NYC birding

Icy Jones Beach, snowy Boonton (Longspur, Shrike)

2012-01-23T06:57:00.000-08:00

The weather channel suggested sun through midday, followed by cloud. In fact the cloud moved in about 5 nanoseconds after dawn at Jones Beach and it was especially dark out there. In addition to the expected snow this area had apparently got hit by some freezing rain. At least under these circumstances you know it's winter, in contrast to the rest of the rather mild January.

On the beach there were a few Horned Larks, a possible Savannah Sparrow, and nothing else. Out in the heavy surf there were feeding flocks of Gannets that extended into Jones Inlet, a flock of something like 25 Common Eiders just north of the inlet, and the common mix of Loons and Long-tailed Ducks. The size of the Eider flock is notable for Point Lookout/Jones Beach - normally you see one or two, but is much smaller than the large flock currently at Barnegat Inlet in NJ.

There was nothing to speak of at the Theodore Roosevelt Nature Center lot/boardwalk so I spent quite a lot of time at the Coast Guard station. This wasn't because of the three female Brown-headed Cowbirds - this is my least favorite native species - but there was a single Snow Bunting and single Lapland Longspur feeding on the edges of the snow-packed lawn. This is partly why I went to Jones - after snowfall you can often see Snow Bunting flocks with a few Longspurs in this general area. Finally, on the drive out I saw an American Pipit along the roadside near the intersection with Ocean Parkway.

It took me a fair while to warm up after that, but I drove through NYC and out via I-80 to Boonton to look for the reported Northern Shrike. Took me a little time to find it, at least in part because of the bozo birder factor. I had a conversation with a local birder in a truck who indicated that some other people had flushed the shrike out of the cedars by walking into them. These birders were loud in multiple ways: loud conversation, and also subsequently sitting in the parking lot with their car engines running (one of them a VW diesel, quite loud) and door slamming. Finally the idiots left. I'll assume these are newbies but they also attracted attention from other birders that turned up while I was there.

Finally I got the Northern Shrike, which turned up at an apparently favored perch near the ball field, then flew along the tree line closer. It didn't linger for long. Subsequently I spied it at the top of a tall tree further away and got record shots of it. I didn't see any barring or brown coloration on the bird, and the thin black mask was solid, so this bird appears to be an adult - I think that all the other individuals that I've seen in NY-NJ have been immatures.

Red-throated Loon
Common Loon
Northern Gannet
Canada Goose
Brant
American Black Duck
Mallard
Common Eider
Long-tailed Duck
Red-breasted Merganser
Northern Harrier
Peregrine Falcon
Dunlin
Northern Shrike
Horned Lark
American Pipit
Yellow-rumped Warbler
(possible Savannah Sparrow glimpsed in beach dunes)
Song Sparrow
Lapland Longspur
Snow Bunting
Brown-headed Cowbird

Gulls in PA

2012-01-14T09:06:00.001-08:00

Falls Twp Community Park (PA) has emerged as a pretty good place to look for gulls in winter and superceded Florence (NJ) as the best place to find interesting species. They both sample the greater Tullytown landfill flock. Diversity is low: Canada Goose, Starling and a fly-over Red-tailed Hawk were the only other birds. (I saw a Cooper's Hawk over Trenton on the way back home attempting to pick Starlings out of the air with no success). The weather was appropriately cold with a north wind but the lake wasn't iced over yet.

In the smaller of the two flocks in the park I found a single immature Iceland Gull - a nice cafe-au-lait colored first winter bird with a rounded head and black bill. Eventually that flock took flight and joined the largest flock. What was surprising about this first flock was the absence of Lesser Black-backed Gulls - normally they're simple to find and the first of the rarer gulls I put my eyes on.

In the second flock I did find Lesser Black-backed Gulls (I came up with a total of 4 or 5, all adults) and then while looking for the Iceland I found a first winter Glaucous Gull sitting on the grass. It was the same color as the Iceland but was huge with a bi-colored bill. Quite an attractive gull when it got up and walked around. Finally, just before the flock was flushed by a dog walker, I found one and then a second Iceland Gull, making the proportions more typical for a PA/NJ winter gull flock (LBB: 5; Iceland: 2; Glaucous: 1).

Later in the day I went to the boat ramp in Edison and found another Glaucous Gull immature - a relatively tame one. This is probably the first time I've ever seen two Glaucous in different locations in one day, given that they are borderline rare in NJ.

Cackling Geese in NJ

2012-01-02T22:17:00.000-08:00

A slower start to Jan 2nd had me in search of yet more winter special birds to pad the year list. I picked up Common Merganser at Mercer County Park at the marina but not much else was there. Then I wandered north to Negri-Nepote Grasslands and saw almost nothing there except a large extended flock of American Robins headed south - several hundred of them spread over many miles in loose association.

Then it was time for geese, albeit via an unsuccessful search for Sandhill Cranes in Franklin Twp (they're there, but often elusive). At Dukes Island Park in Bridgewater the large flock of Canadas at the pond and adjacent field held a lot of Cackling - I was scanning for the Greater White-fronted but kept coming up with Cacking: first one, then two, then a group of 6, then 4 more etc. I figured out I had at least 12 and perhaps 15 or more. A total of 33 was reported from that site during the day, and they were pretty much every where I looked. Finally the Greater White-fronted was found.

2pm now, and there was just enough light to sprint for the final special bird of the day: Snowy Owl in western NJ that I found in it's usual roosting place on the dam as the light started to fade. Combined with a few fly-by Snow Geese at an otherwise quiet reservoir this propelled the 2012 year list to 46 in the first two days. Not a bad total.

Starting 2012 in Manhattan - Dickcissel and Rufous Humingbird (again)

2012-01-01T22:07:00.000-08:00

I don't take state listing too seriously, but the two lists I do pay some attention to are life lists (USA: 644) and year lists. So at dawn on 1/1/2012 the year list was zero and needed some work.

First stop: Perth Amboy waterfront, in search of Eurasian Wigeon without success. This is not somewhere I've birded before but was more-or-less en route to Manhattan. I found other ducks like American Wigeon, Gadwall, Bufflehead, American Black Duck, Red-breasted Merganser and a Double-crested Cormorant (seen well, not a Great). A Cooper's Hawk was hunting downtown, but there wasn't any reason to delay getting into NYC any longer.

Second stop: Inwood Hill Park at 200th St (Dyckman) where it took almost no time at all to find the Dickcissel feeding in the ball fields amongst the House Sparrows. A good extra find was a fly-over flock of Cedar Waxwings.

Third stop: easily finding parking along Madison, I walked from E72nd to W81st through Central Park in a meandering route, checking evergreens for Barred Owl (no luck). The Ramble was quiet and the best bird by far was the Eastern Phoebe at Turtle Pond. I found two more Cedar Waxwings near Tanner's Spring and then starting the wait for the Rufous. Seen earlier in the day, it took its sweet time turning up outside the American Museum of Natural History. It was relatively warmer out and some bees were feeding on the Leatherleaf Mahonia that were still flowering (apparently flowering during the winter). Having got decent looks at the Rufous Hummingbird I hopped the subway and went down to Bryant Park which was about as crowded as it was on xmas eve. I've not got much patience for crowds but did see White-throated Sparrows and a single Ovenbird (by far my late date - I wonder if it has any chance of making it to spring?).

Finally I hopped a bus and returned to the park - a Wood Duck on 59th Street Pond and a Red-headed Woodpecker at the Hallett Sanctuary were good finds here - before retreating to my car and heading home.

King Eider - Avalon

2011-12-26T20:29:00.000-08:00

I did a quick coastal run on Christmas Day, in particular to see the breeding plumaged male King Eider at Avalon. Avalon is most of the way down to Cape May (it's actually in Cape May Co) so it turned into a long loop trip.

A quick start at Barnegat Inlet turned up pretty much nothing in the inlet, relatively few Bonaparte's Gulls in the bay, so I decided not to rock hop 500 times to reach the end of the breakwater and headed south to Avalon.

At the 8th Street jetty there was an "Ipswich" Savannah Sparrow, a few close fly-by Gannets (one oiled, sadly), and a couple of loons. Not much to distract from the sea duck flock: Black and Surf Scoters in decent numbers, lots of Common Eiders and one King Eider. The King Eider was really in full-on breeding plumage - search Flickr to get an idea what I mean - although the orange plate at the forehead (base of the bill?) wasn't quite as large as it can get. All the King Eiders I've seen in recent years (2003+) have been the drab females including the two from this year, although my first few - Rhode Island, Montauk in 1999-2001 were all males.

On the way back I took a little spin around Brigantine/Forsythe NWR and saw a totally predictable set of species - raptor numbers down from earlier visits, Pintail numbers subsiding, but the Snow Goose flock was putting on a good show. Birds would feed out in the saltmarsh and then fly across the dike to the pool to bathe, then return to the saltmarsh. There was pretty much a constant stream of Snow Geese in the air. Being Greater Snow Geese there were very few "Blue" Goose color morphs (Lesser Snow Geese have proportionally more), and I didn't see a Ross's despite keeping my eye open for it.

Christmas Eve - Rufous Hummingbird and Dickcissel

2011-12-25T20:11:00.000-08:00

Manhattan on the last shopping day before Christmas ? Madness. However I decided to take a little photo/birding trip into NYC in search of two rarities: Dickcissel and Rufous Hummingbird.

The Dickcissel was significant because I've seen very few Dickcissels in general (my first being one at Jones Beach in 2001), certainly not annually, although 2011 was a bumper year for them by comparison: one in FL; the ones at Negri-Nepote in late spring; singing birds in TX; and now this one. This Dickcissel was spending time in a large (30+) House Sparrow flock, as often is the way with Dickcissels. The flock was very skittish so it took a while to find the bird even though it had enough yellow (immature male) to stick out from the crowd once you found it. I saw a Dickcissel in Central Park in 2008, the only other one I saw in NYC.

Hummingbirds are another story: I've seen quite a few Rufous this year, mainly on the Pacific Northwest trip but also in Yonkers in November. A Yonkers Rufous Hummingbird in 2001 spawned my first web page and I've pursued a mini project of photographing NYC hummingbirds. This Rufous is an immature female and was found on December 14th. It's on the north side of the American Museum for Natural History - i.e. the cold side - with no direct sun but some reflected sun. Perhaps the micro-environment has kept the hardy plants flowering on which this Rufous is depending on for it's short-term survival. A lot of vagrant Rufous in this area make it into the first few days of January but disappear soon after, so I will try and see it again on Jan 1st.

Barnegat Inlet - epic

2011-12-03T17:48:00.000-08:00

This Saturday I made no mistake about spending most of my time at Barnegat Inlet instead of pushing on elsewhere - I was out there for about 4 hours starting shortly after dawn. Fishermen abounded on both the breakwater and in small craft, so once more there was little in the inlet itself - a group of three White-winged Scoters hugging the breakwater (injured?) being the exceptions.

In the bay there was a flock of Bonaparte's Gulls with a few Laughing Gulls but no Forster's Terns this time - the cooling weather might have pushed them south. Out at the far (Atlantic) end of the breakwater there was an immense amount of activity out on the ocean. The entire time I was watching there were always Red-throated Loons at mid-altitude headed south in small loose flocks (max=14) which means there must have been pushing a thousand migrating during that time. There were also some at sea level. I saw all of two Common Loons. Sea ducks were also numerous - mostly in one huge mixed flock just south of the inlet; Common Eider; all three Scoters; Harlequin Duck; Long-tailed Duck. Eiders themselves numbered in the hundreds (one report from there logged it as 350). If you scoped further out into the ocean there were sea ducks further out as well (scoters, mainly) so there were one to a few thousand oceanic ducks milling around the area. Most of the inshore scoters appeared to be immature/female birds, with disproportionately few males but there seemed to be more males further out in the fairly strong swell off the breeze.

With the Red-throated Loon movement there was also a smaller Northern Gannet movement southward, always in small flocks and mostly adults or near-adults. There were also more flocks of Bonaparte's Gulls north of the inlet. And just as had been reported the previous weekend, this attracted the Parasitic Jaegers. The Jaegers were behaving as a combination of sea gull and Peregrine, hugging the ocean until they saw something they wanted to follow and then accelerating to chase it down - something that was quite visible even at range. Mostly it was the Bonaparte's Gulls but sometimes they chased each other. I had about 8 sightings, which could have been anywhere between two to eight actual individuals (one birder saw 4 at once). The sheer number of birds was impressive, but it was the Parasitics that were particularly special for me since I'd only added them to my life list (conservatively) in late summer. Now I've finally seen more Parasitics than any other Jaeger (I've seen 5 Long-tailed, for example) although none of the views were especially close.

Other birds included the typical four shorebirds: Sanderling; Dunlin; Ruddy Turnstone; Purple Sandpiper. Two Peregrines were soaring together over the breakwater. An unusual bird for Barnegat was a Northern Harrier, probably a late migrant headed south down the barrier beach. Passerine activity was minimal, a few Yellow-rumped and some standard suburban birds, all at the state park.

After Barnegat I did go again to Brigantine/Forsythe NWR but the results were identical to the previous weekend and not noteworthy.

Cackling Geese

2011-11-27T21:10:00.000-08:00

I found singles of Cackling Geese at North Branch Park and Dukes Island Park in Raritan on Sunday morning amongst flocks of Canada Geese, as had previously been reported. I didn't find the Greater White-fronted Goose at Dukes Island (I was there before it was reported) but there were enough Canada Geese milling around in the air that it might have flown in after I left.

En route home for this short birding day I stopped at the Stony Brook-Millstone Watershed property off Titusville Road to check out the pond trail. The pond itself held four Mute Swans, several Canada Geese and a few Mallards. The area around the pond looked promising for sparrows but held only a few White-throated Sparrows - their numbers have been low this winter and it would not surprise me if they have stayed further north courtesy of good food crops and mild temperatures this November. Once the snow comes perhaps they will drift south.

Barnegat, Tuckerton, Brig/Forsythe

2011-11-26T21:02:00.000-08:00

I did a fairly conventional coastal route on Saturday morning - starting at Barnegat for something of a quick "coverage" visit, I found the state park closed (opens 9am these days?) and a lot of fishermen on the jetty and elsewhere. There was also a lot of boat traffic heading out of the inlet, so there were no birds in the inlet itself. However there were a lot of birds in the bay - recent warm weather undoubtedly contributed to the presence of Forster's Terns, although they are quite hardy. Also present was a substantially less hardy first winter Common Tern. Bonoparte's Gulls were particularly numerous and it seems that this species (along with sea ducks, Gannets and Red-throated Loons) have been on the move in large numbers this past week. There were actually relatively few loons in the bay. I took a look out toward the ocean from the end of the concrete walk and could see several groups of Northern Gannets headed south - surely meaning that thousands were on the move.

I left Barnegat pretty quickly - something that proved to be a mistake since both Western Tanager and Ash-throated Flycatcher were reported from the state park later that morning.

Great Bay WMA at Tuckerton was pretty quiet and I saw none of the Sharp-tailed Sparrows that I had gone there to look for. Boat-tailed Grackles and Black-bellied Plovers were the only birds of note.

Finally, then, to Brigantine division of Forsythe NWR where Tundra Swans have moved in, along with a much larger flock of Snow Geese than on my last visit here. Yellow-rumped Warblers and a heard-only Eastern Phoebe were enjoying the warm temperatures, but as usual with Brig in late fall it was mainly about ducks: Northern Pintail, Mallard, American Black Duck and Green-winged Teal were plentiful and supplemented by Ruddy Duck, Bufflehead, Scaup sp., Hooded Merganser. Raptor sp. were mostly Northern Harriers with one or two Peregrines and a single immature Bald Eagle.

Snowy Owl, Merrill Creek

2011-11-24T20:57:00.000-08:00

There's a well-known Snowy Owl at Merrill Creek Reservoir that I went to see on Thanksgiving morning, although I had actually seen it the week before. Although I usually have reservations about "advertising" owl locations this bird has been present for a while and the location is widely disseminated.

Merrill Creek have closed the section of trail that runs down the east side of the southern dam, and the ranger I talked to indicated that this was to protect the owl roost location since people were getting too close. And in fact the Snowy was roosting next to a small rock ledge right adjacent to the closed path. It wouldn't surprise me if the bird had regularly been spooked of it's roost by the overzealous. The ranger indicated that the owl has probably been eating the gulls that roost there in considerable numbers late in the day.

Birding at Merrill Creek was otherwise quite slow - a single Bald Eagle, Horned Grebe, Belted Kingfisher and little in the way of land birds apart from Eastern Bluebird (heard) and American Goldfinch at the boat ramp parking lot.

Great Horned Owl in suburbia

2011-11-13T10:24:00.000-08:00

Periodically I entertain a fantasy of finding a Screech-Owl or a wintering Long-eared Owl amongst my spruces, but it was a pretty big surprise to realize that I was hearing a Great Horned Owl hooting in my own neighborhood.

It was close enough and with enough low frequency that I could get a faint hint of it at 3am even with the windows closed, and I wandered outside to see if I was simply hallucinating or if it was by some miracle in my yard. Neither - it was a single bird, presumably wandering looking for a mate, and it was about two rows of houses over. There was no reply, and I've never thought of my neighborhood as having a quite dense-enough habitat to attract a Great Horned.

Still, it makes my yard 'B' list for things heard/seen from the property.

"Rufous" Hummingbird, Lenoir Preserve

2011-11-12T22:12:00.000-08:00

Vagrant western hummingbirds are what spurred my whole web site development in the first place. My first home page was a precursor to what is now located at philjeffrey.net/Hummingbirds.html and was prompted by the first Rufous Hummingbird I saw at Lenoir Preserve in Yonkers in November 2001. That was the same year as the Fort Tryon Calliopes.

