[EBB Sightings] Garretson Point birds at midday

Today at midday, there were many shore birds in the mudflat at Garretson 
Point in Martin Luther King Jr. Regional Shoreline, Oakland.  Lots of 
Dunlin, Last Sandpipers, Marbled Godwits, Black-bellied Plovers and others. 
Some of the Plovers were starting to show black patches on their bellies.

In the pond across Edgewater Drive from the parking lot we found the 
continuing Blue-winged Teal, along with a variety of other ducks, gulls and 
shorebirds.

At the Arrowhead Marsh parking lot, across the San Leandro Creek channel 
from the fishing pier looking east, we found a Spotted Sandpiper between all 
the Godwits, Willets, Dowitchers and Black Turnstones.  All these were 
crowded on the little exposed point.

In the marsh proper, we heard a singing Common Yellowthroat and saw briefly 
a Marsh Wren and Song Sparrow, both of which were very vocal.

Hugh B. Harvey