It took me a few days to decide to trek down to the Steveston Fisherman’s Wharf to find this little lost birb. My first foray, late morning on the 11th, was a bust, though: there were a couple of other birders there, and one told me he’d been hanging around for an hour and a half with no sighting. I thought that was the end, but reports kept coming in, so I made plans to head out again on Monday the 15th.
And lo! It was right there by the garbage bins, like it (apparently) usually is. At first it was ducking under the bins a lot, but soon it came out in the open and gave me a good show!
In and out in fifteen minutes, now that’s some efficient rarity hunting!
PS: It’s adorable, but I think its head is moulting?
PPS: this little guy was not a lifer. I’ve seen them and 2 other species of wagtails in France in 2022: a White Wagtail (French: «Bergeronnette grise») in Bordeaux, a Grey Wagtail («Bergeronnette des ruisseaux») twice in Paris, and a Western Yellow Wagtail («Bergeronnette printanière») near Mont Saint-Michel. Which, according to Wikipedia, are the three wagtail species that nest in Western Europe, so that’s a nice set to have!
PPPS: the delightful French common name for the genus, «bergeronnette», is an archaic diminutive name for shepherdess («bergère»), probably because these birbs like open fields and grasslands and thus would hang out with shepherds a lot.
