On the weekend that I visited Stevens Creek County Park, there was a Solitary Sandpiper reported at Oka Ponds. Because of the drought, the Oka Percolation Ponds (and several other bodies of water, like the main SCVWD pond) were dried up by the Santa Clara Valley Water District, exposing mudflats, allowing for shorebirds. The Solitary Sandpiper was a pretty big deal, because it was a county code 5 and an eastern bird, and very close to my school. After school ended, my brother and I decided to blitz Oka Ponds only with binoculars looking for the rare sandpiper and an unlikely pair of mergansers that had been reported there yesterday: a female Red-breasted and a juvenile male Hooded, the latter of which would be new for the year for us.
We started off near the main parking lot, seeing the famous (uncountable) Mute Swan, Great and Snowy Egrets together with Double-crested Cormorants on the island in the biggest pond (which hadn't been dried up yet), a California Gull, Mallards, and Pied-billed Grebes on that same pond, singing Red-winged Blackbirds in the reeds on the shore, and Cliff and Tree Swallows swooping over. The second pond was much the same as the first. However, the third was partly mudflats, and partly water, which contained four feeding dowitchers, an American Wigeon, and two Gadwalls. The mudflats had at least six Killdeer, but no Solitary Sandpiper in sight.
On Ponds 4,5, and 6, which were almost completely dried up, there wasn't anything interesting, except for Black Phoebes calling from the creek, five Cedar Waxwings flying over, and a Green Heron near the dam's spillway under the bridge.
We circled around the third pond, and stopped at a better vantage point to check out the shorebirds. I couldn't identify the dowitchers because they were far away, the lighting was bad, dowitchers are hard to ID, and... OK, I'll stop making excuses: because I'm still not that skilled of a birder (even though the first three were also true). I also found a Least Sandpiper together with the Killdeers, and an unidentified peep. Still no Solitary Sandpiper...
At that moment, I realized something was weird about two of the Killdeers - they were only a bit bigger that the Least Sandpiper, and had only one black chest band! Then, it hit me that these weren't Killdeers at all, but Semipalmated Plovers! I couldn't believe that I hadn't picked them out at once, even though this was my first time seeing them! Closer inspection also showed the small, bicolored bills of the plovers. My brother and I were running out of time, so we decided to forget about the Solitary Sandpiper.
As we were walking, we were hissed at by two Canada Geese parents, who were undoubtedly trying to protect their recently fledged young that walked close by them. We avoided the geese, and were about to head back to the car, when we noticed a pair of birds floating on the second pond. An adult Red-breasted Merganser and a juvenile male Hooded Merganser, to be precise!
Two yearbirds (one of which was also a lifer) in thirty minutes isn't bad at all!
Summary:
Birds seen: 30
New birds: 2
Big year count: 159
Good birding,
Sergey Pavlov
We started off near the main parking lot, seeing the famous (uncountable) Mute Swan, Great and Snowy Egrets together with Double-crested Cormorants on the island in the biggest pond (which hadn't been dried up yet), a California Gull, Mallards, and Pied-billed Grebes on that same pond, singing Red-winged Blackbirds in the reeds on the shore, and Cliff and Tree Swallows swooping over. The second pond was much the same as the first. However, the third was partly mudflats, and partly water, which contained four feeding dowitchers, an American Wigeon, and two Gadwalls. The mudflats had at least six Killdeer, but no Solitary Sandpiper in sight.
On Ponds 4,5, and 6, which were almost completely dried up, there wasn't anything interesting, except for Black Phoebes calling from the creek, five Cedar Waxwings flying over, and a Green Heron near the dam's spillway under the bridge.
We circled around the third pond, and stopped at a better vantage point to check out the shorebirds. I couldn't identify the dowitchers because they were far away, the lighting was bad, dowitchers are hard to ID, and... OK, I'll stop making excuses: because I'm still not that skilled of a birder (even though the first three were also true). I also found a Least Sandpiper together with the Killdeers, and an unidentified peep. Still no Solitary Sandpiper...
At that moment, I realized something was weird about two of the Killdeers - they were only a bit bigger that the Least Sandpiper, and had only one black chest band! Then, it hit me that these weren't Killdeers at all, but Semipalmated Plovers! I couldn't believe that I hadn't picked them out at once, even though this was my first time seeing them! Closer inspection also showed the small, bicolored bills of the plovers. My brother and I were running out of time, so we decided to forget about the Solitary Sandpiper.
As we were walking, we were hissed at by two Canada Geese parents, who were undoubtedly trying to protect their recently fledged young that walked close by them. We avoided the geese, and were about to head back to the car, when we noticed a pair of birds floating on the second pond. An adult Red-breasted Merganser and a juvenile male Hooded Merganser, to be precise!
Two yearbirds (one of which was also a lifer) in thirty minutes isn't bad at all!
Summary:
Birds seen: 30
New birds: 2
Big year count: 159
Good birding,
Sergey Pavlov
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