Plus five! 10/1 in Mason County

I had ideas for a title, "The Hunt for Redheads in October", "Tim wakes up and smells the tertials", "Betting on a Longspur", but I don't know if any of them really fit.  That said, this was a trip that was kind of the second of my two September days, and I went ahead and kept formal track of species, so it was a big day to boot. 

The way it always starts!

Seven Eleven has been awfully good to me, although I was sad at 4:30 AM that they didn't have the juice blends they usually sold at such a better price than anything at Starbucks or anything that rhymes with Shmodwalla.  The pumpkin spice coffee almost made up for it.  It let me know fall was here, and I really do love the season.  Apple cider, pumpkins, leaves, crisp air... and for my birding, it was time to make a last attempt at some migrants, and an early attempt at some of the winter birds as they returned.

Oak Patch Lake - early

Camp Spillman

I made it to Camp Spillman some time around 6 AM, and briefly tried the roads for Ruffed Grouse.  It seemed like doing this in the dark wasn't the best idea, so I just parked it by Oak Patch Lake and waited for civil twilight.  Civil twilight is one of my favorite times, and probably one of my favorite ideas.  It's the time in the morning before the sun comes up when it is bright enough to walk around. The very start of civil twilight in spring is amazing! 

I'd go here if I was a grouse

This morning, the lake woke up with a Great Blue Heron, and a bird that was nasal... it had me thinking coot (but turned out to be Pied-billed Grebe when it finally got light enough), which would have been a new bird.  The next birds to join the chorus were Northern Pygmy Owl and Barred Owl.  I enjoyed them for a while, and listened to the sparrows waking up.  Once civil twilight rolled around, I realized that I had Pied-billed Grebes, and decided to drive the roads for my grouse.

Grouse!  Within a few hundred feet of driving, a Ruffed Grouse (170 species for the year) took flight from the side of the road after a moment in my headlights.  It disappeared from the road, becoming as invisible as the other thousand Ruffed Grouse I had certainly driven by this year.  I kept driving the roads and found mostly Varied Thrushes, with some American Robins mixed in.  On the way out, I added a Cooper's Hawk and a few Gadwall at the lake.

Dewatto... say it like Keanu Reaves, come on!  D'wahhh tohhh...  Now try not to say it like that next time/forever.

Spiderwebs and dew

I really didn't need to go to Dewatto.  Nobody had just seen an amazing bird there.  It isn't a place that has a history of people seeing X, Y or Z.  I just hadn't been there before, so I kind of did have to go there.  I made a few stops and side trips along the way.  Blacksmith Lake sounded like a good idea - Tahuya-Blacksmith Road is one of the major roads through the area, so getting to Blacksmith sounded nice.  Unfortunately, many people thought that Blacksmith Lake sounded nice, they built houses all around it, and I had no view. 

On the way to Dewatto, I passed farms, fields, rivers and marshes.  It was great habitat, and may have been interesting to visit back in the spring!  Golden-crowned sparrows and a Gambeli's White-crowned Sparrows called from the fields before I finally got to the mouth of the Dewatto River. 

(Shut up and just show the picture, Tim!  Okay!

Shhhh....)

(Thank you!

... no problem!)

Dewatto Beach is around the corner from the mouth of the river, and I got to see a few saltwater birds - Common Loon, Horned Grebe, Pigeon Guillemot, Double-crested Cormorant and a few gulls. 

Pigeon Guillemot nests near Dewatto

Dewatto to Tahuya

Don Lake

I meandered up the road a bit, and found a turn for Don Lake.  I was game at this point, having American Coot and Northern Shoveler on my needs list still.  In my most optimistic dreams, there were Cinnamon and Blue-winged Teals waiting for me on some of these lakes as well!  Nothing on the lake - nothing!  I got out and enjoyed some of the other passerines, including Yellow-rumped Warblers, Red-breasted Sapsucker, and Downy Woodpeckers.  It was pretty enough, but it didn't seem like there was anything more to see, so I got back on the road from Dewatto to Tahuya.

I passed another lake on my left, the Tahuya Peninsula is full of these little lakes - and pulled over to take a look.  This one was Tee Lake, and it turned out to be a good stop!  First I found a Northern Shoveler (171) sitting in the middle.  I was sorting out the plumage on it... ducks are in all kinds of odd plumage this time of year... when the shoveler next to it dove.  Weird...  Then I remembered that Shoveler's don't dive!  Hmm...