So it was natural that I wanted to go check out the latest hummingbird vagrant at Lenoir, even if Yonkers is a lot further away from home than it used to be. It took me a little while to find the Selasphorus sp. hummingbird, but it was probably sleeping or torpid before the sun started hitting the trees and butterfly garden. Once things started to warm up I saw it spending most of its time insect catching in the trees and the garden as the sun started to hit it. It spent some time in the Salvia Pineapple Sage at the edge of the garden, and a small amount of time at one of the feeders. From plumage the bird was an immature female, but this hummingbird was fairly shy and I didn't get anything remotely like a tail spread shot. The consensus is that it is a Rufous Hummingird (now apparently confirmed), although the staffer at the visitor center indicated that there was a suspicion that it was an Allen's and would be caught to determine which.

I'm pretty much invariably against capturing vagrant hummingbirds out of pseudo-scientific curiosity because it's not part of any systematic research plan and these birds are under enough stress attempting to survive in alien habitats in deteriorating weather. The cost to the bird is significant, and it tells us almost nothing.

There's a proposal to close Lenoir Preserve visitor center being considered by Westchester County - you could email the County Executive (Robert Astorino, ce@westchestergov.com) to express your opposition to this plan. The budget vote is apparently Dec 27th 2011, so sooner is better than later. (Updated to reflect the fact that it's apparently the staff that are getting fired rather than the preserve closed to all access).

Bryant Park on Nov 6th

2011-11-07T07:35:00.000-08:00

I decided to pursue the Yellow-breasted Chat at Bryant Park in the city on Sunday morning, staying clear of Central Park because of the NYC marathon. The main body of Bryant Park is full of pop-up micro stores hoping to make it big for the holiday season and an ice-skating rink sponsored by Citibank, which makes it all the more remarkable that the park was loaded with White-throated Sparrows. Also there: one American Robin, one Ovenbird (my new late date for Ovenbird), a few Hermit Thrushes, Yellow-bellied Sapsucker. I finally found the not-especially-tame Yellow-breasted Chat out front of the library at the same location as the previous year's Prothonotary Warbler. But it did not pose for pictures like the Prothonotary did and was singularly obsessed with hunting down food. This has been an outstanding year for the normally rare Yellow-breasted Chat in NYC but it's also interesting that Bryant Park hosted another Chat in 2002 which put it on the map for birders.

Unfortunate footnote to this trip was finding three dead Red-winged Blackbirds - all males - on the sidewalk just west of Bryant Park. Probably window strikes.

Sandy Hook (fail), Pole Farm on Nov 5th

2011-11-05T19:30:00.000-07:00

In search of a Harris's Sparrow at Sandy Hook on Saturday I did encounter a whole lot of birders, but only commoner sparrows (White-throated, Song, Dark-eyed Junco), an Indigo Bunting, Yellow-rumped Warblers, Hermit Thrushes, fly-over Horned Larks and a Northern Harrier. No Harris's seen by anyone all day and since there wasn't even a good hawk flight I departed after a few hours. The bay and Atlantic shore only held minimal numbers of diving ducks.

A sunset visit to Pole Farm (Lawrenceville) to check the prospect for owls revealed no Northern Harriers and no pre-dark Short-eared Owls which suggests that this location will be a bust in the 2011/2012 winter. A consolation prize was a Merlin perched at the parking lot, which somewhat agitated a local American Kestrel - at one point both were perched in the same tree looking at each other. I also heard a distant Belted Kingfisher.

Land bird migration, Nov 4th

2011-11-04T07:50:00.000-07:00

Although more at work than birding, signs of passerine migration were obvious: flocks of American Robins at mid-altitude over Ewing after sunrise, more on the ground in Princeton, then more flocks headed south west over Princeton U. campus around 10:45, along with an icterid flock and a Cedar Waxwing flock. Two Golden-crowned Kinglets were feeding in the trees outside the lab.

Central Park Oct 23rd

2011-10-24T08:49:00.000-07:00

Central Park was notable for a good push of late fall migrants: lots of Hermit Thrushes, Song Sparrows, Yellow-rumped Warblers with quite a few Ruby-crowned Kinglets and Gray Catbirds. The diversity was low - something that had something to do with me staying put in the Maintenance Field for a couple of hours watching the flocks of sparrows working their way through. The warbler count was fleshed out by a lone Magnolia (my new late date, and pushing it's luck) and one Palm Warbler. The usual late fall additions of Purple Finch and American Goldfinch were absent, presumably because of good crops in the north this fall and the consequent lack of an invasion year.

Cooper's Hawk
Yellow-bellied Sapsucker
Eastern Phoebe
Blue-headed Vireo
Brown Creeper
Golden-crowned Kinglet
Ruby-crowned Kinglet
Hermit Thrush
Gray Catbird
Magnolia Warbler
Yellow-rumped Warbler
Palm Warbler
Eastern Towhee
Chipping Sparrow
Field Sparrow
Song Sparrow
Swamp Sparrow
White-throated Sparrow
Dark-eyed Junco

Brigantine and Tuckerton Oct 16th

2011-10-17T08:56:00.000-07:00

(Catching up with old neglected sightings)

I went to Tuckerton and Brigantine NWR on a windy but sunny Sunday morning to pursue reported Ammodramus sparrows, with little success, but ended up with my first Cape May Warbler for NJ (other omissions that you might consider surprising include Bay-breasted, Wilson's and Tennessee).

At Tuckerton the brisk wind had the passerines seeking cover, so it was a bad day for sparrows and I was a little early for a high tide to push the sparrows out of the saltmarsh. Instead I contented myself with multiple flyover shorebird flocks: Black-bellied Plover, Red Knot, Sanderling, Dunlin, Semipalmated/Western Sandpipers (uncertain which). A sheltered spot along Great Bay Blvd yielded one or perhaps two Cape May Warblers but it was mainly Yellow-rumped Warblers in that flock. Northern Flicker along that road, somewhat out of habitat also provided the impression of migration. There was also a brief glimpse of a fat hummingbird. I'm calling it Ruby-throated by default, not least of all because fall migrant hummingbirds are often loaded with fat prior to migration and look bigger - but I really can't rule out Selasphorus hummingbird (Rufous/Allen's) for which the date and the location would also be possible.

Further down the road at Brigantine NWR there were some shorebird flocks, largely the same composition but without the Knot, and quite a few waterfowl. For some strange reason I had left the scope at home so I lacked things like Wigeon and Gadwall but the other usual suspects: Am. Black Duck, Mallard, Shoveler, Green-winged Teal, abundant Northern Pintail. There was also a small flock of Snow Geese - far short of the population that usually winters here so apparently a vanguard. Unlike Brant Geese, which tend to do the whole migration in one flight, non-stop, Snow Geese stage at multiple points as they "drift" south.

There was a lot of raptor activity at Brig, including at least two Bald Eagles, a few Northern Harriers and one or two Peregrines which were enthusiastically harassing anything small in sight (so I assume they were hungry). There were also noteworthy flocks of two other species: Forster's Terns present in quite high numbers, and also good numbers of Double-crested Cormorant, apparently mostly immatures.

Snow Goose
American Black Duck
Mallard
Northern Shoveler
Northern Pintail
Green-winged Teal
Double-crested Cormorant
Great Blue Heron
Great Egret
Snowy Egret
Bald Eagle
Northern Harrier
Red-tailed Hawk
Peregrine Falcon
Black-bellied Plover
Red Knot
Sanderling
Western or Semipalmated Sandpiper
Dunlin
Dowitcher sp.
Forster's Tern
Ruby-throated Hummingbird
Northern Flicker
Tree Swallow
Cape May Warbler
Yellow-rumped Warbler
Song Sparrow
Boat-tailed Grackle

Central Park Oct 5th

2011-10-05T11:42:00.000-07:00

Trying to leverage a "spare" morning w/o meetings and some pro-migration weather I went into Central Park on Weds morning and found moderate but not spectacular migration. Warbler numbers were not epic, but there was a decent amount of sparrow movement including three Lincoln's Sparrows. Some time spent at the Maintenance Field didn't yield the Chat, but I did have a fly-over Common Nighthawk which is somewhat of a novelty. The Eastern Wood-Pewee I saw in Strawberry Fields is getting late-ish but my late dates are 10/18/03, 10/16/05 - however for most years this would be my late date for Pewee.

There was a small flock of Golden-crowned Kinglets in Strawberry Fields, Yellow-bellied Sapsucker and Hermit Thrush elsewhere - more in tune with late fall migration. I also saw two flocks of migrating Canada Geese that headed over the city to NJ, and three migrating Turkey Vultures.

Double-crested Cormorant
Turkey Vulture (3, seen well to south)
Gadwall
Red-tailed Hawk
Peregrine Falcon
Chimney Swift
Common Nighthawk (Maint. Field)
Yellow-bellied Sapsucker
Northern Flicker
Eastern Wood-Pewee (Strawberry Fields)
Eastern Phoebe
Blue-headed Vireo
Red-eyed Vireo
White-breasted Nuthatch
House Wren
Winter Wren
Golden-crowned Kinglet
Ruby-crowned Kinglet
Veery
Swainson's Thrush
Hermit Thrush (multiple)
Wood Thrush
Gray Catbird
Brown Thrasher
Cedar Waxwing
Nashville Warbler
Northern Parula
Magnolia Warbler
Black-throated Blue Warbler
Yellow-rumped Warbler
Black-throated Green Warbler
Palm Warbler
Blackpoll Warbler
Black-and-white Warbler
Common Yellowthroat
Eastern Towhee
Field Sparrow (Oven)
Song Sparrow
Lincoln's Sparrow (Maint. Field, Azalea Pond)
Swamp Sparrow
White-throated Sparrow
Baltimore Oriole (Maint. Field)

Central Park Oct 2nd

2011-10-02T20:52:00.000-07:00

A repeat performance on Sunday morning showed signs of much slow migration. In particular the surface winds had shifted toward the east, and I only had 3 warbler sp. in Strawberry Fields when I started there an hour later than Saturday. The flight of Blue Jays was replaced by a small one of Northern Flickers and the hawk flight was minimal in the contrary winds.

The Maintenance Field was again the best place, with the continuing Chat and other warblers bringing it up to a total of 12 sp although in lower numbers than Saturday and there was also a visit by a Yellow-billed Cuckoo - I've actually seen more Black-billed than Yellow-billed this year.

Sharp-shinned Hawk
Yellow-billed Cuckoo
Chimney Swift
Empidonax Flycatcher sp. (Yellow-bellied?)
Eastern Phoebe
Blue-headed Vireo
Red-eyed Vireo
Tree Swallow
Carolina Wren
Ruby-crowned Kinglet
Gray-cheeked Thrush
Swainson's Thrush
Wood Thrush
Gray Catbird
Brown Thrasher
Cedar Waxwing
Nashville Warbler
Northern Parula
Chestnut-sided Warbler
Magnolia Warbler
Black-throated Green Warbler
Palm Warbler
Blackpoll Warbler
Black-and-white Warbler
American Redstart
Ovenbird
Common Yellowthroat
Yellow-breasted Chat
Scarlet Tanager
Eastern Towhee
Song Sparrow
White-throated Sparrow
Rose-breasted Grosbeak
Indigo Bunting

Central Park Oct 1st

2011-10-01T20:56:00.000-07:00

With favorable conditions for migration I made it to Central Park via the absurdly early 0612 train out of Princeton Jct and was rewarded by a pretty decent movement of warblers in Strawberry Fields where I racked up 9 species in the space of half an hour. There was an obvious good movement of Blue Jays with me seeing over a hundred in various flocks during the day.

Most other areas were quiet, but the Maintenance Field held a Yellow-breasted Chat that was mostly skulking, and also was a good observation point for a decent hawk migration - mostly Sharp-shinned Hawk (10+) but also several Cooper's Hawk, American Kestrel, Osprey, Peregrine and one likely Merlin. Gadwall and Solitary Sandpiper were on Turtle Pond.

The Chat was the first one of the year for me (and likely the last).

A lack of Kinglets and Sapsuckers made me think that there was a decent amount of fall migration still to come, even if it was October 1st.

Double-crested Cormorant
Great Blue Heron
Black-crowned Night-Heron
Gadwall
Osprey
Sharp-shinned Hawk
Cooper's Hawk
American Kestrel
Peregrine Falcon
Solitary Sandpiper
Chimney Swift
Northern Flicker
Empidonax sp (Acadian-ish and Yellow-bellied-ish)
Eastern Phoebe
Blue-headed Vireo
Red-eyed Vireo
Blue Jay
House Wren
Swainson's Thrush
Wood Thrush
Gray Catbird
Cedar Waxwing
Nashville Warbler
Northern Parula
Chestnut-sided Warbler
Magnolia Warbler
Black-throated Blue Warbler
Yellow-rumped Warbler
Black-throated Green Warbler
Palm Warbler
Blackpoll Warbler
Black-and-white Warbler
Northern Waterthrush
Common Yellowthroat
Yellow-breasted Chat
Scarlet Tanager
Eastern Towhee
Swamp Sparrow
White-throated Sparrow
Rose-breasted Grosbeak
Indigo Bunting

Central Park 9/25 (Cuckoos, Tennessee)

2011-09-25T19:39:00.000-07:00

Quite a slow start in Strawberry Fields, where I learnt that early in the morning a Mississippi Kite had been seen overhead by Peter Post. However migrant activity was extremely patchy in the initial overcast of the day. Wandering into the Ramble I got a #cpkbirds tweet about a Yellow-billed Cuckoo at the Upper Lobe and went over to check it out. The lone willow tree was quite active with multiple Rose-breasted Grosbeaks and Gray Catbirds, a few Swainson's Thrushes, Pewee and Phoebe. There were also one or two warblers including the lone Northern Waterthrush for the day. Being there for a while I saw a cuckoo fly down the Upper Lobe and assumed it was the Yellow-billed. However some time later a Black-billed Cuckoo flew into the willow, and gave quite a few people good looks especially when it was out on a sunny rock on the other side of the lobe.

From the Upper Lobe I went to the Maintenance Field which also was moderately active. After a few minutes I found another Black-billed Cuckoo - this must have been quite a good Cuckoo day since Yellow-billed were also reported from these same areas earlier. Here I also picked up migrating raptors: Osprey and Sharp-shinned Hawk, although that activity was slow. A few Monarch Butterflies were migrating. While here I "heard" of a third hand report of Tennessee and Connecticut Warblers in some vaguely defined area "near Tupelo". I elected to stay and do a little hawk watching since it had been a long while since I had seen a kettle of Broad-winged. At one point there were two Eastern Phoebes and at least two Eastern Wood-Pewee's flycatching here.

This was a bit of a mistake - there was a Connecticut near Tupelo giving excellent looks, and by the time I got there it had gone. Although I did see: Tennessee and Nashville Warblers and several other warblers (Ovenbird, C. Yellowthroat, Black-throated Blue, Magnolia, Restart). They all particularly liked the insect-laden asters as the sun warmed them up.

Shame about the Connecticut since it's rare to get good views. However it's also been a long while since I had eye level looks at Tennessee in fall in the park, so that's the consolation prize.

(On the way home I stopped at the Allentown NJ sod farms and finally picked up American Golden Plover for the year).

Osprey
Sharp-shinned Hawk
Red-tailed Hawk
Black-billed Cuckoo (Maint. Field, Upper Lobe)
Chimney Swift
Northern Flicker
Eastern Wood-Pewee (multiple)
Eastern Phoebe (multiple)
Winter Wren (Upper Lobe)
Veery
Swainson's Thrush
Wood Thrush
Gray Catbird
Brown Thrasher
Cedar Waxwing
Tennessee Warbler
Nashville Warbler
Northern Parula
Magnolia Warbler
Black-throated Blue Warbler
Palm Warbler
Blackpoll Warbler
Black-and-white Warbler
American Redstart
Ovenbird
Northern Waterthrush
Common Yellowthroat
Canada Warbler
White-throated Sparrow
Rose-breasted Grosbeak (many)
Indigo Bunting

Ewing/Backyard 9/24

2011-09-24T11:30:00.000-07:00

Migrants:
Northern Parula (2+)
Magnolia Warbler (2)
American Redstart
BLACKBURNIAN WARBLER
Chipping Sparrow (multiple)

and the local boys:
Carolina Wren
Carolina Chickadee
Tufted Titmouse
Downy Woodpecker

Considering that I hardly ever see Blackburnian in fall, this was a good find and a new yard bird.
Once again the mixed species flock is a reliable locator of migrants. This is also an early date for fall migrant Chipping Sparrows, although none of them stayed in my yard.

Central Park 9/17

2011-09-17T23:52:00.000-07:00

After what was reported to be a fairly good migration on Friday, Saturday was quite slow. A few warblers in a few pockets, the most interesting of which was a Pine Warbler. Raptors didn't put in much of a show either: 3 Ospreys and an Accipter sp as well as three local Red-tailed Hawks.

Osprey
Northern Flicker
Eastern Wood-Pewee
Blue-headed Vireo
Red-eyed Vireo
Veery
Swainson's Thrush
Northern Parula
Magnolia Warbler
Black-throated Blue Warbler
Pine Warbler
American Redstart
Common Yellowthroat
Scarlet Tanager

Although what was by far the most interesting bird was actually an unidentified one. A small active vireo in the Maintenance Field rang internal alarm bells on the grounds of "potential Philadelphia". This has a troubling overlap with immature Warbling in fall, and this individual was too far away and not giving easy looks. What was evident was that it was almost warbler-esque in activity and looked a little small. However the definitive ID points for Philadelphia were absent - it was not yellow from throat to breast and it didn't have an evident dark mark between eye and bill. I decided "Warbling" at the time based also on a single buzz call, but most vireos sound the same and in retrospect I'd be tempted to call it a Philadelphia Vireo but frustrated at not being sure about it. Quite a few other Philadelphias from other locations make me especially curious about this bird.

Mixed species flock in Ewing 9/17

2011-09-17T23:16:00.000-07:00

And by Ewing I mean in my yard in NJ. I was tinkering with the aging Honda's splash guard and heard a mixed flock moving through.

