Wikimedia Commons/Don DeBold

The American Avocet feeds by sweeping its bill from side to side just under the top layer of sediment.

Birdwatchers Need Not Despair simply because the winter migrants are gone. Plenty of shore birds can still be found on summer evenings in the natural coastal wetland areas of San Diego County. From south to north, the publicly accessible coastal wetlands include the Tijuana River Estuary, south San Diego Bay (just north of Imperial Beach and along the bay shore at Chula Vista), the San Diego River channel (inland from Sea World), Los Peñasquitos Lagoon (adjacent to Torrey Pines State Reserve), the San Dieguito River estuary, San Elijo Lagoon, Batiquitos Lagoon, Agua Hedionda Lagoon, and Buena Vista Lagoon. In and around these areas, look for California gulls, American avocets, brown pelicans, snowy egrets, killdeer, and redwing blackbirds.

Snowy Egrets appear to be dancing when they shuffle their feet to stir up prey in the sediment.

Joe Klein

The Full Moon Rises Impressively From The East Horizon on Sunday, July 21, very close to the time of sunset. Look towards the southeast to watch it rise into the sky reaching peak illumination at 3:17 am. The full Moon in July is called the Buck Moon because the antlers of male deer (bucks) are typically reaching peak size during this time. Bucks shed and regrow their antlers annually; the protuberances usually get larger over time. Some other folk names for the July full Moon include “Hay Moon,” “Wort Moon,” “Moon of Blood” (in reference to mosquitoes), “Fallow Moon,” and “Thunder Moon.”

High tide approaching in at Cabrillo Monument's Tide Pools in Point Loma.

This Weekend Will Feature Some Extreme High Tides! Saturday’s high tide will be 7.25 ft at 9:15 pm. Sunday’s high tide at 9:58 pm will be a very high 7.32 ft and will also be a good night for grunion hunting. The next wave of grunion season begins Sunday and continues through Wednesday, July 24. During the spring and summer months, grunion leave the water to spawn on the beach immediately after a high tide. Grunion spawning occurs for four consecutive nights on the full and new Moon.