Birds around San Francisco (1 Viewer)

skink1978 said:

Fisherman’s Wharf is a good base to pick up common birds, especially if you combine it with a visit to a large city park. On my visit (February 2009) I stayed within walking distance of the Wharf (apart from a trolley ride) and picked up a good number of lifers, including Anna’s HB.

Crissy Field Pond is definitely worth a visit for wading birds and waterfowl, although it may be a longish walk with a two year old in tow. Details of my trip can be found below.

http://wildlifewanderer.co.uk/2009California.aspx

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I've read your trip report a couple of times - love the pictures too.

The Anna's HB is my primary target - but would love find anything new ( basically everything for us ). We are staying in walking distance to Fisherman's Wharf too - so I am hopeful of some good sightings.

Can I ask what field guide would you recommend ? I have a small San Francisco birds leaflet - but don't think it's particularly fantastic

Mal Skelton

Anna's shouldn't be at all difficult. Without 'jinxing' you, I'd say it's pretty close to guaranteed.

I prefer the National Geographic guide, but Sibley gets a lot of recommendations from many U.S. birders.

Anna's is very common in Golden Gate Park (or anywhere else with flowers around San Francisco Bay...)

I would recommend Sibley's, but the National Geographic is a good choice too.

malskelton said:

I've read your trip report a couple of times - love the pictures too.

The Anna's HB is my primary target - but would love find anything new ( basically everything for us ). We are staying in walking distance to Fisherman's Wharf too - so I am hopeful of some good sightings.

Can I ask what field guide would you recommend ? I have a small San Francisco birds leaflet - but don't think it's particularly fantastic

Mal Skelton

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I use the Sibley (Western USA version).

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Sibley-Fiel...=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1279020210&sr=1-1

As others have said, Anna's should be easy.

Hope you have a good trip.

I just wanted to thank you all for the advice and guidance I've received on this thread - I leave for San Francisco on Monday armed with my Sibley guide book and several print outs from this thread.

I am doing Alcatraz on Tuesday morning - then Golden Gate Park on Wednesday - between the two I hope to acquire a few new birds on my world list ....... and I am praying that in the Gardens I locate an Anna's

If anybody is in SF now and can see an Anna's - any chance they could somehow follow constantly until Tuesday or failing that prevent it from leaving it's current location

Just kidding

Mal Skelton

Mal
this link may help you

http://ebird.org/ebird/GuideMe?step...&continue.x=48&continue.y=7&continue=Continue

Hi all

It's been a while since I've been back but everything has been a little hectic so I haven't had chance to get on here and update ....... but I wanted to say thank you for all of the help you gave me before we went.

I dipped on my target bird of an Anna's Hummingbird, but overall we were thrilled with what we did see amongst our crazy schedule.

Here's the list we managed to see ;

Western Gull - Pier 33 - 21/09/2010
Brown Pelican - Pier 33 - 21/09/2010
Caspian Tern - San Francisco Bay - 21/09/2010
Brandt's Cormorant - Alcatraz - 21/09/2010
Double Crested Cormorant - Pier 33 - 21/09/2010
Heerman's Gull - Pier 33 - 21/09/2010
Ring Billed Gull - Fisherman's Wharf - 22/09/2010
Brewer's Blackbird - Golden Gate Park - 22/09/2010
Red Shouldered Hawk - Golden Gate Park - 22/09/2010
American Coot - Golden Gate Park - 22/09/2010
Black Crowned Night Heron - Golden Gate Park - 22/09/2010
Dark Eyed Junco - Golden Gate Park - 22/09/2010
Pied Billed Grebe - Golden Gate Park - 22/09/2010
Steller's Jay Golden Gate Park - 22/09/2010
Red Tailed Hawk - Golden Gate Park - 22/09/2010
Cooper's Hawk - Golden Gate Park - 22/09/2010
California Quail - Golden Gate Park - 22/09/2010
Brown Creeper - Golden Gate Park - 22/09/2010
Black Phoebe - Golden Gate Park - 22/09/2010
American Robin - Golden Gate Park - 22/09/2010
American Crow - SF International Airport - 22/09/2010

I was hoping you guys could help with a query bird though - the two pics attached are gulls that we weren't 100% with. I think the roof top one is a Heerman's - which was on the roof of Hard Rock where we had lunch, the second is in Golden Gate Park.

If you could let me know your opinions it could potentially be an armchair tick for us

Thanks

Mal Skelton

You're right about the gull in the right-hand photo which is a Heerman's Gull.

fugl said:

You're right about the gull in the right-hand photo which is a Heerman's Gull.

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Hi there - thanks for the confirmation, we saw two together on Pier 33 and then as we walked to Hard Rock we found this one on the roof ......... was one of the birds I had hoped to see, beautiful grey colouring.

The other gull we passed off as Herring Gull ( which we see loads of in the UK ) but that's because we don't know any different ......... reading our books it suggested that Herring Gull wasn't that common in SF, hence why we were confused.

Mal Skelton

malskelton said:

Hi there - thanks for the confirmation, we saw two together on Pier 33 and then as we walked to Hard Rock we found this one on the roof ......... was one of the birds I had hoped to see, beautiful grey colouring.

The other gull we passed off as Herring Gull ( which we see loads of in the UK ) but that's because we don't know any different ......... reading our books it suggested that Herring Gull wasn't that common in SF, hence why we were confused.

Mal Skelton

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Suspect the other gull is a Western Gull, although may have some hybrid influence from Glaucous-winged.

Andrew Whitehouse said:

Suspect the other gull is a Western Gull, although may have some hybrid influence from Glaucous-winged.

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Hi Andrew - thanks for that. I had a suspicion of Glaucous Winged but didn't feel confident enough to mention it.

This was taken on the lake at Golden Gate Park - there were lots of Western Gulls around and it was significantly different to draw our attention .... but there were many of them, not just this one.

I wondered whether the hundreds of gulls that we dismissed as Herring weren't - they were a lot light backed than the Western Gulls

Mal Skelton

Andrew Whitehouse said:

Suspect the other gull is a Western Gull, although may have some hybrid influence from Glaucous-winged.

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That's would be my guess too, but the photo's so over-exposed that it's hard to be sure.