The local boys were:
Downy Woodpecker
White-breasted Nuthatch
Carolina Chickadee

However they were accompanied by a rather nice selection of migrants:
Northern Flicker (multiple)
Gray Catbird
Red-eyed Vireo
American Redstart
Northern Parula (multiple)
Blackpoll Warbler
Black-throated Green Warbler
Chestnut-sided Warbler
Common Yellowthroat

and the finale was a high altitude Osprey coasting over the yard headed for the Delaware River. The Osprey and three of the warblers were yard birds. The species list also compares pretty well to my Central Park sightings list from earlier in the day. I also heard a Song Sparrow sound off, which may or may not be a migrant - most summer breeders leave my yard before fall migration, which is why Gray Catbird is included on the migrant list.

NYC Checklist Updates

2011-09-12T15:02:00.000-07:00

The checklist that I've been maintaining at
http://www.philjeffrey.net/NYC_unofficial_list.html
has been updated to reflect the amazing fallout as a result of Hurricane Irene. What was added was:

Cory's Shearwater (Bronx)
Great Shearwater (East River, Brooklyn)
Audubon's Shearwater (Bronx)
Band-rumped Storm-Petrel (Bronx)
White-tailed Tropicbird (Manhattan)
Sooty Tern (several)
Bridled Tern (Staten Island, Brooklyn)

although of course this list could conceivably get modified by virtue of NYSARC rulings.

Other noteworthies such as Leach's Storm-Petrel were already on the list, although remarkable finds in themselves.

Given the conditions I personally didn't see any of these birds - while they were being recorded off Brooklyn and Manhattan (and a similar lot off Cape May) the conditions were simply too hazardous to consider driving that far with high winds and potential flooding. Instead I picked up inland Laughing Gulls (three juveniles over Mercer County Park). The pelagics cleared out fast - I got down to Cape May the following morning but there was pretty much nothing out on the ocean, although Bill Boyle did point out a fly-by Sandwich Tern along the beach which turned out to be a new NJ bird for me.

Central Park 9/10 and 9/11

2011-09-12T14:44:00.001-07:00

A fairly slow migration day on 9/10 saw me in Central Park for my first fall birding trip to NYC. The number of warblers were fairly low for a northerly wind and I found:

Osprey
Northern Flicker
Eastern Wood-Pewee
Yellow-bellied Flycatcher
Great Crested Flycatcher
Veery
Swainson's Thrush
Wood Thrush
Gray Catbird
Black-and-white Warbler
American Redstart
Ovenbird
Northern Waterthrush
Common Yellowthroat
Canada Warbler
Rose-breasted Grosbeak

Noteworthy were the Yellow-bellied Flycatcher (first of year for me) and EIGHT Osprey making their way south.

On 9/11 I returned to Central Park without expectation of finding much. However I was living in Manhattan on 9/11/01 and birding Central Park that morning - an experience best related elsewhere, if at all - and this visit was more about symbolism than anything else. As expected it was much quieter even than Saturday. I added Northern Parula (3) and Yellow Warbler to the previous day's warbler totals but left the park fairly early for brunch rather than keep staring at trees full of American Robins and not much else. Of note were two White-throated Sparrows, one of which was singing. There was no hawk movement to speak of on Sunday.

Parasitic Jaeger and Brown Booby (in NJ!)

2011-08-21T16:12:00.000-07:00

This has been quite the year for life birds, including exotic ones (Rufous-backed Thrush, Black-vented Oriole, Laysan Albatross, Short-tailed Albatross, Gray-hooded Gull), so when a Brown Booby turned up in Cape May I doubted my luck would run so far as to have it stick around.

Instead I headed for Bombay Hook NWR (Smyrna, DE) in the morning to look for shorebirds, and apart from the belated year bird American Avocet and some Blue Grosbeaks wasn't all that blown away by things. Checking email I saw that the Booby was still being seen, so I made a 2.5 hour "sprint" across the southern tier of NJ to Cape May, where I saw the Brown Booby perched on a distant marker just before 1pm. Since there was a 1:30 sailing of "The Osprey" I called them up while looking at the Booby through the scope and hopped on the boat to take a closer look. And a closer look it was, with the Booby seen from perhaps 50 feet away.

What's even more remarkable is that it was an adult - usually only juveniles go way out of range. Notably other Brown Boobies had been seen very recently in Massachusetts and Maine - a mini invasion of a Caribbean bird that only breeds in the USA on the Dry Tortugas.

Also seen from the tour were several Whimbrel, a Marbled Godwit and a few Black Terns amongst commoner species. After the tour ended I braved traffic to go to the "Concrete Ship" at Cape May Point. I hadn't even put the 'scope down when a Parasitic Jaeger flew by (a dark-ish juvenile). I had been extra-conservative about Parasitics despite seeing two in Avalon over a decade ago, and "seeing" one or two on pelagics, but this was getting silly so I decided to add it to my life list after all. Also at the Concrete Ship were lots of terns (Common, Forster's, more Blacks, Least, Royal), a lot of Laughing Gulls, with Sanderling and Semipalmated Sandpiper on the beach. I couldn't pull in any Storm-Petrels out over the ocean but it was windy and murky by this point. I headed home through a line of strong storms flash-flooding the roads in places.

Gray-headed/hooded Gull

2011-07-31T20:06:00.000-07:00

(Gray-hooded in AOU area - they just have to be different; Gray-headed everywhere else).

A bird originally identified as a Black-headed Gull had its ID corrected on Thursday from something semi-rare to something exceptional. Two birders had spotted a Gray-hooded Gull on the Coney Island beach on 7/24, and thank God they took a photo of it.

As you might expect with a rare bird that's been seen precisely once in the USA over a decade ago, some civilized panic occurred. Not seen Friday morning but seen Friday afternoon, seen off and on during Saturday, I finally decided to go look for it late morning on Sunday. Since I started out first at Negri-Nepote (Blue Grosbeak, Grasshopper Sparrow etc) I accelerated arrival time to mid morning since it had already been seen.

I actually saw it while walking toward the group of birders on the boardwalk because it has a very distinctive flight pattern with large white mirrors above the black primary tips. On the ground it was a little less obvious with the gray hood and black collar less pronounced than some photos of birds in fresh alternate. Overall plumage condition is a little worn but consistent with an adult in late alternate with year-old primaries and retrices. It's pretty tame but no tamer than the Laughing Gulls it's taking its cues from. It's a little smaller than a Laughing Gull but not by much.

I'm still not sure this qualifies as a countable species - while I don't see any captive origin issues for the bird and there's no particular reason to believe ship-assistance it's still a quite remarkable record well out-of-range.

A picture from August 2nd, when I made a second trip to see this bird:

See also: New York Times article.

Negri-Nepote

2011-07-24T19:45:00.000-07:00

On a marginally more palatable day I went walking in the early morning at Negri-Nepote Grasslands in Franklin Twp NJ. This place was full of passerines with a good number of juveniles. I saw more Grasshopper Sparrow juveniles than anything else, which is really good news for this very uncommon species in NJ. One or two adult males were still singing, and I saw one adult carrying food.

One species conspicuously absent were Dickcissel - they haven't been seen here in a few weeks.

Other sparrows at Negri-Nepote included Chipping, Field (+juv), Song (+juv), a singing male Blue Grosbeak (not seen) and there were also American Goldfinches, Indigo Buntings and fly-over House Finch. I also saw multiple House Wrens (one using a Tree Swallow box), a Prairie Warbler, a few Orchard Orioles, Cliff/Barn/Tree Swallow, three eclipse plumage Wood Ducks on the pond that is drying up. Also of interest there were a flock of 10+ Bobolinks - although this is a grassland they don't breed here for reasons that must be to do with the habitat mix, but Bobolinks breed early and migrate early. These birds were southbound migrants including molting adult males.

Brig 7/23

2011-07-23T13:21:00.000-07:00

Short birding trip (truncated by heat and Tour de France coverage). I went zero for everything on the rarity front at Brig despite checking Glossy Ibis facial skin color (for White-faced) and there being feeding frenzies at very low tide at a few of the sluices (Forster's Tern, Laughing Gull, Double-crested Cormorant).

Shorebird numbers were up, mainly Semipalmated Sandpiper (abundant, thousands) and Short-billed Dowitcher. My best birds were Whimbrel and Pectoral Sandpiper, both year birds, before heading for cover and air-conditioning.

Brigantine NWR

2011-07-11T08:56:00.000-07:00

A warm Sunday visit to Brigantine, although I actually started off at Great Bay Blvd in Tuckerton, just to the north. Along Great Bay there were multiple singing Seaside Sparrows but I was unable to come up with Saltmarsh (Sharp-tailed) Sparrow. Also there: Boat-tailed Grackle, Laughing Gull, distant Forster's Terns, inevitable Red-winged Blackbirds, sizable flocks of Tree Swallow on the wires, and I heard a couple of Clapper Rails. A couple of Least-ish Sandpipers flew over the road, a reminder that fall shorebird migration had already started.

Then to Brigantine where the Purple Martin colony was in full swing. The tide appeared to be high but on the way down. Activity at Brig wasn't all that impressive, especially on the shorebird front: Short-billed Dowitcher, Lesser Yellowlegs, Greater Yellowlegs, Spotted Sandpiper, Least Sandpiper, Stilt Sandpiper. OK, the Stilt was certainly a decent find, and was an adult in fading alternate plumage. At this time of year pretty much all of the birds are adult in faded alternate plumage since it's too early for juveniles to be in a condition to migrate south. Terns included the inevitable large numbers of Forster's which nest out in the saltmarsh and are just starting to show signs of molt in a few cases (into basic plumage). At the south-eastern sluice there was a single Common Tern (semi-reliable here) and a few Gull-billed Terns were dotted around the place. Canada Geese appeared to be at an all-time low for a summer in which I'd normally expect to find lots of juveniles along the drive. There were several Osprey nests with young but the really photographically convenient nest from last year was inactive - I thought that one was a little too close to the wildlife drive and is inactive in most years. I didn't find Saltmarsh at Brig either, but Seaside Sparrow, Marsh Wren, Common Yellowthroat, Song Sparrow, Indigo Bunting and Blue Grosbeak were present. The male Blue Grosbeak was singing and was my first one for the year - not at all common this far north. A fairly typical results for Brigantine but nothing at all compelling.

(Update: 7/17 there were pretty much the same species but also Least Tern family group with juveniles).

Hooded Crow, Staten Island

2011-07-11T08:48:00.001-07:00

This bird is an Old World species of crow, the Hooded Crow, at Crooke's Point of Great Kills Park (part of the Gateway National Recreation Area, just as Jamaica Bay WR is). Back when I still lived in Britain it was a subspecies of the Carrion Crow (Corvus corone) but subsequently was elevated to full species status as C. cornix. Hooded Crow is somewhat of a predator, and the local several pairs of Northern Mockingbirds instinctively know this - they're mobbing the crow quite hard whenever it pops into the parking lot, and often on the beach too. So although the above photo looks like they're companions, nothing could be further from the truth.

This is a pretty significant vagrant, or at least would be if they had much of a migratory habit - Hooded Crows show shorter range migration in winter as a reaction to hard weather (rather like Blue Jays) but like all the crows that I'm familiar with are mostly sedentary. Given the location it's rather tempting to think this was a ship-assisted bird. It could also be an escapee, but there's no obvious feather wear from a cage and the bird is fairly wary. Strongly suggestive of wild origin but I doubt it flew trans-Atlantic under its own power.

Also at Great Kills: Brown-headed Cowbirds incl juveniles (why can't the Mockingbirds harass these ?); Yellow Warbler; Willow Flycatcher; Gray Catbird; Common Tern; Osprey; the usual suspect on the Gull front.

Update: the Hooded Crow moved off Staten Island not long after I saw it, but was found again hanging out on Long Beach Island in New Jersey (this is south of Barnegat Light, so it's traveled a fair distance). As of August 5th it's still present.

Out of area: WA/OR trip

2011-06-28T09:02:00.000-07:00

On probably the last birding trip of the year - since I do mainly late winter and early summer trips - I went to the last chunk of the lower 48 that I hadn't really birded, the Pacific NW. I wound up with 19 life birds which is rather remarkable given that I started out with 622 USA species and it's hard to envision adding 19 in one trip. 9 of these were added in one day on a Westport Pelagic trip on 6/25: Sooty Shearwater, Pink-footed Shearwater, Fork-tailed Storm-Petrel, Leach's Storm-Petrel, Black-footed Albatross, Laysan Albatross, Short-tailed Albatross, South Polar Skua and Cassin's Auklet. The Laysan's is fairly rare, but the Short-tailed Albatross is a real rarity with much excitement on the boat - there are only ~2,400 in the world. This one was an immature. Laysan is also unusual but it's possible that the tsunami kicked many off their breeding grounds this year. Previously I'd seen one Albatross species: Royal Albatross in NZ. I added 3 new ones on this trip.

Other lifers: Rhinoceros Auklet, Marbled Murrelet, Common Murre, Tufted Puffin, Pacific Wren, Red-breasted Sapsucker, Northwestern Crow, Vaux's Swift, Cassin's Vireo, Tricolored Blackbird.

Pretty much impossible to see more than a few life birds in one trip in the Lower 48 going forward.

Arizona in flames

2011-06-15T12:29:00.000-07:00

Way out of area, but anyone who has birded the sky islands of south-east Arizona can understand the cumulative horror of the extensive wildfires that are active right now.

The Chiricahua's (Portal, South Cave Creek, Paradise) are extensively burned, with a firestorm nuking Rustler Park, but S. Cave Creek partially saved by preventive burns. (Inciweb for Horseshoe Two, Coronado NF). The boundaries of this fire extend over the entire AZ Chiricahua footprint.

The nigh-on half-million acre Wallow fire at the eastern edge of AZ (away from the sky islands but still in valuable montane habitat).

The evolving Monument fire in the Huachucas (inciweb link now active) which appears to have consumed chunks of Ash Canyon and rumor has it burning Mary Jo Ballator's birding B&B. There was a brief fire in Ramsey Cyn recently. Evacuation seems possible for Miller Cyn now. Lack of containment on that fire would see decimation of Miller, Carr and Ramsey Cyns.

The Murphy fire west of I-19 and nw of Nogales that probably burned out Sycamore Cyn and covered the area around Pena Blanca Lake.

So far Madera Cyn and Mt Lemmon don't have fires on them or this might constitute a total loss of habitat. Of course fires are part of the natural process and some fire suppression policies in national forests might have contributed to the severity of this - but the drought is the biggest issue and perhaps these fires won't be totally over until the monsoon season in July, assuming it arrives.

The fires mentioned above cover large areas that I visited in the AZ segment of my AZ-NM-CO birding trip in 2006 (Sycamore, Ramsey, Miller, Carr, Ash, S. Cave Creek Canyons, Rustler Park in three different mountain ranges)

Negri-Nepote Dickcissel

2011-06-14T07:17:00.000-07:00

Trying to pack in a few breeding season sites in good weather before I wander off to the Pacific NW I went to Six Mile Run (Grasshopper Sparrow etc) and Negri-Nepote Grasslands. I've been to Negri-Nepote before but not very often - it's just far enough away to represent a higher effort barrier. However this Franklin Twp-managed site is better than Griggstown and probably should become my spring-summer alternative to that.

For example: I heard (and probably saw) a Grasshopper Sparrow within the first 200 yards from the parking lot at Negri-Nepote. I wasn't there for very long since this was a short visit sandwiched between Six Mile Run and work. Predictable birds were: Indigo Bunting, House Wren, Field Sparrow, Common Yellowthroat. On the pond was a male Mallard, Killdeer, Great Egret and a swarm of feeding swallows (Tree, Barn). The bird I mainly came to see was a singing male Dickcissel, given a relatively monotonous and uninspired song even compared to other Dickcissels, but it did make it pretty easy to find.

Dickcissel's breeding range once covered the Atlantic coast but breeding in this area has become a rare to very rare event. They breed here and there in Delaware, but breeding in NJ is extremely irregular. Normally I see this species as a misdirected fall migrant (Jones Beach) or more rarely as a spring wanderer (Central Park) but this is the first Dickcissel I've seen in NJ. Unlike the movement of Cassin's Sparrow's east in response to the major drought of the interior west, there's no obvious climatic reason for Dickcissel turning up in NJ. I saw some in very late May in coastal TX at Anahuac NWR, in March in FL, and for me this is a banner year for them since previously I've seen them very infrequently.

Grasslands, 6/12

2011-06-12T20:16:00.000-07:00

Sunday wasn't any better weather-wise than Saturday, and in fact it was lightly drizzling by the time I reached Six Mile Run State Park (Franklin Twp, NJ). I found the usual suspects fairly straightforwardly: the usual Willow Flycatcher tussle near the parking lot (could it actually be the same two males each year), American Goldfinch feeding in the thistle, Tree Swallow and Barn Swallow, Field Sparrow, Grasshopper Sparrow out in the field. One Grasshopper Sparrow was singing consistently and the other one (also probably male) was just giving contact calls. One singing male Indigo Bunting, a distant Prairie Warbler, Eastern Bluebirds, and an adult Cooper's Hawk hunting the area. The Red-winged Blackbirds must have just fledged or be close to it - several males ended up hovering in an agitated way over my head although they didn't dive-bomb me.

No orioles and no Blue Grosbeak, but Willow Flycatcher and Grasshopper Sparrow were new birds for the year.

A few miles to the south I visited Griggstown. I didn't hear any Grasshopper Sparrows, nor any Indigo Buntings, but I did add both Baltimore and Orchard Orioles for the day. Red-winged Blackbird numbers seemed low and this site definitely appears not to have bounced back from mismanagement in recent years. We shall see if it pulls in the sparrows this fall.

