Notes about your surroundings.

Summer Rarities--The number of unusual feathered visitors spotted in the county during the late spring and early summer months was very high, according to the Sea & Sage chapter of the National Audubon Society.

In particular, several different warbler species were spotted in May and June. These birds usually shun this area and are much more common in the eastern United States and Canada.

Specifically, a Tennessee warbler and a hooded warbler were seen in Huntington Central Park on June 1. Also on that date, a northern parula was seen at Westminster Memorial Park; the same species was spotted again at Huntington Central Park in mid-June. Rounding out the list of warblers spotted are an ovenbird and an American redstart, both spotted in early June in Huntington Central Park.

Other sightings of note include a lesser nighthawk, a rare visitor to the coastal areas, seen in Huntington Central Park on May 26. Another rare coastal visitor was the male bobolink seen at the San Joaquin Freshwater Marsh in Irvine on May 25.

A hepatic tanager was spotted in Santa Ana’s Fairhaven Memorial Park; it was only the second recorded sighting of such a species in the county.

The summer’s rare-bird sighting highlight to date was the sandwich tern, first spotted June 29 at the Bolsa Chica wetlands’ man-made Tern Island. It stayed there with the large nesting colony of elegant terns for at least two weeks. It was the first time that a sandwich tern had been spotted in the county and one of the few times one had been seen in California.

The Bolsa Chica wetlands area was also host to several other rare sightings this summer, including three American white pelicans, at least one pair of royal terns, a bufflehead, a black tern, and a Wilson’s and a red-necked phalarope.