Just good enough! - Redhead, Lake Tee

I looked at it again, and saw what seemed like a Canvasback at first.  The shape seemed wrong and I dug out the field guide. 

!

I pulled the car around and got onto the shoulder, got the scope pointed at the bird, and got what may be the crappiest picture of a Redhead (172) in the history of birding in the county.  Digiscoping has been kind of hit or miss for me, so I was happy to get one that actually showed me the patterned end to the bill.  This was a Code 4 bird that wasn't even properly on my radar, and an awesome surprise.

Tahuya to Belfair
 

Tahuya River Mouth

Tahuya itself was pretty socked in with fog.  As I dropped down from Tee Lake to Tahuya, it got thicker and thicker.  Hood Canal was actually gorgeous like this, even though I had no chance to see very far out into the water.  Even so, I had a couple of nice stops.  One was at Summertide Resort.  I had parked at the dock, and was met by the owner as she made her way out of her home to open up for me.  She let me go out to the dock as long as I didn't block the boat launch.

Foggy morning on Hood Canal

I didn't find any birds to speak of, but it sunk in... these people rent kayaks!  I looked out into the fog, and tried to imagine what was on the other side.  Heading back in, I asked about rentals, and just for fun asked how long it would take to get to the other side of Hood Canal from there.  "Oh, not long.  We're right across from Alderbrook.  It might take a couple hours if you really dilly-dallied."  My eyes lit up, and I looked again at the fog, then back at the owner "Not today.  But... I'll be back!"  I promised, imagining myself crossing the water through all of the grebes, loons and cormorants... maybe with some Common Murres passing me?  Time's running out, but I love this idea.

The other interesting stop came after I'd pulled to the side of the road to look at a loon.  For the... twelfth? twentieth? time this year, I was invited to someone's home to look at birds.  The gentleman who had been clearing out some furniture from his vacation home offered to let me view from his deck.  Now... it was still foggy, so I really didn't see anything at all, but I've loved every time I've been welcomed like this.

Belfair State Park

Cackling Goose - Belfair State Park

This place took a lot of my time!  There were so many ducks back in town, and gulls, and geese.  I had to pick through a lot of birds!  I'd been staring at so many Pintails and Green-winged Teals, trying to make them into something else, when a flock of Canada Geese dropped in, along with a single Cackling Goose (173).  After enjoying the bird, I got back to the gulls.  There were a few Glaucous-winged and California Gulls, and I ended up picking out a Mew Gull as well!  Not a terribly rare bird, but just another sign that winter was coming.

I spied more ducks farther up from the main beach and walked it up to investigate.  They were mostly mallards, but there were also a dozen American Wigeons.  No Eurasians showed up, so that's still a bird that I'll be looking for as the year wraps up.  On the way back, a Merlin and a Northern Harrier took turns patrolling the beach, the Merlin scattering the birds from the beach pretty thoroughly!

Theler Wetlands 

Another repetition of this picture

It's been an awful lot of trips here, but there are just too many birds that have shown up in the amazing and varied habitat.  Shorebirds have been pretty good here, and I knew time was running out to find Short-billed Dowitchers, which had been seen off and on throughout the fall.  Today I made a bee-line for the shorebird habitat, keeping only half an ear out for interesting chip notes. 

Dowitchers - both of 'em

I made it around the corner, before hitting Big Bridge (yep.  I'm just going to name it.  It's the biggest bridge there, and it's the one where 99 percent of the shorebirds have been found this year), and right there were six dowitchers waiting for me to look them over.

!

Now, I've talked about how much better my ears are than my eyes.  Call notes and songs stick with me pretty well, but feathers... I just... I mean there are so many different feathers, and where they show up when a bird is roosting... or flying... I just get confused.   The code word I have used almost universally  has been "tertials".  When people start to note the finer points of identification and field marks and feathers, I'll throw in something like, "Well, and then there's the tertials.  I mean... Just Look at Them!"

So I think (and I want to check with Alanis Morisette on this one) that it's particularly ironic that one of the trickier ID's I pulled off involved tertials. 

A few weeks earlier, I had shown up at the mouth of the Cedar River in Renton to pick up a new county bird - a Semipalmated Sandpiper.  While I was there with a few other birders, we finally nailed down the ID on the Semipalm, and had looked over a dowitcher, deciding it was a long-billed.  Before I left, Marv Breece arrived.  Marv at one point set the Washington State Big Year Record, although greater and greater levels of obsession have led to more birds from others since!

