick note about Clam Lagoon marsh edge walking…

The ideal way to do it is to have at least two birders. One walks along the edge and the other walks through the reeds. This way, any birds on the edge can be spotted by the edger and any birds hiding in the reeds can be flushed by the reeder.

Obviously, when I am alone, I have to make a choice. I prefer walking the edge, as there is then a better chance of actually seeing the birds on the ground — rather than just flying away — and it also allows me to take a wide berth around any birds I do find so as not to flush them.

The sharp-tail and Ruff were both reed birds today — hence I didn’t see them on my pass by.

But I saw them now.

I returned to my car while the others headed out to the peninsula to look at the peeps.

When I came by later, they said they had a dozen birds out there and were working on the ids. This evening they report one Red-necked Stint and the rest were Westerns.

When I got back to the house and downloaded my photos, I discovered that one of my “Red-necks” was a Least Sandpiper! I have seen them three times on Adak before, but always in May. I know of nine other records for Adak — all in May. So this is probably the first fall record for Adak.

As for the stint(s), I’m still working on it. There was definitely one Red-necked, but there may have been two.

Less-exciting birds today included more Cackling Geese flying over, more Short-tailed Shearwaters hanging around, and 30 Rock Sandpipers down at Sweeper Channel,

My trip list is up to 42.

Temp in the 50s, rain most of the day until after 4 pm, wind light and variable.

The day started out slow but ended with a bang.

The rain was generally light, but enough to be a nuisance.

The Tennessee group went out on a boat today looking for auklets, but came up empty-handed.

I added some common birds to my trip list — Ancient Murrelet, Common Loon, Rock Ptarmigan, etc.

At the Seawall, a Short-tailed Shearwater was flying around relatively close.

Last night, the Tennessee group told me they had two Wood Sandpipers at Lake Shirley. This morning, I found them in the small pond next to the lake.

I didn’t see many other new birds, so I quit early and had dinner. The rain finally stopped and the sun broke through, so I decided to take a “quick” run up to Clam Lagoon to see if the rain had prompted any new birds to plop down.

From the south side, I saw the Sanderlings were back out in the middle of the flats.

I moved up to the peninsula parking spot and now saw that they had moved farther towards the east side of the lagoon. But, more importantly, they were now joined by a small brown shorebird. It was way too far, and the heat waves to much to identify it from where I was.

I had been in touch with the Tennessee group a few minutes earlier. They were on the eastern side of the lagoon, so I alerted them to the bird and then started “racing” around the lagoon to join them.

When I got to them, they had the bird in their scopes, but it was still too far away — and now backlit!

We walked out onto the flats to get as close as we could, but the lighting was terrible. We all took what photos we could.

At one point, I ventured closer, keeping my eyes on the flock. Once I stopped, I looked around and not 20 feet from me were two Ruddy Turnstones! Tunnel vision…

Anyway, we decided it was a stint. Studied the bird in the scopes and field guides. I was leaning Red-necked, but knew it would take looking at the photos to be sure.

The birds eventually flew — the sun was setting — so I took the others up to the Breaches where I believe Sanderlings like to roost. No luck there, but had a half-dozen or so more Ruddy Turnstones. Also, as we pulled up to the Breaches, a flock of Cackling Geese flew over.

When I got back to the house and reviewed the photos I became very confident that it was a Little Stint! However, after communicating with Isaac, he feels it might be a Red-necked! Here are my photos. See tomorrow’s blog for a followup.

Not a bad way to end a long day.

PS: The Tennessee group also had a Pacific Golden-Plover today and the(a) Common Redpoll at the Elfin Forest.

Temp 60!!, mostly cloudy, Wind SW 5-10 mph

Well, I’m finally here. And its downright tropical. 60 degrees!

Arrived close to on-time. Unpacked, made a sandwich and went birding.

At the Palisades, there were a half-dozen Short-tailed Shearwaters sitting and flying around the bay. Too far for photos. There were also three Parasitic Jaegers — of interest only because two of them were light morphs. 99% of jaegers up here are dark morph.

As I was driving by the East Side Ponds, a flock of a dozen Rock Sandpipers flew in and started bathing.

There were both Red-necked and Horned Grebes at the Seawall. No loons. The usual alcids, puffins, guillemots, murres.

At Lake Shirley, there were 63 Eurasian Wigeon.

At Candlestick Bridge, the shearwaters were closer (but not close). I took some photos anyway.

As I was driving back up the east side of the lagoon, the other group was on the flats and alerted me to a flock of 30 Sanderlings out in the middle. They weren’t there when I scoped that area earlier.

By the time I got back around to the west shore, the other group had flushed a Ruff along the marsh edge. I walked out and joined them and got a so-so photo.

The other group (Lizzie, Cally, Kevin, and John) are from Tennessee. They had not been in touch with me, so I didn’t know they were coming until I ran into them at the Anchorage airport. Nice to have some extra eyes and ears.

On my way up to Clam, I stopped at the National forest. Two birds flew out as I pulled up. One was a Song Sparrow which circled and returned. The other (smaller) bird disappeared. I stayed there for about 15 minutes (eating a late lunch), but did not see the other bird return. Later, the Tennessee group reported a Common Redpoll there.

So not a terrible start to the trip.

Hoping for more tomorrow.

Here we go again…

No birds from Adak today!

Why? Because I’m still in Anchorage!

The flight was canceled due to the crew being stranded elsewhere.

Luckily, I was able to get a new reservation at the Holiday Inn Express and even got a rental car!

This is when I would usually report the birds I had in Anchorage on Friday afternoon and Saturday morning. Well, not much to report.

Let’s go back a day. Thursday night, I went to bed at 9 pm, planning to get up at 2 am for the car ride to the airport at 3 am.

Well… at 9:30 pm, the power went out! (I know, I know, too many exclamation points!) Over the previous two days, I had 4 power outages due to Ida. They generally lasted 5 to 10 minutes and no problems for me, as I have a whole-house generator that kicks in automatically.

So, I assumed this would be the same scenario. No such luck. It lasted two hours. That would not have been a problem except the generator is located just below my bedroom window! So no sleep that night. Maybe 2 hours.

So by the time I got to Anchorage on Friday and did my food shopping I was way too tired to go back out for birding. So no birds on Friday.

Jump up to today.

By the time I got my luggage back (the flight was cancelled after I had already checked in) and got a car, it was 11:30 am.

I decided to go back down to Girdwood and see if I could rustle up a Chestnut-backed Chickadee (which I need for my Alaska list). No such luck. The birding was poor. My entire list for that area was 2 robins, 1 Varied Thrush and a magpie.

I stopped at Potter marsh on the way back and got the usual suspects along with a flock of Greater Yellowlegs. At Ship Creek, there was a nice flock of Bonaparte’s Gulls (and the usual other stuff).

A make-up flight has been scheduled for tomorrow and I am booked on it.

By the way, there is a group of four other birders also going out on that flight, so I won’t be the lone birder out there.

So try again tomorrow…

Frank