I managed to get on a walk down to Totem Park this morning, but otherwise did not spend too much time outside.

Weather: Mostly clear this morning, with clouds moving in by early afternoon. There were small breaks in the clouds before overcast skies came to dominate by late afternoon. Rain held off until after dark.

Birds: Hundreds of gulls were hanging out down at the park. I only saw 5 shorebirds. They were flying off from near the river mouth and sounded like Black Turnstones.

While talking with the park biologist we saw a pair of ducks flying. One looked distinctly smaller than the other, so it may have been a Mallard and Teal, but the lighting wasn’t great and the birds were pretty far away. OUt off shore or of the river mouth were several ducks that may have been Surf Scoters.

I heard a flicker and saw several warblers on my way around the park beach. On the way back through the woods I heard a woodpecker. I think it was a Hairy Woodpecker.

A Great Blue Heron landed in the estuary (the tide was in to the edge of the grasses) and began fishing as I made my way back to the trail.

I saw two sparrows that I think may have been Golden-crowned Sparrows, but I didn’t get a great look. They were initially along the alder fringe near the estuary before flying into the woods where they stopped in a Devil’s Club thicket to eat some berries (see photo above).

Other Notes: I saw two or three dragonflies today. They seemed to be taking advantage of the warm dry weather to hunt for insect prey.

There were quite a few dead salmon along the beach at the park. Near the river the smell of dead fish was noticable.

I had one tour this morning and went for a walk to Totem Park this evening.  The tour was a Captain’s Choice, and we stopped at the Nadezhda Islands in Krestof Sound and returned through Nawkwasina Passage.

Weather:  Overcast with some light rain.  This evening there were a few breaks in the clouds, but I did not see the sun, only the rays filtering through in the distance.

Birds:  At the park there were more gulls than I had seen in recent days.  The balance of numbers seems to have shifted to Glaucous-winged Gulls, though there were still quite a few Mew Gulls.

I started seeing quite a few small sandpipers flying around between the large tidepools and the river mouth.  I would guess there were several dozen all together, though it was difficult to say for sure, since they can be pretty difficult to see.  There were a couple of interesting things I noticed about these birds.  They were far more spread out than I am used to seeing.  At most 4 or 5 birds would fly together and when they were on the ground they would spread out quite a bit.  Also, most of the ones I saw well enough to identify were Least Sandpipers.  I only saw one Western Sandpiper.  This is the opposite of what I have seen the last couple of springs.  I’m uncertain whether this is just random variation, this year was a good year for Least Sandpipers, or Fall and Spring have different distributions of birds (with Least Sandpipers stopping here more in the Fall and Western Sandpipers stopping here more in the Spring).

Other Notes:  There was a doe and a fawn along the shore in Nawkwasina Passage.  We also saw between 6 and 9 deer on the beach near Inner Point when we were stopped to look at Sea Otters.

Some of the passengers got saw a bear, but it took off and ran before I had a chance to see it.

I had two tours today with Allen Marine.  Both of them were Sea Otter and Wildlife Quest tours, so we did not have any beach walks.

Weather:  It was overcast this morning, with some partial clearing in the afternoon.  Winds seemed to be pretty calm.  On the way back in to Jamestown Bay after the tours, there was a rainbow.  It started out fairly faint, but ended up being one of the most intense I have seen.

Birds:  On the morning tour we went out to St. Lazaria and got to see the birds out there.

On the second tour, we had stopped to watch a whale near Redoubt and I noticed flock of about 5 black birds flying.  At first I thought they might be geese based on the way they were flying, but a quick look in my camera made me conclude they were cormorants (based on the black color).  Watching the whale distracted me from the birds for a few minutes until the captain asked me about them.  He was confident they were not cormorants, so we decided they were probably Brants.

The phalaropes seem to be getting more abundant.  I saw a few in Crescent Bay today (though I doubt they would have been visible from shore).

Other Notes:  There was a doe and a fawn in a small cove near the head of Redoubt Bay.

There were a couple of folks dipnetting in the right falls at Redoubt.  We did not see them pull anything in, however.

We were treated to some pretty spectacular breaching by a whale on the second tour (more on that on a later entry).