La Jolla, San Diego - 2/122024

     After spending a few days in Manhattan Beach, we made it down to San Diego County and were staying in National City, not too far from the Tijuana, Mexico border.  Monday was our first full day there and a day trip to La Jolla was on our schedule.  Before we headed out for the day, I did my usual get up early and take a walk around the vicinity.  Our hotel was right next to the Paradise Marsh area of the San Diego Bay National Wildlife Refuge.  I spent roughly an hour walking about a mile-and-a-half around the area which was mostly a salt water marsh surrounded by chaparral-like habitat.  I picked out 18 bird species, highlighted by American wigeons, northern pintails, Anna’s hummingbirds,  black phoebe, Cassin’s kingbird, several bushtits, lots of white-crowned sparrows and Audubon’s yellow-rumped warblers, a California towhee and a California gnatcatcher.
California towhee.  © S. Weiss

California gnatcatcher. © S. Weiss

After my morning walk, we headed out to La Jolla.  La Jolla is a picturesque, affluent seaside community not far from downtown San Diego.  The winding promenade along its cove gives breathtaking views of the Pacific Ocean from atop rocky cliffs.  The rocky shoreline is home to hundreds of sunbathing seals and sea lions, as well as hundreds of roosting and nesting shore and sea birds.  Depending upon the temperature and wind direction, you might smell the wildlife residents before you see them.  A minor inconvenience for as close of a look at these animals in the wild that you will ever get.
La Jolla Cove, 2019.  © S. Weiss

The point, out along the cove, is a good spot to sea watch.  It is not uncommon to spot western alcids and shearwaters, as well as dolphins and whales, from the cove.  Several local birders had been reporting large numbers of black-vented shearwaters from their early morning sessions.  This day was not one of those days.  If any shearwaters were around, they were too distant for binocular-only viewing.  However, I did spot 20 species for the day.  My list included 10 western grebes, Anna’s and Allen’s hummingbirds, four black oystercatchers, 18 black turnstones, about 50 Heerman’s gulls, about 100 Brandt’s cormorants, a pelagic cormorant and hundreds of brown pelicans.  The black oystercatchers were a new species for me and a neat change from the American oystercatchers we have here in the east.
Brandt's cormorants.  © S. Weiss

Left, pelagic cormorant. Right, Heerman's gull.  © S. Weiss

Black oystercatchers.  © S. Weiss

After we returned to our hotel, I finished out the day with another walk.  I found a nearby park, Rohr Park in Chula Vista.  I spent just under an hour there.  There was a lot of late afternoon recreational activity going on at the park so I really didn’t find any new species, but I did see some noteworthy western birds.  The highlights were Nuttall’s woodpecker, Say’s and black phoebes, Cassin’s kingbird, western bluebirds and lesser goldfinches.
Left, Cassin's kingbird.  Right, lesser goldfinch.  © S. Weiss

Left, Say's phoebe.  Right, Nuttall's woodpecker.  © S. Weiss

The best non-avian find of the day was a large, creepy bug that my daughter spotted on the walkway at La Jolla.  I ran photos of it through a few apps.  I narrowed it down to its taxonomic tribe, but not its particular species.  It was an American Jerusalem cricket.   That name turns out to be a double misnomer.  It is not a true cricket, nor a native of Jerusalem.  It is not even a bug, but actually a nocturnal insect which made it more interesting to spot it during the afternoon.  It was large for a bug, uh insect, at nearly two inches.  It is not poisonous, nor venomous, but can inflict a painful bite with its large mandibles attached to its large, bulbous head.  I had no intention of touching it.
American Jerusalem cricket.  © S. Weiss





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