Colleen Caubin - Wave-Bird Action

Out at the Sonoma Coast in California yesterday, perched on the very edge of the cliff, and immersed in the sound of huge surf, I spotted these just below me, black oystercatchers after the mussels...the little "might have missed" part is becoming fascinated with how they knew exactly what the coming wave would do, and backed up when it was smaller and flying up briefly when big enough to cover the rock and settling right back down between the sets. I tried to figure this out myself, this one big, this one small, this one splashing, but had I been the birds I would have gotten very wet!