Peters Canyon XIV

This morning I again birded Peters Canyon. I walked the Lakeview and Cactus Point Trails as usual, but also the Willow Trail, which has been closed due to nesting Bell's Vireos and other birds over the summer. It was a bit slower than usual, especially with passerines - the cool, cloudy, breezy weather might have had something to do with it. However, the lake continues to be excellent for birding. Numbers of coots and ducks were roughly the same as last week, and the number of Ring-necked Ducks jumped from two to five. However, the best bird was a single Pectoral Sandpiper that I found. It's an annual bird in fair numbers in southern California, and one of the most common shorebird "vagrants", but it was still fun to find. It was a state bird for me! I didn't get a good look of it on the ground, but it made a couple close fly-bys, giving me good looks at its "bibbed" appearance, near lack of a wing stripe, rather chunky feel, and wide dark stripe down the middle of the rump. It was slightly smaller than the Killdeer it was associating with, and it called several times. I've pretty much given up hope of finding lots of migrant warblers at Peters Canyon - they seem to prefer lush, exotic plantings over the dry riparian willows. I also found a couple White-crowned Sparrows and Yellow-rumped Warblers, which were both new Peters Canyon birds for me. These, along with the Pectoral Sandpiper, pushed my Peters Canyon list to ninety-one! I also got good looks at a beautiful Say's Phoebe - very neat birds, and one of my favorites - you can't beat the subtle pink on the underparts and the jet black tail. Here's a shot of one that I took in June in New Mexico: