[SBB] SCL Big Day 10/6/05 - further details (long)

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All,

I finally have a chance to post more details about our 10/6/05 Big Day in Santa Clara County.

Steve Rottenborn, Scott Terrill, John Sterling, and I met out in front of SFBBO in Alviso at midnight to start our Big Day. Walking up to the dike along Alviso Slough, we soon heard BARN OWL, VIRGINIA RAIL, and SORA. A few shorebirds were recognizable by call as well. Driving around Alviso, we located a BURROWING OWL perched on a fence before heading south to Parkway Lakes, where Steve had noted the Osprey roosting on his drive up to meet us. Sure enough, the OSPREY was still perched there at 1:09am when we arrived, parked right above a Great Blue Heron. Next we drove east to the oak woodland along Metcalf Road, hearing 3 WESTERN SCREECH-OWLS and 2 GREAT HORNED OWLS. Upon reaching the junction with San Felipe Road, we headed east to the abandoned Highland School and then south from the next junction. This road is listed as an extension of San Felipe Road on the USGS quad, but is called Las Animas Road on my AAA map. Along this road we added 5 WESTERN SCREECH-OWLS, 2 GREAT HO!
 RNED OWLS, 1 NORTHERN PYGMY-OWL, and a LONG-EARED OWL. (I owl this area for the Calero-Morgan Hill Christmas Bird Count and it has always been productive then as well.)

Pleased with our results, we headed back across the valley to Almaden Reservoir, hoping to find Wood Ducks asleep on the reservoir. We had no luck with that, but did find 4 more BARN OWLS on the roadside telephone wires east of Calero Reservoir, 2 GREAT HORNED OWLS at the Almaden-Quicksilver trailhead in New Almaden, and 4 GREAT HORNED OWLS around Almaden Reservoir. We detoured up to the locked gate on the road to Mt. Umunhum, hoping to elicit a response from a Common Poorwill. No luck with that, but we added 3 more WESTERN SCREECH-OWLS and another GREAT HORNED OWL.

We headed to Monte Bello OSP next. Before hiking into the preserve, we managed to whistle in a NORTHERN SAW-WHET OWL along Page Mill Road, shortly past the "Gate 5" entrance. After this, we hiked into Monte Bello OSP along the Canyon Trail, adding 14+ WESTERN SCREECH-OWLS, 6+ GREAT HORNED OWLS, 5 NORTHEN SAW-WHET OWLS, 2 NORTHERN PYGMY-OWLS, and our second LONG-EARED OWL. By hiking most of the way up to Black Mountain on the Indian Creek Trail, we were finally able to find a COMMON POORWILL, our 19th species of the day.

As the sun rose, our species count rose quickly. RUFOUS-CROWNED SPARROWS were heard near the poorwill location, along with other chaparral species like CALIFORNIA THRASHER and WRENTIT. We also had our only CALIFORNIA QUAILS of the day at this location. Hiking back down to the Canyon Trail, we added VARIED THRUSH (several), HUTTON'S VIREO, PILEATED WOODPECKER (called twice, at 7:30am and 7:33am), TOWNSEND'S WARBLER (7), BLACK-THROATED GRAY WARBLER (1), WINTER WREN (2), BAND-TAILED PIGEON, BROWN CREEPER, HAIRY WOODPECKER (2), PURPLE FINCH, the first of 6 COOPER'S HAWKS for the day, and a TARANTULA. Back at the cars we added a RED-BREASTED NUTHATCH, the day's only AMERICAN GOLDFINCHES, and 3 uncountable WILD TURKEYS that were on the San Mateo County side of the road. We left at 8:42am with 64 species under our belt.

Next we drove to the Palo Alto Baylands to catch the uncovering tide, adding quality species like HOUSE FINCH, ROCK PIGEON, and AMERICAN CROW in transit. We managed to find BLACK-BELLIED and SEMIPALMATED PLOVERS and early returning DUNLIN on the mudlfats, but none of the hoped for Whimbrels. Ducks, gulls, and blackbirds quickly filled out our list and we passed up 100 species by 9:30am, adding BROWN PELICAN and PEREGRINE FALCON at the yacht harbor mouth. We headed over to the end of Embarcadero Way to search for migrants and added the BLACKPOLL WARBLER and 2 YELLOW WARBLERS, as well as the day's only CEDAR WAXWINGS.

We next headed to the Guadalupe River, hoping for more lingering passerines. The river delivered 1 PACIFIC-SLOPE FLYCATCHER, 1 ORANGE-CROWNED WARBLER, 1 YELLOW WARBLER, 1 WILSON'S WARBLER, and 3 WESTERN TANAGERS - but it turned out that we would refind all of these except the tanager later at CCFS. Moving on to CCFS at 11:15am, we had 117 species already on our list. Lingering passerines at CCFS included 1 WESTERN WOOD-PEWEE, 3+ "WESTERN" FLYCATCHERS, 2 WARBLING VIREOS, 2 HOUSE WRENS, 1 BLUE-GRAY GNATCATCHER, 7 ORANGE-CROWNED WARBLERS, 2 YELLOW WARBLERS, 1 BLACK-THROATED GRAY WARBLER, 2 WILSON'S WARBLERS, and the CANADA WARBLER. Equally as important to our day list were the day's only RED-SHOULDERED HAWK and DOWNY WOODPECKER and our first BELTED KINGFISHER. Unusual for CCFS was an ACORN WOODPECKER atop a snag along the creek just north of the trailer.

