[EBB Sightings] Lake Merrit/Mt. Diablo

This afternoon I met up with Andy Kleinhesselink at Lake Merrit. While looking at the continuing TUFTED, Andy spotted another dark backed duck that looked like it may have been another Tufted. He managed to get off a couple of photos with his camera and I will post his flickr link as soon as I get it, so others can check it out.

We then drove up to Mt. Diablo, stopping at the Juniper campground, don't ask me why. It was windy and not very birdy, handful of Robins, some Oak titmice, a few Western Bluebirds, a heard only California Thrasher. A male Northern Harrier battling the wind gave us a brief thrill and I also heard (Andy actually got a brief look at) a low flying WHITE-THROATED SWIFT. 

Finally, as we were descending from the park we stopped at the pull-out next to the steep roadcut where there are some whitish rocks showing. With the sun going down we gave a few resigned pishes. To my surprise (don't know why since the habitat sure seemed right) we found ourselves staring at first a Bell's SAGE SPARROW and shortly thereafter a RUFOUS-CROWNED SPARROW (both Contra Costa county lifers for us, I know, sad).

Good Birding,
Dominik Mosur