Baldpate Mtn, 6/11

2011-06-11T20:22:00.000-07:00

An early morning check of the radar showed a patch of thunderstorms headed toward Mercer county so I ran errands while waiting for the storms to pass by. Afterwards I drove up to the top of Baldpate and found almost exactly the same species as a previous visit. Notably no Kentuckys singing at any point, although it being later in the morning and later in the year may play a role.

I also explored the trails off the north side of Baldpate via the parking lot at the powerline cut. This had lots of habitat that seemed Hooded/Kentucky-friendly yet I only came up with one singing Hooded on the mile-long loop trip.

Upsides were House Wren nesting in the trail map structure, Great Crested Flycatcher, singing Blue-winged Warbler (not seen).

Hairy Woodpecker
Great Crested Flycatcher
Red-eyed Vireo
House Wren
Veery
Wood Thrush
Gray Catbird
Blue-winged Warbler
Black-and-white Warbler
Ovenbird
Hooded Warbler
Eastern Towhee
Chipping Sparrow
Field Sparrow
Rose-breasted Grosbeak
Indigo Bunting

Louisiana May-June

2011-06-03T08:45:00.000-07:00

Away from the NYC area I took advantage of a conference trip to New Orleans in late May into June to do a little birding for one of my nemesis birds: Bachman's Sparrow. Via my own research and a lot of helpful advice from TX birders they weren't all that hard to find at Boykin Springs and another site, both near Jasper TX in the pine woods at the eastern edge of the state. As a bonus I saw two Red-cockaded Woodpeckers at the second site, these being my second and third RCWO respectively.

June is going to be the month for trips - I'm off on a pacific northwest trip in two weeks.

Central Park 5/24

2011-05-24T13:41:00.000-07:00

On the day before setting off on my Louisiana conference trip I took a morning and birded Central Park for almost certainly the last time this spring migration. Spring migration started with a bang in late April where everything seemed early, then stalled with bad weather in the traditional peak window.

So here we are on May 22nd, and there's still a fair number of adult males singing in the trees: Northern Parula, Ovenbird, Common Yellowthroat, Blackpoll Warbler (inevitable), Canada Warbler, American Redstart, one or two Magnolia Warblers, Black-throated Blue Warbler. Adding to the warbler list was Northern Waterthrush and Yellow Warbler. But most species were heard singing, although it was a mix of males and females seen. Migration may have some legs yet, but I'll be away for close to two weeks and I anticipate things will be pretty slow by the time I get back out.

Best bird of the day was a Lincoln's Sparrow at Tanner's Spring.

Chimney Swift
Eastern Wood-Pewee
Great Crested Flycatcher
Red-eyed Vireo
Veery
Swainson's Thrush
Cedar Waxwing
Northern Parula
Yellow Warbler
Magnolia Warbler
Black-throated Blue Warbler
Blackpoll Warbler
Black-and-white Warbler
American Redstart
Ovenbird
Northern Waterthrush
Common Yellowthroat
Canada Warbler
Chipping Sparrow
Lincoln's Sparrow
Rose-breasted Grosbeak
Baltimore Oriole

Delaware Bay Shore, 5/22

2011-05-22T21:18:00.000-07:00

It was heavy overcast and drizzle, with non-migration-inducing winds on Saturday night, so I gave up on any idea of going into Central Park and went in the opposite direction to the NJ Delaware Bay shore instead.

I got a slow start, the light rain not being much of an inducement, but it was merely overcast when I made it to Belleplain State Forest at 10am. Along the usual stretch of Sunset Road I hard a distant Prothonotary Warbler, a closer (but equally elusive) Louisiana Waterthrush, and a Yellow-throated Warbler in the pines there. All were heard-only as was a Worm-eating Warbler and a probable distant Kentucky. Birds I actually did see at Belleplain were Acadian Flycatcher, Great Crested Flycatcher and a Blue-gray Gnatcatcher on its nest.

Belleplain SF was not my main target, which was instead saltmarshes and coastal ponds. I went to Jake's Landing and on getting to the parking lot the first sparrow I put my eyes on was a Saltmarsh (Sharp-tailed) Sparrow - not something I see each trip there, although this was the site of my life bird. Shortly afterwards the first of several Seaside Sparrows and Marsh Wrens doing little song flights. The species were the usual selection (Willet, heard Clapper Rail, Snowy Egret, Glossy Ibis, Osprey, Forster's Tern) and since it was both breezy and overcast I left before too long - I did see one Northern Harrier which suggests they might be nesting there again.

My main interest for the day was migrating shorebirds at the impoundments along Matt's Landing Rd at Heislerville. I got there a little before noon with a projected high tide of something like 1:30pm and there already were a lot of shorebirds in the pool. Hundreds per minute were coming in as the tide rose. There was a multi-thousand swarm of Semipalmated Sandpipers (year bird) but I was lucky enough to find the female Curlew Sandpiper within the first 30 seconds. They prefer the mud and shoreline rather than wading, so despite being similar to Dunlins (but longer-legged) they don't spend much time with them. A little later on the brick red (but still a little mottled) male was found. The female showed remarkable site fidelity and kept feeding on the same 50 yard stretch of mud. Dunlin, Semipalmated Plover, Short-billed Dowitcher were also numerous. The Black-bellied Plovers were more elusive on the other side of the pond. The Black Skimmers were also present, along with Forster's Tern and a couple of Least Terns. I spent some time sorting through sandpipers and came up with three White-rumped Sandpipers - birds I don't see in alternate plumage all that often. Large numbers but not a lot of diversity - this habitat doesn't favor the Ruddy Turnstones (I saw 1) or Red Knots (zero) that hang out along the sandy beaches of the bay. The shorebird flocks were pretty nervous, and at one point a female Purple Martin was flushing them as it dove for insects over the mud.

Although there was a little sun down on the shore, back at home it was still solid overcast. A little migration had happened - as I was doing yard work I heard a singing male Blackpoll Warbler feeding amongst my spruce trees (which along with my big oak prove to be a favorite with migrant warblers).

Sterling Forest, May 21st

2011-05-21T21:06:00.000-07:00

Back up to Sterling Forest on the first sunny day for a over a week, and as it transpired the only sunny day of the weekend. Getting there around 7:30am I checked Blue Lake, where there was little singing activity, so I spent the entire morning along the power line cut at Ironwood Road.

A relatively cool start after a week of rain, and there wasn't that much active singing. In particular I heard no singing Golden-winged until I turned around on the trail, which is where I saw my first male. By that time I'd already seen two singing Blue-winged and photographed a female that was paired with the first "Blue-winged".

I say "Blue-winged" because it was this bird - almost certainly the one that was singing in the same tree as the Golden-winged 10 days perviously - that had pretty obvious Golden-winged genes in it. From underneath it's an unremarkable Blue-winged, but when I saw it from the side the upper wingbar had yellow in it, and the lower wing bar was both broad and solidly yellow. The face was perfect Blue-winged, so it wasn't an obvious "Lawrence's" Warbler. Some sort of back-cross that was 3/4 Blue-winged and 1/4 Golden-winged. Based on tail feather shape (and wear?) it was a first spring bird. The only good thing about all of this is that it was at least paired with a Blue-winged female, not a Golden-winged.

I had three singing Golden-winged on the day, plus a good mix of other warblers: Cerulean (singing male, also seen), Yellow Warbler, American Redstart, Black-and-white Warbler, Magnolia Warbler, Chestnut-sided Warbler, Common Yellowthroat, Ovenbird (heard), Hooded Warbler (heard). That's down from my previous trip here, but a pretty good total given that there was little migration ongoing with another in a series of winds out of the east.

Other passerines: Indigo Bunting, Eastern Towhee, Field Sparrow, Scarlet Tanager, Baltimore Oriole, Yellow-billed Cuckoo (heard), Eastern Wood-Peewee and Great Crested Flycatcher. I also had an Empidonax-sp that looked a lot like a Least Flycatcher but I wasn't totally sure of it based on incomplete looks (but not Acadian or Yellow-bellied). Not a bad day and I stayed a little later there due to the slow start.

Of note were a young Snapping Turtle crawling up the hill, and a large (5+ ft!) Black Rat Snake sprawled across the trail and really quite sluggish in the lower temperatures of the morning.

Osprey
Red-tailed Hawk
Yellow-billed Cuckoo
Ruby-throated Hummingbird
Eastern Wood-Pewee
Least Flycatcher
Great Crested Flycatcher
Yellow-throated Vireo
Red-eyed Vireo
Barn Swallow
Veery
Wood Thrush
Gray Catbird
Blue-winged Warbler
Golden-winged Warbler
Cerulean Warbler
Yellow Warbler
Chestnut-sided Warbler
Magnolia Warbler
Prairie Warbler
Black-and-white Warbler
American Redstart
Ovenbird
Common Yellowthroat
Hooded Warbler
Scarlet Tanager
Eastern Towhee
Field Sparrow
Indigo Bunting
Baltimore Oriole

Migration trickles on, between downpours

2011-05-17T10:12:00.000-07:00

Even though the deluge is scheduled to continue for the first half of the week, it's nevertheless obvious that some birds are still moving in undesirable conditions.

Monday (17th): large 70++ flock of Cedar Waxwings on campus in Princeton; smaller flock of Cedar Waxwings at the yard in Ewing; Northern Parula singing late in the day at Ewing - a new yard bird.

Tuesday (18th): faint Blackpoll-sounding call from the trees in the yard, and an odd-sounding warble that transpired to be a Magnolia Warbler singing an underperforming song while resting in my spruce trees (probably still quite dry). Magnolia Warbler was also a new yard bird.

I am nervous what this cold-wet stretch of weather will do to tired migrants and early breeders, but at least some are finding food and shelter. It should start drying out and warming up on Thursday.

Baldpate Mountain

2011-05-15T20:32:00.000-07:00

On the first morning of a week's rainy spell I assuaged some restlessness by hiking up Baldpate Mountain through some good eastern hardwood forest habitat after the latest line of storms had come through, although there was still light drizzle and quite a lot of water dripping from the trees. I started at the parking lot off Fiddler's Creek Road and decided to walk uphill on the road rather than slip on wet rocks along the trail.

Yellow Warbler, Eastern Towhee and Eastern Wood-Pewee were around the parking lot. On the walk up Wood Thrush, Ovenbird sounded off. Much of the birding today was by ear since the viewing conditions were pretty bad. I heard a distant Veery in the forest. But overall it was quiet, and it being cool and wet you really can't blame the birds. Towards the top of the road as the forest started to thin I added more Wood-Pewees, then Indigo Bunting, Field Sparrow, Chipping Sparrow and Yellow-throated Vireo. Up at the grassy meadow behind the house complex (the alleged visitor center that is never open) there were more Field Sparrows, Indigo Buntings, Common Yellowthroats and a couple of unenthused Blue-winged Warblers.

Hiking an upper section of the Summit Trail before it drops off steeply downhill I could hear Worm-eating Warbler, Blackpoll Warbler (migrant), more Ovenbirds but no Hooded Warblers. Going back down the hill on the road again I added Rose-breasted Grosbeak (a singing mail), possibly another distant Worm-eating, and on getting back to the parking lot once more there was a Northern Parula. Parula's sometimes breed around here, but this one was just as likely to be a migrant.

Before I went home I decided to check on the entrance on the other side of Baldpate, at Pleasant Plains Road, however once I found the trail head at the powerline cut the drizzle had really cut down below tree-top level. This entrance is worth exploring more, particularly since the powerline cut might attract more warblers (like Blue-winged), although it's not really quite the right habitat for Golden-winged or Chestnut-sided.

Central Park 5/14

2011-05-14T20:23:00.000-07:00

Overcast skies made for difficult birding in Central park on Saturday morning. Initially in Strawberry Fields the going was pretty slow as well, and continued that way through the Maintenance Field. En route the Upper Lobe was a little better with a female Ruby-throated Hummingbird and a few warblers, including a very vocal Northern Waterthrush.

On reaching the Evodia Field, however, things lit up a lot. Within five minutes I found a singing Tennessee Warbler, a Blackburnian Warbler, and two Cape May Warblers chasing each other. Tennessee Warbler had become a mini-nemesis bird since I had systematically missed them for several springs in the park, but this one was belting out its song near the source of the Gill and impossible to ignore (that is, if you know the song). Later on the Cape May male was singing at the Azalea Pond. It was also my first of the year, as was the Eastern Wood-Pewee that was flycatching in the lower canopy.

Elsewhere, on the Point etc, the birding returned to relatively slow. Catharus thrush numbers continue to be low, with a couple of Swainson's adding to the now-resident (non-Catharus) Wood Thrushes.

There was a burst of migration in early spring in late April and the first few days of May, but the standard peak window of May 5th-12th has been much slower with less conducive weather patterns. Saturday was the start of some quite wet weather with predominantly east-originated winds and rain every day that may last this whole week and are especially non-conducive to spring migration birding. If migration doesn't go right past us (to the west of us) it could make for a strong migration burst next time the weather is more migration-friendly.

Sterling Forest

2011-05-11T13:54:00.000-07:00

May 11th is the earliest I have ever been to Sterling Forest - when I first went there I favored early June although more recently I've been more likely to go there at the end of May. So this was somewhat of an experiment. The novel experience was the presence of some migrants in what otherwise would be considered classic northern deciduous breeding habitat (Yellow-rumped Warbler, Nashville Warbler, Blackpoll Warbler, White-crowned Sparrow). The female Black-throated Blue was probably a migrant too. In the end I racked up quite a decent total of warblers, although some species were heard-only, and unquestionably my best for this site.

The main targets at Sterling Forest are Golden-winged Warbler and Cerulean Warbler. I heard two Ceruleans and saw/heard about six Golden-winged. All males. I didn't see any sign of females but perhaps since this is mid migration they are en route. Unfortunately I also saw four Blue-winged, a personal high total, which doesn't bode well for this little enclave of Golden-winged. In fact one Blue-winged was singing in the same tree as a Golden-winged without territorial exclusion, which illustrates how this sort of hybridization can so easily come about.

My usual initial spot for Golden-winged has been trashed by the power line company, which likes to destroy habitat of endangered species by chemical and mechanical means. Looks like that will take a few years to bounce back, assuming it ever does. I've also seen these jackasses prune trees in breeding season, including destroying an American Redstart nest in the process and right next to a Golden-winged nesting site. Of course the power line cut itself is providing niche habitat for Golden-winged, especially after habitat encroachment or succession of its more usual sites. Golden-winged is essentially extirpated in NJ, at least from any publicized spots - the last site that I knew of near Layton has gone too far in succession. Although Cerulean is relatively rare, Golden-winged is much rarer as a regional breeding species.

However at least the most prominent spot for Golden-winged at Ironwood Road is mostly intact. Here Golden-winged, Prairie, Chestnut-sided, Yellow and Common Yellowthroat were on territory. I felt that the numbers of Prairie and Chestnut-sided were on the low side, but this may reflect ongoing migration especially of the latter species.

Here's the list, with 17 warbler species:
Green Heron
Red-tailed Hawk
Killdeer
Chimney Swift
Ruby-throated Hummingbird
Great Crested Flycatcher
Eastern Kingbird
Yellow-throated Vireo
Red-eyed Vireo
Tree Swallow
Barn Swallow
Black-capped Chickadee
Wood Thrush
Gray Catbird
Blue-winged Warbler
Golden-winged Warbler
Nashville Warbler
Northern Parula
Yellow Warbler
Chestnut-sided Warbler
Black-throated Blue Warbler
Yellow-rumped Warbler
Prairie Warbler
Blackpoll Warbler
Cerulean Warbler
Black-and-white Warbler
American Redstart
Ovenbird
Louisiana Waterthrush
Common Yellowthroat
Hooded Warbler
Scarlet Tanager
Eastern Towhee
Field Sparrow
White-crowned Sparrow
Rose-breasted Grosbeak
Indigo Bunting
Brown-headed Cowbird
Baltimore Oriole
American Goldfinch

Scarlet Tanager as new yard bird

2011-05-10T07:42:00.000-07:00

While making tea I heard a familiar song - one which I often describe as "a Robin on speed" - and tracked it down after a little while to a Scarlet Tanager that was singing from the top of my big oak in the back yard. It was just singing, not singing-while-feeding as a lot of warblers do, and in fact there were two Scarlet Tanagers with the other one singing from a distance to the north. A little later I heard a nearby Northern Parula sounding off. Despite the cool start to the day and what appears to be a north wind, some local migration must have happened.

Very gratifyingly, not only is Scarlet Tanager a new yard bird, but I also got to watch it sing for a while.

Sunday 5/8

2011-05-08T19:45:00.000-07:00

This was a slower day, both measured in terms of the numbers of warblers but also the extent to which they quieted down by late morning. I did find a Cape May Warbler at Strawberry Fields, singing, but missed the Blue Grosbeak (a lingerer, presumably) and Bay-breasted Warbler. Cape May has been moderately numerous again this spring. Birds like Blackpoll Warbler and Black-throated Green Warbler were notably absent today.

By late morning I decided to pack it in and get some brunch at one of my old UES haunts. I had driven into the city and had parked at 79th/Madison.

After brunch I decided to hit a couple of birding spots and my preferred nursery before getting home. First stop was DeKorte Park in the Meadowlands Lyndhurst. DeKorte has great potential as a spring shorebirding spot if only they would draw down the water a little and expose a little more mud, even in one small section. In the event I saw Lesser Yellowlegs, Least Sandpiper (one quite advanced, very rufous, with a prominent white eye ring), and one Spotted Sandpiper. Also present were Gadwall, American Black Duck, Mallard (with ducklings), Tree/Barn/Bank Swallows. Passerine migration was also in evidence, with the trees and pond edge containing Yellow-rumped Warblers, Yellow Warbler and Common Yellowthroat.