We drove up to the waterbird pond, failing to refind the Wood Duck Scott had seen the day before on the creek near the former heronry. The waterbird pond added nothing to our list, but the nearby sewage ponds turned up 32 PECTORAL SANDPIPERS, a juvenile STILT SANDPIPER, 2 BARN SWALLOWS, and 16 more DUNLIN. We left at 1:20pm with 131 species.

Back at the Arzino Ranch we added RING-NECKED PHEASANT and a SAY'S PHOEBE. The EEC entrance road added 2 LESSER YELLOWLEGS and 3 TRICOLORED BLACKBIRDS. Salt Pond A18 had 6 lingering RED-NECKED PHALAROPES and A16 had an adult HERRING GULL and a CLARK'S GREBE. Two PERERGINE FALCONS were in the area as well. The pond at State and Spreckles had another Lesser Yellowlegs. There was no sign of any swallow flock in Alviso.

Covering the Alviso salt ponds was time-consuming and added only 3 new species: 27 BLACK SKIMMERS on A7, a distant REDHEAD scoped on A10, and several AMERICAN WIGEON. We had another two PEREGRINE FALCONS (both adults) and at least 10 BROWN PELICANS as well.

Hustling up to Ed Levin Park with 141 species we added the first of two SHARP-SHINNED HAWKS and the day's only WILSON'S SNIPE at a nearly dried out Sandy Wool Lake. We added more oak woodland species such as WILD TURKEY, WESTERN BLUEBIRD, and WHITE-BREASTED NUTHATCH and picked out 2 GOLDEN EAGLES over the ridge. Heading up to Calaveras Reservoir added YELLOW-BILLED MAGPIE and a ROCK WREN near the junction of Felter and Calaveras Roads. The reservoir itself added hundreds of RING-NECKED DUCKS and some WESTERN GREBES, including adults of the latter species feeding mid-sized precocial young. Another male REDHEAD was found, as were more WHITE-BREASTED NUTHATCHES and WILD TURKEYS. Yet another adult PEREGRINE FALCON was perched on the shore of the reservoir. Heading back to Felter Road, we added a single LARK SPARROW, species number 152, at 4:26pm. Behind schedule, we decided to skip Sierra Road, costing us Horned Lark and perhaps a rare raptor for the day.

Down at the Sunnyvale Water Pollution Control Plant we added COMMON MOORHEN, GREEN HERON, and BONAPARTE'S GULL. Other birds, not new for the day, included 2 more BARN SWALLOWS, our 7th PEREGRINE FALCON for the day (another adult), 18 RED-NECKED PHALAROPES, 8 more HERRING GULLS, and a flock of 37 AMERICAN PIPITS. Scoping from the Lockheed Ponds corner of the old landfill turned up an eclipse/immature male EURASIAN WIGEON (species 156) and another LESSER YELLOWLEGS.

We next added SURF SCOTER at Shoreline Lake (#157), along with another GREEN HERON and another COMMON MOORHEN. A SHORT-BILLED DOWITCHER was in the Forebay (#158) and 4 BLUE-WINGED TEAL were across Adobe Creek in the Palo Alto Flood Control Basin (#159). Back at the yacht harbor mouth at 6:22pm, the tide was uncovering again. This time we located 4 WHIMBRELS (#160) and heard our first of 8 CLAPPER RAILS (#161). A hike out to the outer Palo Alto Flood Control Basin from Byxbee Park failed to turn up a Canvasback before darkness fell.

Having done so well with owling, we had few possibilities to add more species at night. A quick trip to Stanford University added twittering WHITE-THROATED SWIFTS (#162) in the eaves of Green Library and another BARN OWL, but a drive all the way south to Chesbro Reservoir failed to locate any Wood Ducks, as did another stop at Almaden Reservoir. We split up at 9:57pm, having covered 248 miles together and having broken the previous fall Big Day high for the county by 2 species.

A successful Big Day relies on not missing "expected" species as much as on finding rarities like Canada Warbler. We did well in this regard, with our biggest misses being Merlin (seen the next day by Steve and 2 days later by me), Horned Lark (would have found it at Sierra Road), both Tree and Violet-green Swallows (2 VGSWs were seen at CCFS the following day, 10 TRSW were seen at Byxbee Park the day before), and Pygmy Nuthatch (refused to respond at Monte Bello). Waiting until later in the year may have added more ducks (Canvasback, Bufflehead, Red-breasted Merganser), gulls (Mew and Thayer's) and perhaps such birds as Red-breasted Sapsucker, but may have reduced our flycatcher/warbler total. All-in-all this may be a tough total to beat, as even our previous record from 10/12/1997, which only reached 160 species, included rarities such as Cattle Egret, Greater White-fronted Goose, Red Knot, Ruff, Lesser Black-backed Gull, Sabine's Gull, and White-throated Sparrow.

Mike Rogers
Sunnyvale
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