"Oh man, that's a Short-billed!"  Marv said, with little doubt in his voice.  He started to explain why, and said the word "tertial".   I tried to keep listening, but the rest sounded like the teacher from Charlie Brown.  Marv saw my face and laughed.  "Tim.  Hold on.  Do not leave!  Just breathe!"  He helped others through the ID, then went and pulled out his field guide.  He went to the dowitchers and pointed at Long-billed.  "Tertials."  he said... waiting for me to digest the word and the feathers.  His finger moved to the Short-billed and pointed again.  "Now on the Short-billed.  See?"  

I looked at the bright orange patterning on the feathers, and smirked a little, "Well, yeah, I mean... "  He cut me off and guided me back to the scope.  "OH!"  I looked back up, nodded, and then promptly passed out from the mental effort.  I exaggerate, of course, but this is one of the areas of expertise that most birders work hard on.  I've... tried?  I just feel like things haven't stuck.  But...

Dowitchers in fall

Short-billed (top) and Long-billed (bottom) Dowitchers - Theler Wetlands

I could see the birds pretty well.  They weren't far from me, and looking in the same area that Marv had previously pointed out, it was easy to pick out the orange.  I watched them for a bit, and enjoyed looking at the differences.  Thankfully I also got a few pictures!  People mess up this identification all the time, and no ebird reviewer worth his salt should simply trust any unusual sighting coming from me with the word "tertials".

Brad Waggoner, despite his disdain for The Mason, is definitely worth his salt.  We've birded before on WOS field trips, and his energy and knowledge are extensive.  He had the (unfortunate? entertaining?  both?) responsibility of following up with me on the ridiculous report I had submitted for these birds (they are a bit on the late side, and I had said something like "The tertials were just screaming "Short-billed"").

After stalling him with an equally crappy description of what I remembered seeing on the tertials, I dug out one of the pictures, and opened up a treatise on Dowitcher ID from Surfbird.com:

surfbirds.com - identification of dowitchers  

In the end, I sent this:

Hey Brad!

Theler in fall

I thought I had failed to catch an of the short-billed in pictures, but I think I have one.

Front bird looks like a Long-billed.  It does have what looks like a steep loral angle, but the tail appears to have wider black on it, the coverts are fringed in brown with a dark center, the chin appears dark, and the bill appears pretty straight.  There is no orange patterning within the tertials, and  no barring is apparent, but that may be due to the posture of the bird.  The back bird has a paler chin, white fringes on the coverts and orange tiger striping in the tertials.  It also appears to have a high loral angle and a slightly decurved appearance in the last third of the bill.  There’s no barring apparent, and the posture should show some if there was any. 

-Tim

Short-billed Dowitcher (174)

Now... not all of those field marks (as you can see from reading the article carefully!) are definitive, but still... it was nice to have a picture that showed so many of those differences apparent with birds in the same picture. 

One of many of these caterpillars seen on the walk

Chanterelles!

Exhausted, I made my way back to the car and through Belfair.  I had two bits of yumminess waiting for me in Belfair.  I first found a farm-stand that was selling chanterelles.  Unfortunately, the hot dry summer has meant that not many of these mushrooms were making their way into the market, so it was kind of slim pickings! 

Just down the road from there, I stopped in at Seabeck Pizza and ordered a slice of Hawaiian.  Holy Canoli!  They cook slices of pizza to order, and they come out with this crispy flaky crust that's just f;ldkfjeoiejejrelkjd, and the toppings are done up pretty deeply.  I'll be back.

Twanoh to Hunter Farms

From several stops on Hood Canal, I ended up finding a few interesting birds - Bonaparte's Gull, Red-necked Grebe and Western Grebes.  As I stopped at Twanoh, then Union, the number of Surf Scoters rose and rose.  It was nice to see them back!  The mouth of the Skokomish, however, was just not great.  It wasn't that there was any lack of birds, but they were so far out.  It made me more resolved to get out there in a kayak!

Hunter Farms was all ready for October.  People were working on finding pumpkins in the patch which will be open all of October.  I stopped in for ice cream, and saw licorice waiting for me in the display case, but... Pumpkin Praline?? Yes please. 

Hunter Farms - October is here!

I was directed to a gentleman in a black cowboy hat to ask for permission to walk the back fields.  I got a yep, and asked out of curiosity if he was the owner "...the family" he said after searching for the word to qualify it properly. 

The very first vegetable gardens on the way out from the parking lot were teeming with sparrows!  All I could find were Savannah, Golden-crowned, White-crowned and Song, but the numbers of them to pick through were pretty darn substantial. 

