We have a new record in the 253 this year! Craig Miller has toppled Will Brooks, amazingly! Congrats, Craig!

Congratulations to our newest 2025 members of the 253 Club, here in Pierce
County – Area Code 253. By achieving this lofty mile stone, new
members are entitled to a beverage of their choice from yours truly!

Ryan Shaw #253 – finding a Short-tailed Shearwater off of Dune during the massive influx of these wonderful tubenoses into Puget Sound waters. Massive extra credit for achieving this goal while living in Texas!

Dune Peninsula at Point Defiance Park, continues to be the spot to see pelagic birds from land. With a sweeping view to Des Moines to the Northeast, Commencement Bay to the East and Dalco Passage to the Northwest, it is the #1 eBird Hotspot in Pierce County with 229 species seen. Accessed near Point Ruston, this park was created in 2019. Amazingly, this year tallied all 3 Shearwaters: Short-tailed, Sooty and Manx and a shocking trifecta of Storm-Petrels: Fork-tailed, Leach’s & Wilson’s (the latter under WBRC review).

Unfortunately, the 5 Mile Drive that went around the tip of Point Defiance has
been closed to cars due to severe erosion of the bluffs, but it is still a wonderful place to bike and walk, now without cars.

New Pierce County Big Year Record – 246 species by Craig Miller

Special Kudos to Craig, for surpassing Will Brook’s Pierce County record of 243 species, with a final Tundra Swan on Lake Tapps in the last week of the year. I can attest to his many hours out in the field and up in the mountains. The most amazing sighting that I personally witnessed with him was of a White-tailed Ptarmigan off of Panorama Point on Mount Rainier. While it is possible to see ptarmigan right off the trail, it is a rare occurrence, often requiring as many as 6 dedicated trips. Craig had carried his scope all the way up the snow field in June with us and found the bird a 1000 feet below us off of Pebble Creek! Certainly not identifiable with binoculars.

And for completeness, here are the prior 253 members as divined by a combination of eBird and WA Birder records. Let me know what your 253^rd bird was and if you have a story to go with it, better yet.

Patrick Sullivan <2007
Charlie Wright 2011
Bruce LaBar 2014
Marcus Roening 2016 Cassin’s Auklet
Ed Pullen 2017
Mike Charest 2017
Heather Ballash 2019 Barred Owl

Tom Mansfield 2021 Emperor Goose
Wayne Sladek 2021
Peter Wimberger 2021
Heather Voboril 2022
Will Brooks 2022

Bryan Hansen 2023 Black-legged Kittiwake

Scott Saunders 2023 Tufted Puffin

Craig Miller 2023 Nazca Booby

Michael Hobbs 2024 Marbled Godwit

Ryan Shaw 2025 Short-tailed Shearwater

Good birding to all in the New Year,

Marcus Roening, Tacoma WA, The 253 Pierce County