1 January 2014 - New Year, New Birds, New City

My company scheduled our sales meeting for the first week in January in San Francisco.  I took a couple extra days to visit Robin before the meeting started.   So on January 1st, I flew to SF. And what a visit it was! Birds, art, nature, and food. Does it get much better than this? 

Robin indulged me shamefully. Catering to my current obsession with birding, she did some research and found a couple of spots where the birds were. When she picked me up at the airport we did no pass go, we did not drive to Lombard, we drove directly to the Bay Bridge and crossed over to birdland--otherwise known as the Emeryville Crescent.  

The week I was with Robin, the king tides were in. These seasonal giants were raising the level of the Bay seven feet over normal high tides. It is hard to get my brain around that much water. The ebb tides were enough lower than normal that rocks and ocean bottom were revealed for the first time in months. Many shore birds were taking advantage of all the little creatures in the sand which gave me a great look at birds I had not seen before! It was a thrill.

The very first bird we saw was brand new to me--but the funny part is that Robin spotted it first. She is so near sighted that she can see the shape of birds, but no details unless it is pretty darned close. 

The little gem she spotted was a Black Phoebe.  

It just kept getting better and better. As we were leaving the marina area to move down the coast we spotted a hawk on a lamp post over the road. We pulled over to check it out.
 
 Red-shouldered Hawk. New bird number two. 

Number three? Still out to lunch on the id.  My best guess to date is a Fox Sparrow.

 

 
We drove on down to Emery Point where the excitement continued. There were Black Oystercatchers -- absolutely gorgeous with bright red bills and gold eyes with red eye rings. Wowser. 

I had fun watching them pry limpets off rocks and pull clams out of the sand.

Next came the Black Turnstone-- the fifth new bird of the day.

Also found a large flock of Sanderlings. There may have been 50 or more running along the edge of the water. 

They reminded me of little kids on the beach who run backwards when the waves lap up close. It seemed like they didn't want to get in any deeper than just having their feet wet.

 
 We also saw a lot of Least Sandpipers-- another very small shorebird and was number six on the new list.








At the far tip of Emery Point, a flock of at least one hundred crows were making a commotion. I enjoyed watching them pull clams up, then flutter up about three feet in the air and drop the clam on the rock. They would do this over and over until the shell broke. 

The blur in front of the crow is the falling clam. 

From  here we went on down the road to the Regional Shoreline Park. 

We saw a flock of Least Sandpipers. What was fun about this flock was the seagull among them. Great way to give a size comparison. 
 

 Number seven was a Marbled Godwit complete with a little snack he just pulled out of the sand.

We were surprised to see him emulate the ostrich in his quest for food. He was pulling up some sort of sea worm.

Number eight was a wonderful find--the California Clapper Rail which is an endangered species. 

What is particularly interesting about this bird is that in addition to being banded, I think that thread-like thing rising from his back is a lightweight GPS tracker. 

This great birding area also had a large park area. In the middle of the lawn was a sculpture that reminded me of a long forsaken french horn. 
 

 
All too soon it was getting dark so we headed back across the bridge to the city. The new Bay Bridge is beautiful. I like how you can see ahead through the structure to many more of the pillers- like an infinity mirror. 

Even better is the light show/art installation on the outside of the bridge. The lights have infinite patterning--supposedly never repeating a sequence. I found that to be yet another brain baffler. 

Robin pulled over on the Embarcadero so we could look back at the bridge. Wow. 

Later, from Robin's roof, the view was just as spectacular. 

As was the moon. The city had been quite hazy which is the current euphemism for smoggy-- so the yellow on the moon is from looking through the smog. 

Thus my first day in San Francisco ended. And what a day it was! I ended up with 37 species for the day and many new sightings. It was a day full of excitement, beauty and new things.