Date: 1/15/26 5:53 am From: <lehman.paul...> via groups.io <lehman.paul...> Subject: [SanDiegoRegionBirding] the MIA Scissor-tailed Flycatcher ; and miscellanea
As some of you recall, Chris McCreedy saw a Scissor-tailed Flycatcher on 27 Dec along 28th/Maple along the east side of the Balboa Park Golf Course and just immediately north of Switzer Canyon. He has not reported it again. But I just now discovered an eBird report with a perfectly good photo of the bird at exactly the same spot from a week earlier--on 20 Dec--by a Wendy Walker. Sometimes late-submitted eBird reports, even obviously correct ones, end up several pages back in the chronological review queue, so us reviewers don't see them in a timely manner. I mention this report here because it does not seem that almost anyone has gone looking for this bird (I tried once in late Dec). And although it does sort of seem like a needle in a haystack, the bird may have a routine and can be re-found at some point in that area at that same time of day (late morning). And there is a reasonable chance this is a returning bird from a few years earlier at slightly different but relatively nearby locations.
Yesterday, the 14th, additional species of interest I saw in the Imperial Beach and South San Diego Bay area included an adult dark-lored (oriantha-type) White-crowned Sparrow, 3 Golden-crowned Sparrows, and continuing Green-tailed Towhee bordering Camp Surf, the continuing female White-winged Scoter at the IB Pier, and the usual Pacific Golden-Plover at high tide roosting with the hundreds of Black-bellieds on "Stint Island" at the Salt Works, along with a pretty good count of 70+ Herring Gulls and a first-cycle "Thayer's" on the nearby dikes. Also, three Black Scoters continue on South San Diego Bay--two drakes and a female--as viewed with a good scope looking west in the AM from Chula Vista Bayfront Park (J Street) toward the north section of Coronado Cays. Requires long periods of patience sifting through the masses of Surf Scoters. Can also try looking from Chula Vista Bayside Park just to the north, or from the opposite direction from the end of Grand Caribe in Coronado Cays. Also a reminder that the medium sized tight flock(s) of scaup out in the middle of the bottom bay are often Greaters.
--Paul Lehman, San Diego
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