Wood Ducks
Sun, 5 Aug 2001 12:39:04 PDT
From: Kathy Robertson
Hello East Bay Birders,
Yesterday evening at around 5:30 I found Wood Ducks at Shadow Cliffs Regional Recreation Area at the east side of Pleasanton off Stanley Blvd. There were at least 25 birds, including many juveniles. The adult males are all in eclipse plumage.
The birds were in the easternmost pond south of the levee trail. This is the large pond with an island that has a heron/egret rookery (still a few very large chicks in nests on the island). The Wood Ducks were foraging in the "pond scum" at the east and south ends of the pond and many were perched on branches along the shore in these areas.
Good birding,
Kathy Robertson
Hayward, CA
Richmond Marina Bay
Sun, 05 Aug 2001 19:36:56 -0700
From: Larry Tunstall
If you go to Richmond Marina Bay to look for the Wandering Tattler, be sure to look carefully. This morning there was a Willet doing an excellent tattler impersonation near the west end of the south shore of Marina Bay (northwest corner of Vincent Park). It was doing the frequent and very extreme tattler head bob, but its legs were gray. Eventually I did see it fly, and the wing patterns were definitely Willet.
Though the tide was not too good when I was there, I did see a nice selection of shorebirds, including a Black Oystercatcher near the breakwater at the Marina Bay entrance. A few Caspian Terns were fishing in the area.
I never did find any Black Skimmers or Wandering Tattlers, but it was a lovely morning for a walk and watching the more usual birds.
Good birding
Larry Tunstall
El Cerrito CA
Original Message Subject Index
Bird book bargains in Berkeley
Mon, 6 Aug 2001 10:05:18 PDT
From: Steve Glover
Hello everyone,
Yesterday I visited Moe's Books on Telegraph Ave in Berkeley and found some great bird books at great prices. Since most of their books are used it is always hit or miss, but yesterday it was hit.
When you walk in the door turn left into the small alcove and go up the stairs (not the short flight that is straight ahead as you enter the store). At the top of the stairs is a table of remaindered but new books that is always worth checking. Yesterday there were 4 copies (3 now) of Beaman and Madge's fabulous The Handbook of Bird Identification for Europe and the Western Palearctic brand new for only $40. I think this book normally runs at least $80. Though it is specifically aimed at Europe this book features many birds found in California (some drawn better than in North American books) and lots of the mega-rarities that we all hope for.
In the used field guides section it appeared as if somebody had sold their entire library and their were many European, African, Australian and Asian Field Guides including the Indian Sub-continent book, the recent Kenya book, etc. For those of you with lots of money and shelf-space there was Volumes 1 to 6 of Cramp's Handbook to the Birds of Europe for $100 a volume, normally $160 each I think.
This is also a great place to find the old UC Press nature books, botany books, etc.
happy shopping,
Steve Glover
Dublin
Sunday at Niles Community Park
Mon, 6 Aug 2001 17:15:37 -0700
From: Vijay Ramachandran
I had an opportunity to visit Niles Community Park in Fremont this Sunday morning. A very pleasant spot indeed!
Highlights were a female Wood Duck in the pond close to the tennis courts, a very bright looking Wilson's Warbler, and in the creek, 3 Red-breasted Mergansers, and a Caspian Tern.
good birding,
Vijay
Burrowing Owl and good stuff at Arrowhead
Marsh
Wed, 8 Aug 2001 02:02:40 -0700
From: Mike Ezekiel
Dear EBBers,
Tuesday evening, I finally saw the Burrowing Owl again - Courtney Peddle had reported it within the last week or so - right on the first mound inside the fence on the drive in to the Arrowhead Marsh parking lot at Martin Luther King Jr Regional Shoreline, Oakland. I havent seen it there in my last 10 or 15 visits - just Knot lucky lately I guess.
In addition, there were great gobs of birds in the Mitigation Marsh area - high tide and most of them must have moved into that area unlike last Saturday morning when I spent 1.5 hours with little success in seeing birds until I went down to the Garretson Point area and found all of the birds in the mudflats there.
Anyway, nothing else unusual except that the number of Semipalmated Plovers seem to be increasing - there must have been 50 or so. Lots of dowitchers, Marbled Godwits (lots of them), Willets, Western Sandpipers, yellowlegs, a Dunlin or two, Long-billed Curlew and Whimbrel, lots of Black-bellied Plovers, egrets of several stripes as well as the one lone Great Blue Heron in the marsh, Forster's and Caspian Terns (one small tern was being mobbed by some Western Gulls until it dropped its fish.)
Although I saw the Burrowing Owl, I did not see Red Knots, however - certainly like to see some soon.
Mike Ezekiel
Oakland