From Hunter Farms, I went across Purdy Cutoff Road, spying a Ring-necked Duck along the way.  From there, I decided to hit Sanderson Field.

 
Sanderson Field

I've had a handful of pretty good birds at Sanderson, but two were on my mind as I pulled in:  Lapland Longspur and California Quail.  I pulled in and listened again to the calls for longspurs, finishing with one of their flight calls.  I stepped out of the car, and less than five minutes later, flying over head, "Kityoo... kityoo... kityoo..."  and done.  Or... at least I'm pretty sure that was the sound?  The thing is, longspurs are almost always found on the ground, hopping around from spot to spot in the grass, and making a distinctive rattle call. 

It's not that they never make other calls, and it's not that they never fly overhead.  It's just that for  a life bird, I couldn't find a good reason to trust something that odd.  Purple Finches made a similar sound, although I really don't think their call was a good fit for what I heard.  The time of year was great for it, and the habitat seemed good, but after a half hour of waiting, I didn't get a chance to hear the calls again. 

Cue the Frozen soundtrack.... let it go!  let it go!!!

Kamilche

It took a little bit of work, but I found that there is a place to access Little Skookum Inlet pretty easily.  Port Blakely Tree Farm has a little gate off of Kamilche Point Drive, and an easy walk down to the water.  As long as you don't block the gate, it's fine to park and walk, and the view at the bottom was pretty.  I do wish I had come when the tide was a bit lower, but I had time, so I sat and waited for some interesting birds to float by.

As I waited, I shot emails back and forth with Matt Bartels and Cara Borre as we planned out a crazy idea for a field trip in Mason County in October (details to come!).  I also peeked across the inlet and realized that I had birded from the other side at David Ness's home - clearly visible from the picnic table by the water.

No new birds, and just a handful of gulls, and I decided to pack it up.  My last stop was Kennedy Creek - similarly I had a stop that was free of shorebirds, although this last stop of the day did at least have a lot of ducks and gulls - just nothing that stood out.  The day ended with a list of 71 species for the day - not bad!

Kennedy Creek Estuary

So

Five new birds for the year, and a few of them were pretty rare!  It made up for my last trip, which had yielded no new birds.  I only need six new birds for the year to break the yearlist record (and as an update... there are coots in Mason County now!).  It will be interesting to see how the year wraps up! 

Running Tally and Needs List

Below is the year list following my October 17-18th trip.  At the bottom is a list of the code 1-3 birds I'm missing.  I'll talk about the rarer birds on my Birds for Thought page, which I'll update soon as well.

Code one birds remaining:  Birds that should /might be around now  Birds that don't seem like code 1 birds
(This list is now empty!  With American Coot, I've seen every code 1 bird in the county)

Code 2 Birds  Birds that should/might be around Birds that have me worried
1.  Eurasian Wigeon
2.  Cinnamon Teal (All but certainly missed)
3.  Ring-necked Pheasant (Not worried anymore on this one.  All of a sudden I have five or so places to look for these - Mason Lake, Hurley-Waldrip Road, the mouth of the Skokomish, Hunter Farms and Theler.  These will be placed on my list because they are on nearly anyone's Mason County list, but it will be done tongue in cheek given their disappearance over the course of the year and sudden reappearance in the last month or so.)
4.  Common Murre

Code Three birds.  They will take planning work and luck

1. Blue-winged Teal 
2. Long-tailed Duck  (they are annual, but there's a lot of water to search!  I have to be patient in looking through distant dots)
3.  Ruddy Duck
4.  Parasitic Jaeger 
6.  Spotted Owl  (I will make attempts for these owls, but am not holding my breath.  It would be silly not to try for species that are "annual" in the county, but I wonder if anyone even knows where/if there are any remaining.)
7.  Townsend's Solitaire. 


So the 178 birds I've found, plus the birds above that aren't crossed out makes 185. That means I can miss five of them and still hit the old record, even if I find no other rare birds!  One miss will probably be Spotted Owl, and Parasitic Jaeger may slip away if I don't hurry!  It's certainly getting down to a short list, so I'm going to revise the Birds for Thought page to reflect the ones that may show up down the stretch.

Labor Day Birding - 9/7

Across the Narrows:  A familiar sight

I know.  I'm almost two weeks late on this post.  I... grumblegrumblegrumble...

Okay, I didn't find any new birds!  Gah! 

It was interesting to hit the wall here, although I should clarify two things: 1) I didn't leave the house until 10.  2) I had an awesome food day in Mason.

