Ottawa NWR, Estuary Trail 5/16--Ruddy Turnstone

It seems ridiculous that I had to go to Ohio to get my first Ruddy Turnstone of the year, but that's how it happened and I almost didn't get them. We did the same thing as the day before: After we got off the boardwalk, Shari sat and rested while I walked the Estuary Trail. Shorebirds were abundant out on the sandbar and I added Short-billed Dowitcher to the trip list, but nothing new until I was at the very end of the loop. Another birder asked me what I'd seen down the beach and I told him nothing but an Eastern Kingbird and a few Yellow Warblers. He had seen a Blue Grosbeak in the parking lot (what a parking lot!) and it had flown in the direction of the beach. Since I hadn't seen it, he thanked me for saving him the trip (what trust in the birding abilities of a stranger!). Off-handedly he pointed out where 3 turnstones had been roosting a short time before. I turned the scope toward the bulkhead he was pointed to and sure enough, there they were, finally. I went to get Shari, who was chatting with a couple from southern Ohio and all four of us went to look for the turnstones, which, of course, were gone, replaced by a gull, probably chased, in fact, by that gull. "You schmooze  you lose," I told Shari. Someone pointed out a small bird on the beach in the opposite direction, Shari, not to be denied, scoped it and had her turnstone for the trip and for the year.

We birded a couple of more places during the day, but aside from a Snowy Egret at Metzger Marsh, relatively rare in Ohio and Greater Yellowlegs at the Boss Unit, both new for the trip, did not find anything worth reporting.

I knew it was time to go home when we walked a few hundred feet along the boardwalk in the late afternoon and I just couldn't stand being there anymore. I'd had enough. And since we planned to go home the next day anyway, the trip and my patience ended at precisely the right time.

Ottawa NWR--Crane Creek Estuary Trail
24 species
Trumpeter Swan  3
Mallard  10
Great Blue Heron  1
Great Egret  1
Black-bellied Plover  30
Semipalmated Plover  2
Killdeer  2
Ruddy Turnstone  3
Least Sandpiper  2
Dunlin  500
Short-billed Dowitcher  1
Ring-billed Gull  10
Herring Gull  1
Caspian Tern  4
Common Tern  5
Northern Flicker  1    Heard
Eastern Kingbird  1
Warbling Vireo  1
Tree Swallow  15
Gray Catbird  3
Yellow Warbler  3
Northern Cardinal  1
Red-winged Blackbird  X
Common Grackle  X