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From: john@nmt.edu (John Shipman)
Newsgroups: rec.birds
Subject: Glad I went birding Sunday.
Message-ID: <1990Nov7.074024.2192@nmt.edu>
Date: 7 Nov 90 07:40:24 GMT
Organization: Zoological Data Processing
Lines: 65

Sometimes you just have to drop everything and go birdwatching.

I was planning on a relaxing Sunday, spending the day making
dinner for a group of friends around 7.  At 2 in the afternoon, I
figured I had plenty of time to pick recipes, shop and cook.

The day before, I had gotten word that someone had sighted an
odd shorebird at the Bosque del Apache National Wildlife
Refuge, which is about twenty miles south of my home in central
New Mexico.  I figured it wasn't that rare, and I could miss
seeing it.  But just for fun, just before I went to the store,
I called the person who had seen the bird.

We had a long discussion on the field marks of the bird.  He said
that the bird was quite rare and he was hoping that someone else
could go and confirm the sighting.  So, what the heck, I can push
dinner back a bit---I grabbed my gear and headed for the refuge.

I went to the spot where he saw it, and there didn't seem to be
any shorebirds around.  So I just sort of scanned around looking
for any kind of shorebird.  He said it was with some dowitchers,
so when I found a group of birds that appeared in the glasses to
be dowitchers, I got out the scope and started to scan that area.

By some kind of dumb luck, I almost immediately found a candidate
in my scope field.  I started to write a description.

I was looking at a medium-sized shorebird, length about halfway
between Western Sandpiper and Long-billed Dowitcher.  The bird
was feeding actively, talking about four steps a second---much
slower than a peep, but faster than a yellowlegs.

The general size and shape were about the same as a Pectoral
Sandpiper.  Projecting the axis of the bill through the head,
the head and bill were about the same length; the bill was
black, not too thick, pretty much straight with a hint of a
droop at the end.

But the plumage was all wrong for a Pectoral.  The crown showed a
strong reddish cast.  There was a prominent white line over the
eye that got slightly wider behind the eye.  While Pectorals
always have a brown streaky chest that terminates cleanly at the
top of the white belly, this bird had a warm buff chest devoid of
streaking, the buff fading gradually to a white belly.  There was
a bit of dark streaking off to the sides of the chest, but none
in the middle.  The legs were yellow.  The feathering of the
upper back looked scaly, the feathers having dark centers and
buff margin.

A little later I found a Pectoral, and it looked very different.  No
rust on the head, no noticeable eyeline, chest sharply delineated.

Figured it out yet?

Okay, I said to myself, I just got my lifer Sharp-tailed Sandpiper.
Also happened to be my 350th species in New Mexico.

I was wondering exactly how rare it was in the state.  I got home
and checked the references.  Holy Toledo, it's a first state
record!

Dinner was late.  Oh well.
-- 
John Shipman/Zoological Data Processing/Socorro, NM/john@jupiter.nmt.edu
``Let's go outside and commiserate with nature.''  --Dave Farber