This past weekend, the COASST interns (Shannon, Adrienne, Chelsea, An, Stephanie, Hilary) road tripped down to Long Beach, Washington and Cape Disappointment to do a COASST survey . It was a chance for all of us to experience conducting their own survey and learn more about beached bird species identification. Perusing the coast under the grand Pacific Northwest sunshine. There’s nothing better than that.

Klipsan Beach entrance – our first stop.

Liz (left) and Adrienne (right) head out to Klipsan beach to start their survey.

Adrienne scans the surfline for any birds that might have washed up on shore.

It wasn’t long until we had our first find. It was a wing that had been partially buried in the higher portion of the beach, and the team quickly got to work to try and identify what they had found.

Adrienne measures the wing length (wrist to end of outermost primary).

The next step was to determine the species!

Liz points out mottling on the upperwing. Eventually we decide: Large Immature Gull.

Adrienne takes a couple of photos of the Large Immature Gull wing.

Soon we were on a roll. Not too much further from our first find, we come across another find: just a head!

Liz shows us the starting point of the bill measurement.

The head is tagged: black, white, red (#901). Large adult gull.

Our last find: a Sooty Shearwater –  a seabird with one of the longest migration routes ever recorded: 39,000 miles.

After COASSTing, we had the rest of the day of explore Long Beach and Cape Disappointment – not a disappointment in any sense!

Liz, Stephanie, Adrienne, An, Hilary, Chelsea, and Shannon.

Cape Disappointment was spectacular, actually.