After a visit to Belle Mead C0-op for grass seed, I went down to nearby Griggstown Preserve (Franklin Twp, NJ) to check for Bobolinks. Someone had reported quite a few near the parking lot. I found one, a male that still had a rather subdued plumage - either in mid-molt or a young bird. As often happens here, the Bobolinks drop in but don't seem to stick for very long. Also there was Orchard Oriole, Tree Swallow, Warbling Vireo and many Red-winged Blackbirds.

Saturday 5/7 - good migration

2011-05-07T19:54:00.000-07:00

A pretty good migration happened overnight Friday-Saturday although the numbers were not huge in Central Park. In Strawberry Fields the diversity was decent and I picked up Blackpoll Warbler for the year (a singing male, one of a few that day and not atypical for the end of the first week in May). On the way into the Ramble I heard/saw Blackburnian Warbler and Northern Waterthrush and then shortly thereafter I found my first Swainson's Thrush for the year. It's not been a good year for Catharus-type Thrushes and Saturday was no exception with only a couple of Veeries and a Wood Thrush to add to the total (and Wood Thrush isn't even a Catharus). Still it's too early to expect Gray-cheeked so it may yet pick up.

Still, it was a decent mix of earlier and mid spring birds - Black-throated Green Warblers were in a couple of places, but there was also Canada Warbler. Red-eyed and Blue-headed Vireos. Along the point there was my second Summer Tanager for the year - certainly the only year when I've seen two in the park. There were also tame Canada and Magnolia Warblers, American Redstart - the relatively warm area along the Point was the most active part of the Ramble, perhaps reflecting a cool start to the day. Two good birds were in the Evodia Field area: a Ruby-throated Hummingbird and a Black-billed Cuckoo. I was alerted to the Cuckoo by other birders and was frankly amazed when it was chased out of the tree by another Cuckoo ! We rarely see multiple Cuckoos in the park, and when we do we really don't see that sort of territorial interaction. I assume the second Cuckoo was also Black-billed but I wasn't able to relocate it. Turns out this was my first Black-billed Cuckoo in a few years. I usually have better luck with Yellow-billed, although they really aren't that much more common.

Following up on a sighting of more than one Cape May at the Bethesda Fountain I wandered south of the boathouse - something I rarely do now but it used to be part of my regular route into the park when I lived on the UES in Manhattan. I was lucky enough to hear a singing male and after a little search did get onto it. A park employee showed me two roosting Raccoons, and later in the day I saw two more near the Upper Lobe - 4 being the most I've ever seen in one day in the park. Despite culling due to rabies infection they still seem to be present.

There was also a Blue Grosbeak - another park rarity - that I didn't see after it was initially found at Cherry Hill. At that point in time (early afternoon) the crowds would probably scare away most wild birds. (Probably the same bird was found the subsequent day at Strawberry Fields).

Black-billed Cuckoo
Ruby-throated Hummingbird
Northern Flicker
Great Crested Flycatcher
Blue-headed Vireo
Red-eyed Vireo
Barn Swallow
House Wren
Ruby-crowned Kinglet
Veery
Swainson's Thrush
Wood Thrush
Nashville Warbler
Northern Parula
Yellow Warbler
Chestnut-sided Warbler
Magnolia Warbler
Black-throated Blue Warbler
Yellow-rumped Warbler
Black-throated Green Warbler
Blackburnian Warbler
Blackpoll Warbler
Black-and-white Warbler
American Redstart
Ovenbird
Northern Waterthrush
Common Yellowthroat
Canada Warbler
Summer Tanager
Scarlet Tanager
Chipping Sparrow
Savannah Sparrow
Swamp Sparrow
White-crowned Sparrow
Rose-breasted Grosbeak
Brown-headed Cowbird
Baltimore Oriole

CPK 5/3 (Acadian, Cape May)

2011-05-03T14:23:00.000-07:00

I often feel like Accuweather let the 16-year old interns play with the forecast, so I wasn't totally surprised on Monday evening to see that Sunday's forecast for the week was wrong and Tuesday had prospects for a good migration day.

And so it was.

Entering Strawberry Fields at 7:15am I saw three Great Blue Herons migrating north. Isn't that a little late for them ? I had Great Blues migrating over the ocean on 3/26. Also in Strawberry were a lot of Gray Catbirds (as in: 7 in one small tree, many elsewhere). Outnumbering the Catbirds were White-throated Sparrows, which were there in the hundreds. Common Yellowthroat also put in a strong showing today too, and I saw at least twenty.

There were rarities about, but I only put my eyes on a few really interesting birds. The high point for me was an Acadian Flycatcher in Strawberry Fields (greenish, long-billed, long-primary projection). Acadian was my #1 park nemesis bird for many years - I've heard a few over the years - but compared to the Least Flycatchers I saw later the difference was quite marked. Marked, that is, for an Empidonax. Other nice birds included multiple singing White-crowned Sparrows (never common there), Cape May Warbler, Hooded Warbler. I also picked up Rose-breasted Grosbeak and American Redstart as year birds along with the Cape May Warbler, Acadian and Least Flycatchers. One of the better nn-FOY birds was Louisiana Waterthrush which stood out since the supercilium was indeed "the whitest thing on the bird". Lots of Northern Waterthrushes too. 17 warber species in all - pretty good going for a day originally forecast as rainy.

Great Blue Heron
Black-crowned Night-Heron
Chimney Swift
Acadian Flycatcher
Least Flycatcher
Great Crested Flycatcher
White-eyed Vireo
Blue-headed Vireo
Warbling Vireo
Ruby-crowned Kinglet
Blue-gray Gnatcatcher
Veery
Hermit Thrush
Wood Thrush
Gray Catbird
Nashville Warbler
Northern Parula
Yellow Warbler
Chestnut-sided Warbler
Magnolia Warbler
Cape May Warbler
Black-throated Blue Warbler
Yellow-rumped Warbler
Black-throated Green Warbler
Black-and-white Warbler
American Redstart
Ovenbird
Northern Waterthrush
Louisiana Waterthrush
Common Yellowthroat
Hooded Warbler
Scarlet Tanager
Eastern Towhee
White-crowned Sparrow
Rose-breasted Grosbeak
Baltimore Oriole

Backyard Monday

2011-05-02T07:49:00.000-07:00

Watching the yard in Ewing on Monday morning was quite productive: the Yellow-rumped Warbler(s) were singing their unmusical warble and I could hear a distant Black-throated Blue Warbler song and hints of an even more distant Northern Waterthrush (uncertain). Then I spied an Ovenbird, only a few feet from my property line (and therefore sadly not on my full yard list). Finally two Pine Siskins turned up at my feeders, which I'm still running as I get through the last of the season's seed. Sadly from the way the House Wren is singing it still lacks a mate, but with migration ongoing perhaps one will arrive soon.

Good Weekend Part 2, May 1st

2011-05-01T19:30:00.000-07:00

Following on the heels of Saturday, Sunday was slower but still pretty good. First interesting bird of the day was a Worm-eating Warbler at Balcony Bridge. I got a brief glimpse of what I believed to be the Varied Thrush (flushed by birders approaching too closely, yet again), then I got a tweet about a Bay-breasted Warbler in the Ramble. I got a brief look at that, and while trying to relocate it found a Blackburnian Warbler. After Nashville being a first-of-year bird the previous day there were several singing males in the Ramble and I saw a few individuals. While at the Bay-breasted I heard of a Yellow-throated Warbler elsewhere, and while unsuccessfully pursuing that I was told of a Summer Tanager. Summer Tanager is pretty rare in Central Park since it's north of the breeding range, but after a little searching it proved to be very active and not all that difficult to observe.

As the time approached noon I decided to check out Tanner's Spring which was initially quiet but had a brief flurry (N. Parula, Black-and-white Warbler, Black-throated Green Warbler, Nashville Warbler, Yellow-rumped Warbler) followed by another quasi-rarity - an Orange-crowned Warbler. Hermit Thrush and Veery were here (I saw Wood Thrush near the Varied Thrush spot). Then after leaving Tanner's intending to go home I spent at least an hour along the south side of Turtle Pond where the Summer Tanager was flycatching bees in the tall oaks and giving excellent views. I also added Eastern Phoebe and Canada Warbler for the day here.

First of year birds: Summer Tanager, Bay-breasted Warbler, (Varied Thrush), Canada Warbler

Black-crowned Night-Heron
Peregrine Falcon
Chimney Swift
Belted Kingfisher
Northern Flicker
Eastern Phoebe
Blue-headed Vireo
Northern Rough-winged Swallow
Barn Swallow
House Wren
Ruby-crowned Kinglet
Blue-gray Gnatcatcher
Veery
Hermit Thrush
Wood Thrush
Gray Catbird
Blue-winged Warbler
Orange-crowned Warbler
Nashville Warbler
Northern Parula
Yellow Warbler
Magnolia Warbler
Black-throated Blue Warbler
Yellow-rumped Warbler
Black-throated Green Warbler
Blackburnian Warbler
Prairie Warbler
Palm Warbler
Bay-breasted Warbler
Black-and-white Warbler
Worm-eating Warbler
Ovenbird
Northern Waterthrush
Canada Warbler
Summer Tanager
Scarlet Tanager
Eastern Towhee
Brown-headed Cowbird
Baltimore Oriole

Good Weekend Part 1, April 30th

2011-04-30T19:37:00.000-07:00

As Chris pointed out, what you don't normally get is multiple Blackburnian Warblers on April 30th. And yet here one was, singing 20 feet over my head. The day had started cloudy and slow, although with pockets of activity. When the sun came out the Ramble lit up in terms of migrants: Veery, Wood Thrush, Blue-winged Warbler, Blackburnian Warbler, Nashville Warbler, Chestnut-sided Warbler, Magnolia Warbler, Cerulean Warbler, Red-eyed Vireo were the first-of-year birds. The Cerulean, while typically high, was quite vocal and gave decent looks.

I ended up with 16 warbler species, which is rather a high total for April, especially since I was carrying the camera. Cape May and Bay-breasted were reported from the north of the park, Worm-eating from the Ramble, so the multiple observer total was comfortably in the 20's.

Double-crested Cormorant
Great Egret (fly-over)
Northern Shoveler
Wood Duck
Chimney Swift
Northern Flicker
Blue-headed Vireo
Warbling Vireo
Red-eyed Vireo (1)
Northern Rough-winged Swallow
Barn Swallow
House Wren
Ruby-crowned Kinglet
Blue-gray Gnatcatcher
Veery (1)
Wood Thrush (1)
Gray Catbird
Brown Thrasher
Blue-winged Warbler
Nashville Warbler
Northern Parula
Chestnut-sided Warbler (1)
Magnolia Warbler (1)
Black-throated Blue Warbler
Yellow-rumped Warbler
Black-throated Green Warbler (several)
Blackburnian Warbler (2++)
Prairie Warbler (1 heard)
Palm Warbler
Cerulean Warbler (1 singing)
Black-and-white Warbler
Ovenbird
Northern Waterthrush
Common Yellowthroat
Eastern Towhee
Brown-headed Cowbird
Orchard Oriole (1st year male at Polish Statue)
Baltimore Oriole
Purple Finch (Polish Statue and Maintenance Field)
American Goldfinch

Princeton - Hooded Warbler and Solitary Sandpiper

2011-04-26T07:39:00.000-07:00

Although striking out on the Virginia Rail that was reported the previous day, a morning visit to Princeton's Institute Woods was quite interesting early. There wasn't a big migration there, with low numbers of warblers, but there were one or two interesting birds. On the pond: Great Blue Heron, Tree Swallows and two Solitary Sandpipers. The latter were new for the year to me. Along the drive toward the water plant were Baltimore Oriole, Yellow-rumped Warbler, Yellow Warbler and Blue-gray Gnatcatcher at the pond and off in the woods were singing House Wren, Ovenbird and Common Yellowthroat. However the best bird of the day was right back at where I parked my car - a female Hooded Warbler moving purposefully through the low undergrowth in the woods but showing itself clearly for a few seconds before darting across the road and vanishing.

Central Park 4/24 - good migration

2011-04-24T19:16:00.000-07:00

On about as good a migration day as I've seen as early April 24th, a warm day following a wet day filled the park with migrants. Most of the migrants were Black-and-white Warblers (all male) and Yellow-rumped Warblers, but I did come up with 12 warbler species by the time I left around 1pm.

In the Maintenance Field things started off slowly, with two Brown Thrashers, Common Yellowthroat and Chimney Swift (first-of-year for me). Then Hermit Thrush and Northern Flicker put in an appearance and I had a brief look at Northern Parula flitting from tree to tree. Around Azalea Pond things were more active with multiple B+W Warblers and Yellow-rumped. My only Palm Warbler for the day passed through. Then I found by chance a silent Yellow-throated Vireo, for the longest time my only vireo of the day but I was to add Blue-headed Vireo later on. Northern Waterthrush was singing at Azalea Pond and there were several around including a very vocal one at the Upper Lobe. Near the Upper Lobe I also found a very mobile singing Yellow Warbler along with silent individual Blue-winged Warbler and Great Crested Flycatcher. Over at Sparrow Ridge (Sparrow Rock) near Tanner's Spring I found two Field Sparrows, a Black-throated Green Warbler and located a vocal Baltimore Oriole. Then up in the small flat area between Shakespeare Garden and Belvedere Castle I saw both the reported Hooded Warbler (first year male, by appearance) and tracked down the first year male Orchard Oriole by its chatter. The final hurrah for the day was a singing Black-throated Blue Warbler in the Oven.

Looking at the sightings logs I keep online, the Yellow-throated Vireo was by far my earliest one - previously May 1st was my early date. But the Black-throated Blue was more or less on time (my early date for that is the 20th). But there's still a lot of spring to come.

First of year birds in the following list are marked with FOY.

Red-tailed Hawk
Chimney Swift (FOY)
Great Crested Flycatcher
Blue-headed Vireo
Yellow-throated Vireo (FOY)
Black-capped Chickadee
White-breasted Nuthatch
Ruby-crowned Kinglet
Blue-gray Gnatcatcher
Hermit Thrush
Brown Thrasher
Blue-winged Warbler (FOY)
Northern Parula
Yellow Warbler (FOY)
Black-throated Blue Warbler (FOY)
Yellow-rumped Warbler
Black-throated Green Warbler (FOY)
Palm Warbler
Black-and-white Warbler
Ovenbird (FOY)
Northern Waterthrush (FOY)
Hooded Warbler (FOY)
Common Yellowthroat
Eastern Towhee
Chipping Sparrow
Field Sparrow
Song Sparrow
Swamp Sparrow
White-throated Sparrow
Dark-eyed Junco
Brown-headed Cowbird
Orchard Oriole (FOY)
Baltimore Oriole (FOY)

Princeton 4/18

2011-04-18T07:35:00.000-07:00

With the prospects of a better migration day on Monday, I spent a little time at Princeton's Rogers Refuge before work. Along the road were several Yellow-rumped Warblers along with Ruby-crowned Kinglet (singing), Brown Creeper, Yellow-bellied Sapsucker, Eastern Phoebe. Near the pond I had a singing House Wren and back toward the car a Carolina Wren. A pair of Wood Ducks were on the pond.

The Lesser Calendines are in full bloom here, carpeting the ground in many places in an attractive display. Shame then that they are a nasty little invasive and crowding out the native species.

Central Park after the deluge, 4/17

2011-04-17T19:40:00.000-07:00

Saturday ended amidst a storm of epic proportions, which cleared out too late to provide much of an overnight migration. So while I traveled into Central Park on Sunday I had to work hard to see any migrants at all. I came up with a single drab female Pine Warbler for the new world warbler list, although it was perfect habitat for Waterthrushes or Rusty Blackbird given the amount of water in the Ramble. Most interesting bird for me was an immature Sharp-shinned Hawk sitting in the Evodia Field, which showed little interest in making a pass at the American Goldfinches working a way at the last remaining feeder.

Double-crested Cormorant
Sharp-shinned Hawk
Yellow-bellied Sapsucker
Northern Flicker
Black-capped Chickadee
White-breasted Nuthatch
Brown Creeper
Golden-crowned Kinglet
Ruby-crowned Kinglet
Blue-gray Gnatcatcher
Hermit Thrush
Pine Warbler
Eastern Towhee
Chipping Sparrow
Fox Sparrow
Swamp Sparrow
Dark-eyed Junco
American Goldfinch

Princeton: Bittern, White-eyed Vireo 4/14

2011-04-15T13:05:00.000-07:00

A quite cooperative American Bittern had been at Princeton's Rogers Refuge most of the week. After a quick check on Monday, when I found only a few Wilson's Snipe, I returned on a warm Thursday evening where I found the bird out in the open at the edge of the phragmites. Not a bad bird for NJ. I also saw one Wilson's Snipe again as it flushed from further back in the pond.

Additional birds were Wood Duck, Blue-gray Gnatcatchers and a White-eyed Vireo. The vireo is noteworthy because my personal early date for WEVI in the north-east was April 22nd 2008 (Sandy Hook), so this bird was 8 days early.

Migrant yard birds Saturday 4/9

2011-04-09T19:54:00.000-07:00

After a week away working at Brookhaven National Lab, I returned home to see that spring had progressed in my absence. On Saturday morning I was watching feeder birds and thought that the House Finches looked odd. On retrieving my binoculars the birds were still there and proved to be two male Purple Finches - a first for the feeders, and for my year list, although they've flown over the yard before. The finches stuck around throughout the morning. Another first-of-year was Chipping Sparrow, which had clearly had a major influx during the week from other NY/NJ reports. Dark-eyed Junco numbers seemed to be down, so possibly some have moved on.

Two FOY's before even leaving the house. Although I was still lethargic from the Brookhaven trip I did head out to a local birding spot. Plainsboro Preserve is an old gravel pit with surrounding woodland and farmland. The visitor center had held a good collection of US birding travel books but their selection was poor this time - they've clearly stopped stocking them. At the feeders were a predictable mix of molding American Goldfinch, Brown-headed Cowbird and Red-winged Blackbird. Tree Swallows have also moved in en masse this past week and several were staking out nest boxes. I also found Golden-crowned Kinglet, Hermit Thrush (FOY) and Eastern Phoebe but the preserve was relatively quiet, as is typical here. The lake can sometimes pick up Common Loon but all there was were a few Canada Geese and two Mallards.

