This is my second of two posts about birding on Anchor Point near Homer, Alaska (see the first post … The Shifting Sands of Time). This will be the final post about my recent trip to Alaska. Without some of the tools I use for Shorebird Identification (see post on this subject), I would never had known that this morning of birding at Anchor Point accounted for not one, but two lifers.

I had only seen Black Turnstones once prior in my life. When you examine the four images shown immediately below you should understand how I was fooled. Most shorebirds change over to drab plumage during the winter, and in Alaska in mid August the southern migration is well underway. Anyhow, the dark brown birds in these photographs are Black Turnstones. I thought the rather drab gray birds present in most of these four images were just Turnstones in winter plumage. Wrong. These birds are “Surfbirds“, a new lifer for me!

In addition, I saw Bonaparte’s Gulls and a Short Billed Dowitcher (and many other shorebirds). It was worth the four mile hike from the parking lot along the beach to the kelp bed at Anchor River’s outlet.