Date: 10/1/25 9:11 pm From: Vicki Silvas-Young via groups.io <mrnngwrblr...> Subject: [southbaybirds] Field Trip to Sunnyvale WPCP, 10-1-2025
Good afternoon, SBBers,
On a particularly cloudy, "it-looks-like its-gonna-rain-any-second" day Dan Bloch and I arrived to greet 7 "not-so-beginner" birders. Thirty-nine species showed up for us, too! Singing, flying here and there, Marsh Wrens peeked at us at the very beginning along with a bunch of overhead feeding Tree and Violet-green Swallows, closely watched by a perched Red-tailed Hawk. A couple of Common Ravens with American Crows flew by, starting a conversation about how to tell them apart. Look at the tail......there will be a test later. A Say's Phoebe showed up from ....? Where *did* this Say's Phoebe come from? From the Great Basin? From the overflow of the local population? From up "North." Hmmmmm....... After being amazed at the great number of distant American White Pelicans, so pretty, showing white, then black and white, then disappearing for a moment we traveled further up the trail, where we could see a smaller bunch of American White Pelicans, sitting and preening on the pipes going across the body of water below WPCP West Pond. Then more birds started to appear on the pipes.....Brown Pelicans appeared, amongst the California Gulls was a Western Gull, Black-necked Stilts landed, Forster's terns floated by, and Double-crested Cormorants coasted in with a big splash. High on a high-voltage tower, a blackbird landed. What *is* that? Bad light, belly to vent view not particularly helpful. Finally, there on the wing of the all black blackbird was a white patch! A Tricolored Blackbird! But, wait.....there's more! A Common Gallinule ducked for cover, some Mallards with 2 Green-winged Teal scooted off the shore at our approach with the finish being a bunch of lounging Greater Yellow-legs, a lone Willet, with a couple more Black-necked Stilts hanging out with them. Black-crowned Herons, Great Egrets, and Snowy Egrets hid-not-so-well in the tules. The Sunnyvale WPCP has instituted methods to keep the assortment of blackbirds, American Crows, and Common Ravens away so they do not become dependent on our waste. But not today! Red-winged Blackbirds, American Crows, Common Ravens with a Eurasian Collared-Dove or two showed great interest in the "food source." Most attendees passed the "Tail Test." And, it did not rain, but got really warm. Many thanks, as always, to Dan, for keeping the ebird list and here it is. https://ebird.org/checklist/S276737391 Keep birding, Vick, co-leader
Do not disclose information that identifies the location of nesting birds of any species, to minimize stress on the nesting birds and the risk of vandalism or abuse.