Redpolls

2011-04-04T12:58:00.000-07:00

Common Redpolls were forecast to be an "invasion bird" this winter. And invaded they have, but they started invading really late in the winter, around February. It's not likely that they are still heading south, but there are some lingerers around. Two such birds turned up at the Central Park feeders and I went to see them on April 3rd. I found one adult male and a much drabber bird that on checking my photos turned out to be a first winter male. They didn't stick around for long (and certainly not close to as long as the long-staying Varied Thrush, still present in the park on April 14th).

Snipe in Piscataway 3/27

2011-03-28T08:05:00.000-07:00

While recovering from the pelagic and associated drugs, I wasn't disposed to venture too far afield, instead limiting my sights to Piscataway, 20 miles to the north, and a Wilson's Snipe that had been in a park there. Just a single bird - and I wonder how these individuals elect to go their own way - and one that was sheltering in a wet area with surface water surrounded by Canada Geese. In fact it was having to dodge the geese as the latter wandered around. It was a little skittish, and with the number of (on-leash) dog walkers it's probably not much of a surprise.

This was a nice riverside park with some woodland, and I picked up Hairy Woodpecker and Northern Flicker for the year, in addition to the expected flocks of Robins and Canada Geese.

I stopped at Griggstown Preserve on the way back just as a monitoring stop en route to my favored plant nursery and found nothing, but the grassland hasn't yet bounced back from winter.

Uneventful "Inshore" Pelagic 3/26

2011-03-28T07:37:00.001-07:00

I don't normally go on Pelagics without good reason, since I'm prone to getting seasick. I had balked at a genuine winter pelagic since the high temp was in the high teens Farenheight. However I rolled the dice on this Pelagic run by See Life Paulagics and found it to be almost totally futile - nothing I saw was something I couldn't see on/from land (and for the most part already had), although some of the views were better. For the life of my I cannot understand why this outfit always runs pelagics with NJ and NY trips on the same weekend, unless they're using the Saturday trips to scout for the Sunday trips.

Highlights: Iceland, Glaucous and Lesser Black-backed Gulls spending time at the back of the boat, somewhat of a regular pelagic thing; lots of Razorbills and some of them in breeding plumage.

Lowlights: only one year bird (the Glaucous); all the Razorbills were rather distant; NO other alcids (murres, puffins, dovekies); NO Kittiwakes; NO Fulmars; and the Gannets were relatively uncommon and all adults. Nothing on the water near the boat save gulls and a few Gannets.

The trip started off well - a Peregrine on the highway bridge, and coming north out of Belmar to Sandy Hook there were large numbers of scoters (Black, Surf and a few White-winged) off Sandy Hook. Which is where we picked up the persistent first winter Glaucous Gull in rather worn plumage. That bird followed us for a while, including the point where we turned south-east toward the "mudhole". When the Glaucous left an immature Iceland Gull joined us briefly. From the turn and for the first few miles we picked up a lot of Razorbills, most distant, but absolutely all of them in flight - if they saw us within several hundred yards they left the scene. A few of the closer ones (close enough that I could pick out the white stripe on the bill) had visible breeding plumage but most appeared to be in basic plumage. As we got further offshore the activity dropped off precipitously and so there were long stretches of total boredom. At about hour 6.5 (of 8) we found a group of gulls around some trawler (scallops?) and picked up adult Iceland and shortly afterwords also second cycle Lesser Black-backed, then after that a brief visit with third cycle Lesser Black-backed. But overall it was 2 hours of good start and 6 hours of total tedium.

Migration novelties were a flock of 7 Great Blue Herons, far enough from land that they must have set off on faith or some sixth sense heading for Long Island , a single Great Egret even further out, and a Wood Duck that I missed but was the furthest out of all (but at least it can set down on the water).

Note to self: no more late March pelagics, at least not with this lot, barring a lot of evidence to the contrary. Subsequent Atlantic pelagics should probably be off MA or NC, or perhaps a real deep winter pelagic again.

(I haven't seen the results of the subsequent day's pelagic, but given the lack of noise about it on the lists I think it had much the same results).

Spring enters, slowly

2011-03-24T12:26:00.000-07:00

Of course speed depends on where you are. Here around NYC/Philadelphia March has been called "the month of hope denied" with some justification. Nevertheless things are moving.

On Saturday 19th I decided a late day visit to Brigantine was warranted, given the habit of Short-eared Owls to fly during the day. The wind may have kept them down, but there was a fairly typical array of ducks (American Black Duck, N. Pintail, Mallard, GW Teal, N. Shoveler, Canvasback, Scaup sp., a single Hooded Merganser, Brant, Snow Goose). The waterfowl numbers were down from the late Feb visits there - ducks are migrating north. A more overt sign of spring was the pair of Great Egrets that I saw.

Another sign of waterfowl migration: the Ross's Geese have left Tom's River, as I found out while checking for them on the way back.

On Sunday 20th I went into Central Park, and found target bird #1: Fox Sparrow - itself an early spring migrant - but struck out on the Varied Thrush I wanted for the year list. Eastern Phoebe showed up as another early spring migrant, having been reported widely that week. Other than that it was the usual overwintering birds, with American Goldfinch in a range of molt states intermediate between basic and alternate, also Junco, Brown Creeper, Red-breasted Nuthatch. Everything, in short, pretty much on schedule and in the low numbers you also expect at this time of year. I also saw Fox Sparrow on a brief visit to the park on the early evening of Tuesday 22nd.

Goose Weekend Part 2 - Pink-footed

2011-03-13T20:25:00.000-07:00

The Pink-footed Goose in Washington Twp (NJ) that was roosting on Schlegel Lake each night was not what you might call the easiest bird. It left shortly after dawn, returned shortly before dusk, and during the day fed on inaccessible areas. The lake itself is mostly private property with minimal access. So in order to see this bird - my 3rd Pink-footed in the north-east - I had to leave home at 0415. Actually make that 0515 because when I woke up on Sunday morning I realized that the hour had gone forward.

Either way, it's about a 1:40 drive to Washington Twp from Ewing, and I got there when it was still dark enough that it wasn't worth rushing to the lake. I grabbed a bagel and headed to the library area where you could view the lake through a chain-linked fence. On the lake were a variety of waterfowl: Common Merganser, Hooded Merganser, Ring-necked Duck, Mallard, Wood Duck, Mandarin Duck, Canada Goose, but no PFGO. After a while of rising light and futile scoping a birder came by to tell us that the goose was being seen from the small park at the other side of the lake. A mini rush ensued since there were a fair number of birders, but eventually we did get fairly mediocre views of the Pink-footed before it flew out at 0740 or thereabouts.

Pink-footed Goose used to be relatively rare (population ~30,000 in 1950) but underwent considerable expansion to the point where the UK wintering population exceeds 300,000. These birds breed in Iceland and Greenland so it follows that the odds of vagrant PFGO in north east USA have expanded considerably. Barnacle Goose (Greenland population at least 40,000) is also becoming more numerous, and at least one of the 2010-2011 overwintering individuals was banded and known to be wild (seen in NY, CT).

Anyway, in an attempt to complete a goose trifecta I headed south-east in NJ to avoid the heavy overcast and intermittent drizzle to Lake Como on the northern coast where two Black Brant had been reported the previous day. It was still sunny here, at least for a while. The Brant flocks are probably quite mobile on the Shark River area so I checked four lakes altogether, finding Brant at three of them but failing to find Black Brant anywhere. Since waterfowl migration has been ongoing, there was a diminished selection of birds on the lakes (Bufflehead, Scaup sp, Red-breasted Merganser, Ruddy Duck) as the birds move out from their wintering areas.

Goose Weekend Part 1 - Ross's

2011-03-12T20:16:00.000-08:00

Since the day started off cloudy, I experienced a lack of desire to run out of the door and go birding - this being a usual reaction to returning from birding trips. However the cloud started to clear towards 8am so I headed towards the coast and Tom's River. By 0830 I found myself at Shelter Cove Park in Tom's River, and I hadn't even turned into the parking lot before I found the conspicuous pair of Ross's Geese amongst the larger flock of Canada's on the soccer field.

These birds were particularly tame, and the park not at all busy, but they did spook when a Bald Eagle flew by. I found the Ross's again off the beach area at the other end of the park after the flock fragmented.

I wasn't highly motivated but still made one more stop: Barnegat Inlet a little to the south. Here it was mid morning and I didn't even walk out on the jetty. Nevertheless in windy and sunny conditions I did track down: Common and Red-throated Loons, Long-tailed Duck, Red-breasted Merganser, Harlequin Duck, Common Eider. The cormorants at the end of the jetty are still probably Great rather than Double-crested, but at that range I couldn't be sure. All that without leaving the concrete walkway - however the activity in the inlet was low and I didn't feel like rock hopping all the way out.

On the way back I went via Pemberton (generally cheap gas), turned at Columbus to avoid Bordentown, and on a whim decided to check out the Delaware River at Florence. The Delaware itself was swollen and brown with a lot of tree debris floating down stream. Trees south of the riverside park had suffered and fallen, and there was a large tree trunk pulled up on the boat ramp - reflections of recent difficult weather. The river itself was quiet - the gulls that were there were all Ring-billed and there wasn't much else hanging around.

Florida March 1st-8th

2011-03-09T13:02:00.000-08:00

A divergence from NYC birding into Florida for the past week. The most interesting bird was the persistent (and thankfully vocal) La Sagra's Flycatcher at Bill Baggs SP which I saw as a life bird on Day 1. After that, other interesting birds included a close-up view of American Bittern, a total of 4 Short-tailed Hawks in the Everglades, a group of 5 Swallow-tailed Kites over Anhinga Trail, and some really good looks at the always spectacular Painted Buntings at Okeeheelee Nature Center up around West Palm Beach. The family of Limpkins strolling across the trail in front of me at Loxahatchee NWR and the two Snail Kites seen close (also at Loxahatchee) were just icing on the cake.

Trip report (under edit): http://www.philjeffrey.net/FL2011.html

A little birthday birding

2011-02-23T19:45:00.000-08:00

I took a half day off in the middle of a hectic work week to do a little birding. At the Falls Twp Community Park the gull flock was mostly adult Herring and Ring-billed. Nearby Common Mergansers crowded the patches of open water, but most of the ex-gravel pits here are still iced over. Back up through Trenton and down to Florence, the river was devoid of gulls. Consolation prizes were a Great Cormorant bathing in the river, a few more Common Mergansers, and a Fish Crow which continued to vocalize cuh-uh the entire time I was at Florence. American Crows were far more numerous however. (Fish Crow was new for the year).

After work and towards dusk I checked a Great Horned Owl spot near Kingston without success, but then at Mapleton Preserve I did manage to find American Woodcock. I inadvertently flushed two from trail-side, but the at my usual location at the intersection of two trails I did see and hear two males displaying. Since I was about two weeks earlier than I normally check out this place, dusk was earlier and the rush hour traffic noise more intrusive, but I was able to hear the Woodcocks peenting (typically on the ground when they do this, sometimes circling at low altitude), twittering (as they climb in display flight), chirping (descent in display flight) and also the vocalization I don't regularly hear described: a sort of muttering growl sound that they sometimes make when flying around or mixed in with twittering on ascent. Woodcocks are in decline but still not all that difficult to find on warmer evenings in early spring.

Eurasian Wigeon, Feb 20th

2011-02-20T19:39:00.000-08:00

After balking at harsh conditions at Barnegat Inlet at dawn, I went down to Brigantine/Forsythe NWR as a second option.

Waterfowl numbers are building here and the essentially ice-free freshwater impoundment was loaded with birds like Green-winged Teal, Northern Shoveler, Northern Pintail, a surprisingly large flock of Canvasback, and a few Gadwall and American Wigeon mixed in with some Tundra Swans. While scanning the Wigeons one male turned it's head and reflected the sun with a dramatic chestnut - a male Eurasian Wigeon. I found it even with binoculars but a scope confirmed the identity. The Snow Goose flock at Brig seems to be growing, although it's always hard to estimate numbers as they may be broken up into multiple flocks. However the re-appearance of Snow Geese at Jamaica Bay suggests that they are on a northbound drift with the warming weather. (Unlike Brant, which essentially leave the NYC area en masse and fly non-stop to breeding territories, Snow Geese stage at multiple locations).

Back at Barnegat Inlet in only slightly less hostile weather I came up with an 'Ipswich' Savannah Sparrow on the rocks.

Barnegat and Brigantine

2011-02-13T19:19:00.000-08:00

The deferred trip to Barnegat happened on Sunday, although in this case I expected the cloud was still going to be a problem, and apart from a short blue sky patch the light was mediocre to poor. There was also a rising strong southerly wind that buffeted me on the end of the jetty. Not ideal conditions but the jetty itself was almost ice-free.

There was a small freighter moving up and down the inlet, apparently part of some dredging operation. This spooked many birds out of the inlet and might explain why I saw no loons whatsoever on this trip. Other regulars: Long-tailed Duck, Red-breasted Merganser, were in relatively low numbers. The usual star of this location - the tame Harlequin Ducks - were present in small groups along the jetty, probably up to 20 or so. Shorebirds were few in number - a few Dunlin and Sanderling, but no Ruddy Turnstones or Purple Sandpipers. This might be a factor of the tide, which was very low indeed when I got there and was still low when I left 3 hours later. 30-odd Common Eiders, and 20-30 each of Surf Scoter and Black Scoter were at the mouth of the inlet. There were large (hundreds) flocks of Greater Scaup a flying south a little further out. The scoter flocks appeared to be mostly male, and as luck would have it one or two came in close to the jetty - at one point a mixed flock of 2 adult male Surf, 2 immature male Surf, 1 female Surf and 2 adult male Black Scoters. I don't normally get to see Scoters that close, and the only regret was that the light wasn't better for photography.

Add in Great Cormorant, Brant and a Red-breasted Nuthatch at the parking lot of the state park and that's pretty much all the birds of note. Harlequin and Surf Scoter were new for the year.

Then on to Brigantine, where it was partly sunny and so windy the car was getting rather buffeted and dirt was getting blown into the car. The freshwater pool was rather icy but with some open water. The brackish pool was predictably much more open. It was a pretty good day for waterfowl numbers, if perhaps not diversity: American Black Duck, Mallard, Northern Pintail, Gadwall, American Wigeon, Snow Goose (large flock), Tundra Swan (20++), Mute Swan, Bufflehead, Hooded Merganser. Northern Harrier and Peregrine were the only raptors, but the Peregrine was probably the reason why the large flock (a thousand or two) of Dunlin was rather nervous as it roamed around the brackish impoundment. The tide was so low that the water in the sluices was too low to attract diving ducks. I had a bit of a time crunch so didn't spend as much time at Brig as I normally do, but it was still moderately productive. Peregrine Falcon, Snow Goose and Tundra Swan were new birds for the year.

Another entry in the photographers-as-bozos list: an SUV with PA vanity plates "BIRD PIX" was repeatedly pulling up onto the grassy edge of the drive - which is already more than wide enough to let traffic pass. I guess erosion and habitat damage are less important than getting 2 feet closer to the bird.

Gulls

2011-02-12T07:53:00.000-08:00

Checking the satellite for the area at 5am it pretty much showed that if I did go on a planned trip to Barnegat Inlet, I'd get there just as a wall of cloud rolled in. Having this happen to me once was quite enough, so I deferred the trip to Sunday and did errands and a trip to the local gull watching site: Florence.

Florence, on the NJ side of the Delaware where the river runs roughly east-west, overlooks the series of dumps in Tullytown PA. It's very much in the tidal section of the river although the salinity is probably somewhat brackish. The gulls often roost on the river where you can sort through them. However this has been trickier in recent years with the dump next to the river less active and grassed over. So on Sat morning: few to no gulls. Best birds were: Ring-necked Duck, Common Merganser, Great Cormorant (fly-by) and an immature Bald Eagle who was easy to track because it flushed all the geese, gulls and crows on the landfill.

I decided instead to head over to the PA side, taking the turnpike from near Florence just across the river. And got promptly gouged for a total in $3:40 in tolls. I'm sorry but if you gouge me on the tolls I don't spend $ in your township. Ever. Period. I also ended up being diverted nearly all the way up to the Trenton-Morrisville bridge by a road closure, so it was a total waste of time and $ in doing the driving shortcut. Tullytown is in a particularly ugly part of n.e. Pennsylvania - and given its location perhaps it should call itself the "Gateway to Garbage". But garbage means gulls.

On my detour I passed an incineration plant with a huge flock of roadside Starlings - not merely a few hundred but at least a thousand. Usually they are really traffic-savvy but I could see one or two roadkill ones which the Crows and one or two other Starlings were taking advantage of. Opportunistic cannibalism. There were simply so many that it would have been easy to kill a few had I not slowed down to 15 mph.

I could also see a large circling flock of gulls over a landfill to the west of where I was (i.e. n.e. of Tullytown) and this boded well for my ultimate destination, Falls Township Community Park. The lakes were frozen except for a very small open patch of water, but there was a flock of several hundred gulls there on the ice. Almost immediately I found an adult Lesser Black-backed Gull. Elsewhere Lesser Black-backed is a rare gull. In this general area it's not really that rare and in this flock there were at least 18 adults, outnumbering the Great Black-backed Gulls. I scoped the flock for several sweeps until I decided to warm up in my car and eat a bagel. After a little while I saw a paler gull fly up and got to examine a blotchy pale coffee-colored first winter Iceland Gull for a while. The Florence-Tullytown area usually hosts quite a few Lesser Black-backed Gulls and a few Iceland Gulls of a winter, and one or two Glaucous Gulls are often in the mix. Of interest were some Herring Gulls that had pure white heads and were getting into breeding plumage, although most were pretty strongly marked on the head. Most of the birds in this flock of all species were adults. There were probably other gull flocks nearby on the frozen lakes and impoundments, but its not always easy to find pull overs on public roads in this area.

