[Tweeters] Marymoor Park (Redmond, King Co.) 2024-10-17

[Michael Hobbs via Tweeters]

Tweets - The day was better than we expected, with the forecast rain
holding off until we were on our ways home; just a sprinkling at the Rowing
Club was all we faced.  We even had sunshine for part of the morning, and
it was rather warm and windless.  And birdy!

Highlights:
     Snow Goose - One bird, spent most of the day with a flock of
Cacklers.  First of Year (FOY)
     Cackling Geese - 1000+, with many flocks overhead at sunrise and a
large flock on the grass later
     Ring-necked Duck - One in the slough from the Rowing Club.  First of
Fall (FOF)
     Short-billed Gull - One in our first mixed flock of gulls at sunrise
this fall (FOF)
     Northern Harrier - One being escorted off-site by crows, just like
last week
     Cooper's Hawk - Both an adult and a juvenile, separately
     Northern Saw-whet Owl - Matt had two pre-dawn (FOY)
     Merlin - Two sightings
     Hermit Thrush - One at the "Mysterious Thicket" south of the East
Meadow (FOF)
     American Robin - Constantly super-abundant.  No way to put a number on
them, though it was in the hundreds
     HOUSE SPARROW - The first for the Survey since 2021-03-11 (!)   Male
at the Compost Piles (FOY)
     American Pipit - Around a dozen on the grass/gravel field in the NE,
only our 2nd sighting this fall
     Pine Siskin - Fifteen or more today; our first actual flocks of the
fall
     Townsend's Warbler - Beautiful male near the mansion

A late scan of the lake turned up over a dozen WESTERN GREBE and a couple
of AMERICAN COOT.  There was also a very large raft of ducks too far out to
ID, but they were at least mostly Aythya spp.  So perhaps way more than 1
Ring-necked Duck for the day.  An earlier flyby of ducks also appeared to
contain a female Aythya duck, possibly a scaup.  So here's hoping we'll
have some diving ducks more visible next week.

Misses today included Hooded Merganser, Ring-billed Gull, Brown Creeper
(may have heard), and Purple Finch.

For the day, 63 species.

= Michael Hobbs
= BirdMarymoor at gmail.com
= www.marymoor.org/birding.htm
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