This was one of those days.
Clear skies, light east winds going NE and fantastic visibility.
12 CANG
10 WODU
16 GADW
78 AMWI
54 MALL
35 NOPI
44 NSHO
30 GWTE
4,252 BWTE (Up until this point this season only ~3,200 BWTE had migrated south, a year earlier we were closing in on 8,000. Needless to say my hope for this season was pretty much gone, and all I could think of was how much 2013 was sucking. Then today hit! It utterly destroys the previous Tiscornia and county highcount of 1,772 set last fall, in the first hour alone 1,392 flew south! Without a doubt one of the highlights of the season)
15 REDH
1 GRSC
4 LESC
1 TUDU (Mixed in with a flock of BWTE 600-800m out in the first hour. After having seen 60,000+ Scaup/REHE/RNDU out here over the years I feel like I have a reasonably thorough grasp on what the expected Athya look like in flight, so when I picked up on a Scaupish duck with a nearly black chest, head and back (all essentially the same color), gleaming white flanks and belly, in combination with a GRSC amount of white in the wing the warning bells started ringing and upon closer study (60x baby) I picked up on the differences in head shape from the expected Athya's along with what looked like a tuft extending ~2/3 way along and being held against the neck. At times you could pick up on the tuft changing shape/position in relation to the head moving)
7 HOGR
2 DCCO
1 AMCO
1 AGPL
1 KILL
26 AMAV (talk about a surprise, this flock showed up south of the pier in the 7th hour and alternated between getting flushed off the beach by walkers and sitting in the water. This sets a new county highcount!)
1 GRYE (spent a hour on the beach)
29 SAND
1 BASA
Crappy TUDU composite with BWTE
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