Pacific flyway

Along the Pacific coast, April is a great time to watch sandpipers in breeding plumage.  They have long migrations to complete, and need to stop to feed along the way.  Today, I went out to see which species were present.

The beach was pretty deserted.  In about an hour of walking I saw only 3 other people, but hundreds of sandpipers.

The beach

Whimbrels

Black-bellied plovers

A semi-palmated plover (in the foreground)

Mostly western sandpipers

Dunlins (with black bellies) mixed in with western sandpipers