First New Rarity of the Season

Bar-tailed Godwit

The day was unusually warm as an early October heatwave descended on the Bay Area. Looking across the Bay we could see two of the largest cruise ships I had ever seen docked in San Francisco. Glancing up we could see the Blue Angels practicing for their Fleet Week performance. And just a few hundred yards away we could hear the horn blasts and see the organized chaos that is one of the largest container ports in the world. Hardly the place where you would expect to find a rare bird. 

Middle Harbor Shoreline Park in the middle of the Port of Oakland seems a bit of an afterthought and is generally unknown to most people, but it does have a reputation amongst birders as being a good place to view a variety of different shorebirds. Word had gotten out on the listserves that a Bar-tailed Godwit was being seen here so I texted Jeff and he met me there and acted as my guide since he had seen the bird the previous day.

The Bar-tailed Godwit has been a problem bird for me. Two years ago one wintered in Emeryville and I tried numerous times to see it without any luck. Most recently, on our way home from the San Juan Islands, Danette and I made a slight detour along the coast of Washington to Tokeland to see one that had been there for at least six weeks - no luck. I was beginning to think that this was going to be my new nemisis bird. I can now rest easy in the knowledge that they do actually exist. Within one minute of setting up his scope Jeff found the Godwit on a sandbar in the harbor surrounded by a large number of close cousins, Marbled Godwits. For the next half hour we enjoyed leisurely views of the bird and took in the beautiful day around us.

The image above shows the Bar-tailed at the top just left of center. In this image you can see the size difference with the Marbled Godwits around it and see its paler color, heavier barring, and white supercilium. Those are Elegant Terns in the foreground - the "bad hair day birds."

A few more words about the Bar-tailed Godwit. It is widely held that these birds are the champions of non-stop migration. Each fall they leave Alaska and fly non-stop over the Pacific to New Zealand, a journey of over 7,000 miles accomplished over eight days, losing over half their body weight in the process. Astonishing! There is no way of knowing why the bird we saw is not on this traditional route, but we do know from previous records that their appearance on the Pacific Coast is not out of the question. Like many other bird species the Bar-tailed Godwit is in decline particularly due to habitat loss along the coast of the Yellow Sea where it depends on mudflats to feed during the return journey to Alaska.

This is a bird you can't help but to admire. If you'd like to learn more about this distance champion I would point you to this article from Audubon's "The Sketch."

Link to the google photo album of my images.