A walk at Theler

This was the plan!  We were actually going to head over as a family for our first trip together to the county this year.  Monday morningn came, and a fever came with it.  My son, Declan hit 101, and we decided the best use of the day would be for me to make this one of my two birding days for the month.  There were some recent sightings of a Parasitic Jaeger at the mouth of the Skoke, so I was pretty excited.

Wow, Theler... looking good today!

Feel free to tell me what kind of dragonfly this is in the comment section :D

My first stop was Theler, (Theeeeler? Theller?  Thayler?  I've given up now on this one perhaps).  It had continued to be a good shorebird spot, and I suspected it might be good for ducks, so I hit the trail some time around 11 with eyes and ears open.  In the fall, it seemed that Theler was getting as full as ever with Cedar Waxwings, American Goldfinch, Purple Finch and White-crowned Sparrows.  Savannah Sparrows were hanging about, often out in the mud rather than tucked in the grass.

I did something I hadn't done this year, doing the whole walk along the boardwalk that heads from the education center directly out towards Hood Canal.  I got nothing new from here, but there seemed to be a lot of great little nooks and crannies for ducks to visit.  I found a half-dozen mallards in one, but not the ducks I was looking for.  These aren't the ducks you're looking for.  Sorry.. Star Wars... ANYWAY!

From the bridge

Heading back to the education center, I found a silent Swainson's Thrush mixed in with the waxwings before heading off to the shorebird habitat.  There is a bridge along the walk that holds shorebirds on both sides.  Today, I had arrived with the tide rising into the wetlands, and I ended up with some ducks that essentially took an hour or two of my day!  With Northern Shoveler, Cinnamon Teal, and Blue-winged Teal all on the wish list, any bird with a blue bill was an interesting bird for me.  I had a pair of pintails, and a trio of other ducks that ducked behind some reeds on the far end of the slough, and I just never got a good look at them.  Green-winged Teal and Northern Pintail were likely enough that I didn't worry too much about it.

Northern Pintail, and a camera, and me and my phone

I still don't have the use of my camera, so all of this became challenging.  At some point early in the summer, I put the battery charger for the camera... well, I'm not sure where I put it.  Still looking, but in the interim, the cell phone and the occasional digiscoping has gotten me through.  The picture here is a picture of a picture of a pintail on another photographer's camera.  As a bonus, there is a picture of me taking the picture ovelaid on the picture.  Whoa.

I did my due diligence and continued walking the trail, passing some more shorebirds (Western and Least Sandpipers, and even some Semipalmated Plovers, but not large numbers of anything with the tide peaking.  An osprey made several appearances, and I had two flyovers of American Pipits. 

Butterfly - same deal as the dragonfly

Another interesting sighting was Cara Borre!  She, her partner and a friend were birding the wetlands before heading off to Hartstene Island, where they hoped to pick up some alcids. We checked in on plans - she wanted to know where I'd had Rhinoceros Auklet; I wanted to know where she'd had the Parasitic Jaeger.  It had become quite a tight little race for the Mason County year list, and it turns out that Cara added another bird (Sharp-shinned Hawk) to make it 168 to my 169 for the year!

We parted ways, and I meandered back.  The interesting stop on the way back was a former freshwater marsh that now was subject to the tides.  It means no more rails in this little pocket, but there were a few shorebirds pushed in by the high tide.




Union

Common Loons

With the rest of my day, I drove the length of Hood Canal, making stops nearly everywhere I could along the way.  There were a lot of stops that blurred together, as they contained no birds or no new ones.  The overall surprises, bird-wise were the higher number of Common Loons, and the return of cormorants to the canal - both Double-crested and Pelagic were seen during the day.

One of my stops was at the Hood Canal Marina, where I walked through the Union City Market - a relatively new shop at the Marina - not even three months in!  It's a nice boutique shop, and the owners apparently also do a little bit of catering in addition to the hand crafted foods mixed into their shelves and coolers.  I popped onto their facebook page, and am now regretting not having gotten chowder while I was there! 

Sea lion - Hood Canal Marina

I did get a chance to say hello to a visitor that had been at the marina for weeks - a sea lion!  As I snapped pictures,  I casually asked people fueling up their boats at the marina how much they would charge for a trip down to the mouth of the Skokomish and back.  The it-never-hurts-to-ask plan has been giving me interesting results all year, and this time I actually happened to be asking someone that I had asked before, but by email.