Falls Twp Community Park is west of US-13 along Mill Creek Road, open dawn-dusk. From Trenton, south on Route 1 and then south on Route 13.

Meadowlands and Central Park - better luck in February

2011-02-06T17:26:00.000-08:00

Back when NJ Transit had more reasonably priced tickets I used to take the train into Manhattan, but since they jacked the round trip prices by 50% it barely makes sense to give up the flexibility and pay $35 for parking+ticket to get to NYC. So, I drove in and parked on local streets. The upside of this is that I had the chance to go to the Meadowlands early before I went into Manhattan.

In contrast to the previous Sunday, I found a light morph Rough-legged Hawk moving from one landfill dome to another, giving good looks but it was not a bird I refound. Northern Harrier and Red-tailed Hawk were also around. Near the old ballfields I also saw an immature White-crowned Sparrow, but attempts to refind it were stymied by a birder who stopped right in front of where the birds had retreated into the phragmites after a Harrier fly-over.

But not a bad start, so then I went into Manhattan. On the walk up Cedar Hill I saw a Yell0w-bellied Sapsucker, then into the Ramble. I failed to find the Varied Thrush, despite looking around its old locations quite carefully. However the feeders gave good birds - Black-capped Chickadee, Red-breasted Nuthatch, Brown Creeper, Pine Siskin. In a strange moment the Brown Creeper was feeding at the thistle feeder.

Apart from the feeder birds the Ramble was quiet, Turtle Pond was frozen over (the Varied Thrush was seen by others at the west side of it), so I wandered south toward Sheep Meadow. In some places the footing was treacherous with ice, but after the little trek I was rewarded by views of the immature Red-headed Woodpecker on the south side of Sheep Meadow. And now being in the south end of the park I went off to the 59th Street Pond to look for the reported Wood Duck. Most of the pond was frozen, but in the open section there were 120-150 Mallards taking advantage of the people feeding them. In the time I was there they were fed at least 4 times, so despite the high numbers of ducks there really isn't all that much of a food shortage, at least on weekends. Mixed in was a clearly hybrid Mallard, a fairly typical American Black Duck, and two male Wood Ducks. The Wood Ducks, despite being smaller than the Mallards, were fairly vocal and fairly aggressive, and did manage to get a decent share of the bread being thrown.

So not a bad day, in total, at least measured in terms of finding the desired target species.

Long Branch, Sandy Hook, Meadowlands, Alpha

2011-01-30T17:18:00.000-08:00

A promising start to the day was seeing both the Red Crossbills and the White-winged Crossbills in Long Branch and taking more photos of them. After that the success rate went rapidly down hill.

Long Branch is not that far from Sandy Hook, so I went there to look at water birds. Both the ocean and the bay were relatively quiet, although there were certainly sea ducks moving around well out in the heat haze. Closer to shore it was deathly quiet, save one Black Scoter, a distant small flock of White-winged Scoter, and very little else. A few Horned Larks on the beach. On the bay side there were Red-breasted Merganser, Brant, Bufflehead and American Black Duck. What was notable, given the heavy snow cover, were flocks of American Robins feeding - I assume out of desperation - on the mudflats exposed by the tide.

Off I went, headed west towards the Meadowlands, site of Rough-legged Hawks after the hard weather pushed them south. I think you know where this is going - I saw Northern Harrier, Red-tailed Hawks, and one probable young Red-shouldered Hawk, but no Rough-legged, despite walking along the road for a while to scope thoroughly. I did see a few American Tree Sparrow, which were at least new for the year.

So finally I decided to make a sprint west along I-78 toward Alpha and the grasslands there, getting there not all that long before sundown. The snow cover there was extensive and the birds were being forced to the side of the road, including Horned Lark and Savannah Sparrows. However no Snow Buntings, Lapland Longspurs or the elusive Rough-legged Hawks were found.

Some days it works like this.

North Shore Crossbills

2011-01-23T07:29:00.000-08:00

Even though I eschewed a pelagic trip in 10-20 degree weather I did manage to motivate myself to get out in relatively sunny but frigid conditions to go find the crossbills reported in Seven President's Park in Long Branch. Easy enough task, since birders had already found them. There were three White-winged Crossbills and two Red Crossbills but they were grouped by species at opposite ends of the park. Both spent some time on the ground either eating snow or foraging amongst the fallen pine cones (just the White-winged) in addition to spending time in the pines that in the park. I haven't seen either in NJ that frequently, so this was a nice way to get myself frozen of a morning (it was breezy in the 20's).

While thawing from that experience I went down to the Manasquan River inlet on the Point Pleasant side - I'd been told that Shark River inlet was very quiet, and a very brief stop at the Roosevelt Ave sea overlook in Deal yielded only a few loons, Great Cormorant and Bufflehead. Point Pleasant was similarly quiet - Common and a few probable Red-throated Loons, a Horned Grebe, a mixed flock of Dunlin and Purple Sandpipers and a single male White-winged Scoter. Since Scoters are gregarious in NJ in winter I wondered if this was a sick/injured bird. Either way there was so little visible on the water within identifiable range that I got out of there before I started to even get really cold.

TX trip

2011-01-21T07:26:00.000-08:00

Well away from NYC I did a 6-day trip to TX whose most noteworthy birds were Black-vented Oriole and Rufous-backed Robin, both lifers, as well as a myriad of year birds. Also of interest was a Golden-crowned Kinglet at Salineno on the north bank of the Rio Grande river.

Trip report (in edit as of writing): http://philjeffrey.net/TX2011.html

More North Shore birding

2011-01-09T19:31:00.000-08:00

Since my major activity on Saturday was wrangling snow, I did venture further afield on Sunday. I went back to NJ's north shore, ranging between Long Branch and Point Pleasant.

In Deal I made two visits at Roosevelt Ave looking for the reported Red Crossbills, but although they had been seen they were not present either time. Since there are a lot of pines in the area there was no particular reason to hold them there. In the sea off the fishing access it was a little more productive: 20+ Great Cormorants, Common and Red-throated Loon and a small group of adult Northern Gannets.

I decided to head north to Long Branch and Seven President's Park to search for the White-winged Crossbill. By this time the wind was quite strong and gusting, so I came up empty on the crossbill but did find Red-breasted Nuthatch, a flyover Black Vulture harassed by crows, and a single Sanderling on the beach. On the way back down to Deal I circle Lake Takanassee and found a small group of Green-winged Teal with a male Common Teal/Eurasian GW Teal in with them. While the head pattern wasn't as striking as it might have been the horizontal flank markings were very obvious and there was no indication that it's a hybrid - this bird has been seen for a few years at this site in the winter. Very little open water there, so the only other things were a male Ring-necked Duck and a Mute Swan.

I'd noticed waterfowl coming in off the Atlantic during the day - perhaps increased snow coverage up north (or on Long Island) was inducing a shift further south. Either that or they were getting blown way offshore by the strong wind.

Back down at Deal there was nothing new except two Red-breasted Nuthatches at Roosevelt Ave so I headed down to Manasquan Inlet and Point Pleasant. On the north side the wind was just as the right angle to make it howl across the jetty, making birding there quite unpleasant. Purple Sandpiper, a couple of Sanderlings, Common and Red-throated Loon, Brant were in evidence. I headed over to the jetty on the southern side (in Point Pleasant) and found that the beachside development attenuated the gale a little so that birding on the end of the jetty was tolerable. An immature male Common Eider was here, more Purple Sandpipers, Horned Grebe. Red-necked Grebe had been seen - and I might have seen one in the air - but I couldn't find one in the water. Best birds was a flock of 14-15 Razorbills flying south. I'm pretty sure I've never seen a flock that size in winter, and in fact these may well be my first ones seen from dry land in NJ.

I'd been battered by quite enough icy air for one day, so I headed home rather than try my luck down at Barnegat Inlet.

Pole Farm and Rosedale Park

2011-01-08T07:22:00.000-08:00

Snow started early but slowly on Saturday (after about 2" on Friday that didn't melt) so I felt it was foolish to head further afield. Instead I checked the nearest birding spots: Pole Farm and Rosedale Park. I don't bird Rosedale Park much because it is more heavily used.

At Pole Farm it was me and a Mercer Co Park ranger. It was also low in bird diversity, and in fact there were two individuals: the ongoing American Kestrel, and a Northern Harrier male. I'd come to check for Harriers to see if the snow had pushed any more into Pole Farm, but that male was the only one I saw and it left Pole Farm and headed to neighboring farm fields. The Kestrel was perched over the usual sparrow spot, so nothing was active there.

So on to Rosedale Park where I had low expectations. Almost immediately I came across about 40 Horned Larks in a flock at the edge of the driveway, feeding on a partially cleared patch of earth. These are my first ones for Mercer Co. The lake itself had an open patch and a lot of Canada Geese were roosting here. There may well be a Cackling Goose in this group (seen feeding nearby on a CBC) but I couldn't see it. However as I was scoping a small flock of Northern Shoveler flew into the pond. These are also my first for Mercer Co. There was nothing else in the vicinity of the parking lot and I was apparently making the geese a little nervous, so I left.

Not a bad 45 minutes of birding wedged in before the snowfall got heavier.

A slow start to 2011

2011-01-02T23:45:00.000-08:00

Otherwise busy on Jan 1st (upside: two Black Vultures while filling up with gas), I headed out to the northern NJ shore on Jan 2nd to kick start the year list.

I started out late because of intermittent rain and really dark conditions early. This put a crimp on the time I spent at Sandy Hook. Also a factor was the existing snow drifts at various places on the hook - coastal NJ had been hit hard by the storm of Dec 26th and it had by no means melted. Some of the roads still had significant snow plowed to one side of them, narrowing them from two lanes to one. En route to Sandy Hook there were no raptors or vultures in the air. I started off at D lot where I found Black Scoter, Common Loon, a few Horned Grebes, groups of gulls on the beach. But no shorebirds - I was expecting a Sanderling or two. One solitary Bonaparte's Gull was seen a little further out over the water. Just further north at the visitor center I added Yellow-rumped Warbler, House Finch and American Goldfinch.

Further up, just south of the bird observatory I took the boardwalk out to the bay side and heard a lot of Long-tailed Duck activity. I also saw Bufflehead, Ruddy Duck, Red-breasted Merganser and a mere two Common Goldeneye. Visibility was limited by heat haze (it was relatively mild) so the Goldeneye flock may have been more widely dispersed. Best bird for this site was a Belted Kingfisher which was noisily surveying the saltmarsh. American Black Duck and Brant were also in this area.

I stopped at B lot on my way out, and saw distant flocks of Sea Ducks but the haze was too much to ID them. Other species of scoter and Eider are perhaps likely candidates. If only they had been closer. The ducks that were close enough to ID were: more Black Scoters, and a mixed flock of Ruddy Duck and Greater Scaup. I almost convinced myself there were Lesser Scaup mixed in, but demurred since the viewing conditions were not great.

If I spent more time at Sandy Hook I might have added a few more species, judging by other reports, but I wanted to head south and check out a few ponds north of Point Pleasant - Lake Como, Sylvan Lake etc. I found these to be almost totally iced over with little or no open water, and the birds were mostly gulls. I added American Coot to the year list but otherwise that was largely a waste of time and I need to wait for the thaw.

Finally I decided to skip the Manasquan River inlet/Point Pleasant area since the interesting birds had departed, and instead I came back to a site near me - Pole Farm (aka Mercer County Park Northwest) where I saw Short-eared Owl before even getting the scope out of the car, and ultimately came across a total of three. What's interesting is the almost total absence of Northern Harrier from this site this year, and the SEO's must have been bored since they took to harassing a Red-tailed Hawk perched over in the far corner of the field. An American Kestrel was perched on the symbolic remaining pole in Pole Farm, and there was a flock of about a dozen Eastern Bluebirds to round out the day.

(Jan 3rd: added Turkey Vulture)
(Jan 4th: added Great Blue Heron)

Barnegat, Brigantine

2010-12-24T13:47:00.000-08:00

Rolling the dice on a traditional NJ coastal route I started at Barnegat Inlet a little after sunup, although more accurately presented as sun-behind-overcast-rise. For a late Xmas present I request a weatherman voodoo doll.

The tide was so high that the breakwater (south side of the inlet, as usual) was surrounded by water on all sides beyond the concrete paved section. This also meant that there was some inundation further along. That didn't make a great deal of difference since with the tide so high not very much was perched on it. I saw fly-by Ruddy Turnstone, Dunlin and Purple Sandpiper. On the walk back down the breakwater from half-way I added Black-bellied Plover. A (presumed) Savannah Sparrow was also hanging out, too far to ID with any certainty but also likely to be an Ipswich ssp.

Large numbers of ducks milled around the ocean side of the inlet - scoters and Eiders and the common Long-tailed Ducks. I got all 3 species of Scoter (Black, Surf, White-winged) and a small group of Eider flying down the inlet on the rising tide. Red-breasted Mergansers periodically flew by. There was a relatively small group of Harlequin Ducks next to the breakwater but the tide was really too high to induce them to perch up. Common and Red-throated Loon were in the inlet. So in fact despite the high tide and unfavorable conditions I managed to find a perfectly typical range of Barnegat species. I left when two duck hunting boats headed out into the inlet. This appears to be a new feature this year, and as far as I can tell not illegal, but rather screws birding here.

Down at the Brigantine division of Forsythe NWR I could also hear shots out in the saltmarsh, but not right next to the impoundments. There was a flock of Snow Geese near start of the drive - normally they are further south and east of this, but I didn't find a Ross's with them - the flock was rather dispersed. Much of the fresh water impoundment was frozen solid - 30+ Tundra Swans and other waterfowl were clustered around the open patch. The southerly salt-water impoundment was about 50% ice free. The tide here was also very high - perhaps as high as I have seen it and much of the saltmarsh was under water. The flocks of Dunlin were resting on ice mats still stuck to the marsh grasses out in the bay. Waterfowl numbers were decent, although mainly American Black Duck, Northern Pintail and Mallard. Hooded Mergansers and Bufflehead were present, as was a nice surprise in a single female Common Merganser near one of the sluices giving good photo ops. Common Mergansers are usually pushed down from the north after hard freezes and it has been a cold December. Passerines were limited to a flock of Red-winged Blackbirds and a few Eastern Meadowlarks

Raptors were not especially numerous but I did have Red-tailed Hawk, Northern Harrier, Peregrine and a Bald Eagle. The eagle was an adult, but the Peregrine showed a small patch of brown on its otherwise slate-gray back, suggesting a first year bird.

I went back to Barnegat on the way back home and found nothing new, although I did watch a cooperative Common Loon hunting crabs near the end of the concrete paved section of the breakwater.

A little Black Vulture migration

2010-12-20T13:35:00.000-08:00

Black Vultures have been expanding north over the last several years, but they are still by no means numerous in the general area of Central to Northern NJ. They seem to retreat south in the winter, and I was refilling my yard feeders on Monday morning when a trio of Black Vultures were circling over my house, headed south. A new yard bird.

Not long afterward on the commute to work there was a mixed Turkey & Black Vulture flock circling over Nassau Park shopping center, also headed south. An attractive idea of vulture flocks picking over holiday shoppers, I think in this case the hardening weather had driven vulture flocks south. I also see more Turkey Vultures over my neighborhood in winter, although they remain pretty numerous locally throughout the year.

Hermit Warbler

2010-12-08T12:20:00.000-08:00

A Hermit Warbler was found by Vinny Pellegrino at Sunken Meadow State Park on Long Island on Saturday afternoon - a first state record that looks good for the species and remains only to be duly anointed by the records committee. I made a special trip on the very early morning of Wednesday to make it through NYC before the worst of rush hour and reach the park at dawn. Took me only a little while to find the warbler, and then I spent a little while photographing it.

This Hermit Warbler is especially significant because of a hybrid Townsend's X Hermit Warbler found at Jones Beach on Thanksgiving 2002 that I (amongst others) photographed and was the subject of quite a lot of discussion. NYSARC finally decided it was probably a hybrid and not a pure Hermit Warbler and so Hermit Warbler was not on the NY State list. Until now. The 2010 bird is gray-backed, lacks yellow in the vent (excludes Black-throated Green) and has a diffusely pale gray breast and flank. It appears to be a first fall female - the primary and retrix shape certainly indicates a first fall bird. The yellow eye ring is quite striking, as is the swath of yellow on the face - the slightly greener auricular patch is clearly limited to below a line from the bill through the eye which gives it quite a different pattern to Townsend's or Black-throated Greens which have larger auricular patches. This bird looks like it has a huge yellow supercilium by comparison. There's no evidence of Townsend's Warbler genes in it, short of capturing it and sequencing it to be totally certain.

And since this is merely birding, I don't think that sort of bird stress is ever justified just to fulfill curiosity.

Vagrancy being the mother of invention, this little warbler was seen feeding on the short grass along the northern edge of the park, in a manner that is quite atypical of other similar Dendroica warblers. Hermit belongs to the family of obviously closely-related warblers: Black-throated Green Warbler, Golden-cheeked Warbler, Townsend's Warbler and Hermit Warbler. Three of these species prefer evergreens to feed in, but Golden-cheeked breeds in Juniper-Oak habitat. Given the Hermit Warbler preference for conifers it's all the stranger for it to be feeding out in the open on grass, but I presume this is where the insects are and there's more of interest there than there is in the heavier cover. One of my photographs shows a very small insect on the tip of the warbler's bill - sub-millimeter size.

The Jones Beach Hermit hybrid was also a terrestrial bird, feeding amongst the ornamental kale/cabbages, which made for an interesting photographic backdrop.

