A DAY ON THE BAY SHORE 



E HAVE chosen a day for our excursion when 

 . the tide is low in the morning, and have made 



W ^ ^^ early start to see what the birds are about 

 upon the mud-flats. Imagine the scene. We 

 are upon the eastern shore of San Francisco 

 Bay, a few miles north of Oakland. The 

 country is low and rolling, gradually swelling back toward the 

 base of the Berkeley Hills. Way off across the water rises 

 Tamalpais, with its familiar, ever present contour against the 

 sky; but what most concerns us is the great stretch of mud- 

 flats, black, slimy, and oozing from the receding tide, with a 

 crowd of shore birds thronging upon it to feed. Here and 

 there in the pools still left are little crabs, holding up their 

 menacing pincers as we approach. Miniature bubbling foun- 

 tains indicate the hiding-places of clams. The stingaree, with 

 its wicked tail, is lying in wait for us in some of the basins of 

 water, and we shall do well to give him a wide berth. 



It is a clear day in midwinter. The low, matted marsh- 

 grass is reddish brown in color, contrasting with the dull blue 

 water of the bay, the light green of the hills and the delicate, 

 misty blue of the far-away mountains. We are soon con- 

 scious of the presence of many birds upon the mud-flats. 

 Great flocks of sandpipers whirl past, suddenly turning and 



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