Alderbrook Resort is just up the road from the Hood Canal Marina.  It's as posh as it gets on Hood Canal, and in addition to the dining and facilities, they operate boat rentals during the summer.  I had emailed them before the year even started about a trip to see birds, and they had actually already anticipated this idea!  Interestingly, their thoughts on the times it would be best to boat through Hood Canal looking for birds is the summer. 

I turned and looked at the nearly birdless water behind me, and then conjured up pictures of the canal in the winter when it is teeming with loons, grebes, cormorants, diving and dabbling ducks.  My head was also thinking of the Skokomish delta during migration, with the shorebird and other migrant possibilities.  I explained a little bit of this to the woman as she finished fueling the boat, but she just seemed stymied that the summer birding trips had not filled up.  I'm hoping I can get to Alderbrook this year, and into the canal on some kind of boat before the year is out!

More of Hood Canal - Loons and gulls in the water

Skokomish Delta/Hunter Farms

It might have been worth it if I had earned the right to wear it

From here, my next stop was the mouth of the Skokomish.  A Parasitic Jaeger had been seen harassing gulls at the mouth on two consecutive days during the previous week.  The start of school and other obligations kept me from running out after it, but I still had some hopes that it would be out there, or would have been replaced by some equally interesting bird. 

"Red or black licorice?"  Think about that question...

Nope.  There were scads of gulls on the point of land extending farthest into Hood Canal, but nothing more unusual than a Caspian Tern passed overhead.  A Horned Grebe seemed like an early returnee to the canal, and there was also a huge flock of Surf Scoters on the far side of the temporary islands. 

I packed it up and visited Hunter Farms.  This was a good food stop.  Their shelves were full of some of the fruits of their summer produce, and I was able to leave with a jar of salsa made in Grapeview, a jar of peach butter made at Hunter Farms, and a carton of Olympic Mountain licorice ice cream. 

Please don't judge if you haven't tried licorice ice cream.  Coffee ice cream is another example of something really bitter that is tamed by sugar and cream.  It's my favorite flavor by far, and it was nice to finally hit the shop when they were serving it and selling it out of the freezer case.  I got it to go with a big bag of ice, and crossed my fingers that it would stay frozen-ish through the end of the trip (it did!)

Hoodsport to Hamma Hamma

I had similar views throughout the end of the day - a zoom will show the gulls roosting out near the water.

The Hardware Distillery Company, Hoodsport

I continued making stops, adding an American Wigeon at Eagle Creek, and finding many flocks of gulls to pick through.  None of them produced a Heermann's Gull, but it was nice at the very least to have possibilities to pick through.  The biggest finds continued to be edible rather than countable.  In Hoodsport, I stopped in at the Hardware Distillery, and it turned out to be a great stop.  They offered a free tasting of their spirits, from gin and vodka to whiskey and aquavit, and even walked me through the area where the distilling happened.

The sciency stuff

Several of the spirits used fruit or other ingredients, and it seemed like they would be overpoweringly fruity, but it was all pretty clean stuff with subtle flavors from whatever he had added to that particular spirit.  The highlight was a gin (the "R Dry Gin") that was made from grain that had been placed in the smokers up the road at the Hamma Hamma oyster company.  The owner had a mason jar full of the grain, and let me smell it.  Oh lord.  The resulting gin had the most subtle notes of that smoke.  I did a little bit to support the local economy and continued up the road.

Chuck from the distillery, showing me the peach mead that be transformed into an acquavit

Hamma Hamma Oyster Company

With a little bit of the taste of oysters still in my mouth, I made it to the Oyster Saloon itself for the third time this year.  It was by far the busiest I've seen it - not surprising on the tail end of a three day weekend!  I had some raw oysters with that tasty mignonette they make and a beer, and chatted with people on both sides of the bar.  The big year came up;  It almost always seems to, as I inevitably feel the need to bend people's ears on birds or Mason County in general.  The time I spent there was enough time for another flock of gulls to float in, this one also empty of any jaegers or Heermann's Gulls.

Wait... does this count?  I need to find a California Quail!

Leaving Hamma Hamma, I did something I had not done all year, meandering farther up Highway 101 to the county line.  I had not properly stopped at the mouth of the Hamma Hamma before, but it seemed like great habitat, and Triton Cove, near the county line itself, while unbirdy today, at least had a few passable viewpoints into the cove. 

A look at the time... a last look at the water... and I thought it was time to start heading back.  I knew I would get to this point - a trip without new birds!  Hopefully fall and winter will be cooperative, as there are still a lot of birds left out there to find!

The mouth of the Hamma Hamma River