[EBB Sightings] Blue-gray gnatcatcher at Coyote Hills

About 1:00 today, I found a returning or new blue-gray gnatcatcher at the northwest corner of the entrance to the Quarry staging area at Coyote Hills Regional Park. The bird was in the brushy area between the main road and a steep trail that goes up to a picnic ramada on the hillside.  It was roughly between the diamond-shaped "Ped Xng" sign on the road and the "no bikes" sign on the trail. I found it by sound first, as it repeatedly vocalizes with a distinctive "pwee".  

A Say's phoebe was hawking for insects from a tree near the first picnic area on the right as you enter the Quarry parking lot.

>From Quarry, I walked out the Bayview Trail towards the bay. An adult male northern harrier was perched on a post not ten yards south of the trail, completely undisturbed by my presence and indifferent to surveillance. His mate was coursing over the hills south of us.  In the large fennel patch at the corner of the Bayview and Meadowlark trails, I found at least three yellow warblers, an orange-crowned warbler, a ruby-crowned kinglet, and a Lincoln's sparrow.  


Stephanie Floyd
Fremont