Having seen a couple of females briefly on migration in AZ in late May in the company of migrating Townsend's, it was good to finally be able to take time to study one up close for an extended period, and be pretty sure I've seen a pure Hermit.

It's turning out to be quite a good rarity season (I've not seen either Ash-throated or Western Kingbird this fall, but they've been reported from NYC).

Update: this was apparently the last day the Hermit was seen - the following day it was absent, but a Merlin and a Cat were in the general area. I saw a falcon (probably the same Merlin) hunting the edge on Wednesday also. Wednesday night was also the coldest night of late, getting down into the low 20's F. Not a hospitable environment for a small vagrant warbler. It was not reported subsequently, and unfortunately that suggests that it succumbed to the elements.

More Varied Thrush

2010-12-04T19:22:00.000-08:00

Yes, I know that photo's not a Varied Thrush, but it was taken while I was waiting....

Lacking more original ideas I went back into Central Park on Saturday to attempt more Varied Thrush photographs on a day with at least some sun but rather low temperatures. I found it without too much trouble but it's questionable how much better the photographs are. There were two male Eastern Towhees in that area while I was there, and a number of White-throated Sparrows. While I was there I saw a flock of presumed Pine Siskins (by call) flying over the park and dropping into the trees but didn't get my binoculars on them before they flew off. A large aggressive Cooper's Hawk hunting the general area rather suppressed activity for a while. The Thrush made a detour out of the little patch that it normally hangs out in and headed into the Maintenance Field, unfortunately pursued by the gaggle of birders and some photographers with small lenses to the point that it was almost impossible envisioning it feeling safe enough to drop to the ground. Sure enough after 5 minutes or so it returned to the area east of the maintenance building/restrooms.

On the walk toward the Ramble from Strawberry Fields I heard then saw a Yellow-rumped Warbler - not regionally unusual but certainly infrequently reported from Central Park in winter. After getting a little frozen standing still in the Maintenance Field I went in search of the Yellow-breasted Chat near the Boathouse (no luck) but did find a Fox Sparrow in the Evodia Field.

Not a day of great diversity and the cold wind made a wimp out of me relatively early.

Actually, NOT a Northern Shrike...

2010-12-02T07:20:00.001-08:00

but a Loggerhead Shrike instead. The Jones Beach bird was somewhat ambiguous, being both atypical for Northern and atypical for Loggerhead but the word of experience on BIRDWG01 has come up with some rather clear reasons of why it should be Loggerhead over Northern. You can follow the thread from the start via the archives.

Ironically, this is my first Loggerhead in New York State.

Varied Thrush in Central Park, Nov 30th

2010-11-30T12:51:00.001-08:00

It's just a number, but as of last weekend I'd been sitting at 194 species seen in Central Park for quite some time. Now that I'm no longer in Manhattan it's become a little harder to track down one-day wonders although over the years I've not done badly in that department. I did, however, take time to visit the park on Tuesday morning to see the Varied Thrush that had originally been spotted by Mike Bryant et al on Sunday.

This Varied Thrush is an immature, and so sex is indeterminate, and there's some indication that it's had a hard life - the feathers at the throat on one side show a cleft that is suggestive of some injury. And it was mentioned to me that a toe might be dislocated. I didn't notice this myself and the bird seemed quite mobile and robust. In fact the only other Varied Thrush I'd ever seen was in MA in the dead of winter at Quabbin Reservoir feeding in the snow (Feb 13th 2004). I'm grateful that this bird stayed around long enough to be park bird #195.

Now all we need is another 5 vagrants.....

The Cackling Goose quandary

2010-11-29T08:34:00.001-08:00

Cackling Geese are somewhat sought-after in these parts, being relatively rare and a very small proportion of the often massive Canada Goose flocks that dominate inland ponds and lakes. There are big wintering flocks around the Princeton-ish NJ area. This is rather different from e.g. the Katy Prairie area of TX where Canada/Cackling are in the distinct minority amongst other geese.

On Thanksgiving morning I headed out to Etra Lake, south-east of Hightstown in search of both Greater White-fronted and Cackling Geese, and found one of the latter but no GWF.

Picking out Cackling from Canada requires a certain comfort with the variation within Canada, which can be quite considerable within a flock. In particular the cheek patch and breast color are rather variable. Cackling is sometimes hyped as being a grayer-frostier colored bird, especially on the back, but there's quite a range of variation just within Canada. When I finally found the Cackling - identified by square head structure, bill size and small size - it was a similar color as a Canada next to it and well within the range of color variation of the flock. In fact I had one bird pegged as a Cackling by color until it raised its head and proved me obviously wrong.

In this mix there's also the big question of Lesser Canada Goose, which shares many of the attributes of Richardson's Cackling Goose and the separation of which is a potential nightmare. At the moment I'm (mostly) sweeping that under the rug but there have been some "Cackling" Geese that have certainly got me to wondering, in particular last winter's Rahway River Park birds.

A recent post by Sibley on Cackling vs Canada goose bill structure is pertinent here. The whole ID morass is still being worked out. While that effort is ongoing I rather suspect that Cackling Goose in eastern NY and NJ is really a bit bucket for all sorts of small outlier White-cheeked Geese. Which is why I still seek out reliable locations to study them further.

Stamford, Bronx, Long Island, Jamaica Bay

2010-11-28T19:53:00.000-08:00

One of my period dark-dark trips with long road miles, I started off at the Fork-tailed Flycatcher spot in Stamford, CT just after dawn and while the bird took a little while to turn up it did pose very nicely indeed for photographs. There were also a few roosting Wild Turkeys and a couple of Monk Parakeets. The Fork-tailed (FTFL) was at this site Nov 17th-Dec 4th.

I had chosen to look at the FTFL because it was fairly close to my main interest for the day - a banded Barnacle Goose of known wild origin in Pelham Bay Park at Orchard Beach. So after heading back into NYC from Stamford I spent two hours combing the local area for it, including some grassy areas slightly further afield. I was sadly unsuccessful. I later learned that some photographers had got far too close the previous day and scared it off. That's a lot of people hours wasted as a result of selfishness. Update: this Barnacle Goose turned up again on Dec 4th in Stratford CT, roughly 45 miles to the west, again associated with a Canada Goose flock.

After some frustration at Pelham Bay I went south to Jones Beach West End and spent a little time looking at the somewhat distant ~~Northern~~ Loggerhead Shrike and chatting with other birders - the shrike in particular is a little small and a little dark but otherwise seems a decent match for Northern over the rather similar Loggerhead (see discussion of this both above and below). Shai Mitra pulled out a distant Kittiwake over the ocean with his scope, but the Northern Gannets were rather more obvious. A Merlin was hunting the swallows (presumed Tree, but Cave is possible) and later on the pigeons at the Coast Guard Station. At the Coast Guard Station there was a big flock of Brant and shorebirds (Dunlin, American Oystercatcher, Black-bellied Plover and a few Red Knot) and a dispersed flock of Bonaparte's Gulls in the bay. Since there wasn't that much of interest at Jones I went around to Point Lookout which used to be a big spot for Bonaparte's several years ago, and there were some off the park. However they were not especially concentrated, being spread out all over the inlet, bay (and probably the beach). This flock holds multiple Little Gulls and at least one Black-headed Gull but unless they concentrate in one place finding them will be a challenge. A small flock of Common Eider flew in and out of the inlet while I was there.

Finally I spent the late afternoon at Jamaica Bay Wildlife Refuge, photographing ducks flying in and out of the West Pond. All the usual suspects were there, with the exception of Canvasback which seemed to be curiously absent. The Snow Goose count was a grand total of 5 birds seen in flight as I was exiting the refuge. The list from Jamaica Bay is:

Snow Goose
Brant
Gadwall
American Wigeon
American Black Duck
Mallard
Northern Shoveler
Greater Scaup
Lesser Scaup
Bufflehead
Common Goldeneye
Hooded Merganser
Red-breasted Merganser
Ruddy Duck
Northern Harrier
Cooper's Hawk
Dunlin

Barnegat, Brigantine

2010-11-27T19:41:00.000-08:00

Saturday was sunny but breezy, and I headed out for a fairly traditional coastal route.

First, Barnegat Inlet (Barnegat Light) were at 7:44 the breakwater held a lot of people - mainly fishermen - out of all proportion to birding opportunities. The wind was already fresh, it was relatively cold, and there was a dearth of birds in the inlet itself so I went into quick scouting mode. Perhaps this was not totally unrelated to the extensive small boat traffic. Of interest was a fly-by immature Great Cormorant, and several small groups of Bonaparte's Gulls. Last winter there weren't many Bonaparte's Gulls around in general, so these were actually my year list ones. This winter there's a bonanza of them.

In search of more productive areas I went south to Brigantine (or if you want to be formal, the Brigantine Division of Forsythe National Wildlife Refuge). The wind had risen and was quite strong here, so there was little chance of finding a Cave Swallow. I did two tours around the impoundment and found decent numbers of ducks, a good flock of Tundra Swans (also a year bird) and Green-winged Teal and some shorebirds, a few of which were Western Sandpipers making for an implausible three year-bird day in late November. Northern Harriers were around in numbers, terrorizing the Teal again, but the Peregrines did not seem to be present or at least not hunting. A fuller list follows (Brigantine unless noted):

Snow Goose
Brant
Mute Swan
Tundra Swan (50-ish)
American Black Duck
Mallard
Northern Shoveler
Northern Pintail
Green-winged Teal
Long-tailed Duck (Barnegat)
Bufflehead
Hooded Merganser
Red-breasted Merganser
Red-throated Loon (Barnegat)
Pied-billed Grebe
Double-crested Cormorant
Great Cormorant (Barnegat)
Great Blue Heron
Northern Harrier
Red-tailed Hawk
American Coot
Black-bellied Plover
Western Sandpiper
Dunlin
Savannah Sparrow
Eastern Meadowlark

Statistical Models of Bird Identification

2010-11-15T08:33:00.000-08:00

A recent post on BIRDWG01 particularly piqued my interest because it ran counter to my viewpoints on the statistical nature of bird identification. I think likelihood is both implicitly used and also formally overlooked. In this case, an Aythya (diving) duck of unusual appearance was seen in the Eastern USA and proposed to be a Pochard X Scaup as opposed to what the final ID appeared to settle on, which was Canvasback X Greater Scaup. (Scaup in Great Britain is the Greater Scaup in the U.S.A.).

All duck hybrids are rare to very rare, but many of them certainly occur (an even more recent WG01 thread shows a nice selection of Goldeneye hybrids). Well I guess that the Mallard hybrids with American Black Duck, Mottled Duck and Mexican Duck are more frequent than "very rare".

For any bird ID the likelihood that it's correct is basically the ratio of the probability that the species displays those characteristics vs the probability that some/all other species displays those characteristics, weighted by the chance that you'd see the species in that spot. Much of bird ID stops before the comma in that last sentence, but that's naive.

So for this duck let's arbitrarily say that the chance of seeing a hybrid is 1/10,000. If you see a Canvasback then there's a 1/10,000 chance of it really being a hybrid, ignoring for a moment the evidence for hybrid traits (i.e. an "unusual Canvasback" based on appearance). Let's say this 1/10,000 holds true for the similar Aythyas on the UK side of the Atlantic. The fundamental issue is, the chances of seeing a Pochard or Tufted Duck or Scaup on the East Coast of the USA is very low. Pochard is essentially unknown here although some stray to the west coast from Asia, Tufted Duck is very rare, and Greater Scaup vs nominate Scaup from Europe is impossible to distinguish in the field. It's safe to say that very, very few diving ducks make that transatlantic voyage. But let's say that there's a 1/20,000 chance of the Aythya you come across in some pond in NJ being one of Pochard/Tufted/"European" Scaup. This means that the chance that you find a European PochardXScaup hybrid is (1/20,000)X(1/10,000) or 1/200,000,000.

One in 200 million. The odds of winning the Powerball lottery grand prize from one ticket is pretty much the same. I do not recommend this as a retirement strategy.

We can haggle over any of the numbers - actually I think that the real numbers are more remote odds than these ones. Simply plug your own estimates in and follow the bouncing ball.

Now, the chance that you'd stumble into a hybrid Aythya from the USA side of the Atlantic is only 1/10,000 so the relative chance that any hybrid is European is less long odds: a mere 1/20,000. This means that for any bird that you're sure is one of those rare Aythya hybrids there's a 99.995% chance it's going to be USA-origin.

For most of us, ID is done with far less certainty - we see an American Robin fly by and call it that because it's shape best fits American Robin and the color we can see best fits American Robin so the overwhelming probability is that it's an American Robin and not, say, an atypical-looking Varied Thrush. Or a Redwing (Turdus iliacus). When you're working with common vs rare species, or even rare vs very rare species, that occurrence ratio of 1/20,000 is quite a strong selector between different IDs. You would have to be very, very certain indeed that the fly-by bird is NOT an American Robin before Varied Thrush even becomes a reasonable probability.

So it is with the hybrid Aythya. For any possible hybrid, there's a range of appearance that is "typical" of the hybrids. Hybrids are notoriously variable so the range of appearance is often broader than for a pure species (think Golden-winged Warbler and Blue-winged Warbler vs the common hybrids of Lawrence's and Brewster's Warbler, both of which show quite a range of variability). Even if a hybrid were judged to be 80% likely to be Pochard X Scaup and 20% Canvasback X Gtr Scaup by appearance, when you add the population weighting in, it becomes a 99.925% Canvasback X Gtr Scaup by likelihood. Or put another way: you would have to be absolutely certain it could only be Pochard X Scaup based on the bird appearance before it became anything close to even odds on the overall population-weighted chances you'd got that ID right.

I.E. You should use population to weight your idea of what the bird is. Failure to do that is a failure to take proper account of birds of a common species showing an atypical appearance, which might be a far more likely explanation than a much rarer bird.

This subject is not new to WG01 - a more formal discussion of this using Bayes theorem was bounced around in October 2007 regarding the identity of a Catharus thrush, although the post I linked to uses the dangerous territory of race rather than thrush ID points.

However I think this aspect of bird ID is still under-appreciated, and quite an important one when attempting to put labels on strange-looking birds.

Pole Farm Sunday 11/14

2010-11-14T23:59:00.000-08:00

Let's just say that I don't think it's going to be a big Short-eared Owl year based on the early winter going with a late afternoon visit to Pole Farm (Mercer Co. Park Northwest) in Lawrenceville:

American Kestrel: 1
Northern Harrier: 1
Short-eared Owl: 0

In recent years the number of Northern Harriers milling around have been a pretty good predictor of Short-eared Owl occupancy. Unlike the big year, I also haven't heard rodents milling around in the grass. Few rodents = few/no owls.

Other birds: Eastern Bluebirds, Hairy Woodpecker, large overhead flock of Grackles, some American Robin movement at sunset, Dark-eyed Junco, Song Sparrow. Really fairly quiet. Not even a Red-tailed Hawk perched along the fields, which might also correlate with the lack of mice.

White-tailed Kite and Brigantine

2010-11-07T19:15:00.000-08:00

I made three visits to various parts of the Edwin B. Forsythe National Wildlife Refuge on Sunday. First and last were a visit to the Barnegat impoundment (Barnegat division of Forsythe NWR) where there was a persistent White-tailed Kite. The first time around, shortly after dawn, netted various ducks and herons but no kite. The second time around on the way back home the kite had settled on a dead tree in the far distance half-way across the bay, but was visible in scope views and flew briefly while I was there.

In the intervening time I went down to the Brigantine division, the more traditional area for birders visiting Forsythe NWR. En route I stopped at Barnegat Inlet, found the tide very high, a lot of chop in the inlet and very few birds milling around. A roving flock of Juncos and other fly-by passerines suggested migration movement off the north wind.

The tide was also very high at Brigantine, with much of the saltmarsh at least somewhat inundated. A lot of the ducks were coming in at middle altitude and settling into the north-east impoundment. Shorebirds were limited to several flocks of agitated Dunlin and a few Black-bellied Plovers. One of the reasons that they had good reason to be agitated were two Peregrines and several Northern Harriers, although those raptors were harassing a large flock of Green-winged Teal when I saw them. Blue-winged Teal was the best duck, and there was also Northern Pintail, Mallard, many American Black Duck, Bufflehead, Hooded Merganser and Ruddy Duck. A small flock of Brant and a moderate-sized flock of Snow Geese were in the impoundments but windy conditions made for few photo ops. The most active part was on the south-east sluice where the influx of water and small fish made for a Double-crested Cormorant and Gull feeding frenzy. Given the wind the passerines kept their head down but I did see a few fly-by Savannah Sparrows.

I returned north via Barnegat impoundment for the White-tailed Kite and a brief visit to Well's Mills County Park where the feeders held only titmice, chickadees and Juncos. At Well's Mills they've also removed the trees to the east of the visitor center which provided some protection around the periodic drainage pond for small birds drinking there. Since it's not a spring-fed pond that patch was also dry - a shame since last winter it did attract some birds in that small area.

Rough-legged Hawk at Griggstown

2010-10-30T19:49:00.000-07:00

As part of my Failure to Find Photogenic Fall Foliage loop trip up the D&R canal on Oct 30th I stopped in at Griggstown Preserve and birded from the parking lot - because I was unwilling to strap on orange to avoid some hunter shooting me. The terrestrial birds around the parking lot were: Eastern Bluebird, Palm Warbler, Song Sparrow. The fly-bys were far more interesting:

Multiple flocks of American Pipits, of which the first one was 60++ birds
Palm Warblers, seen apparently moving as diurnal migrants
Yellow-rumped Warblers, probably just local boys flying around
The expected local raptors/vultures: Red-tailed, Black V and Turkey V
Rough-legged Hawk, pale morph

I was more than a little surprised at the latter. Although they sometimes do winter at Pole Farm (Lawrenceville) which is probably no more than 20 miles to the south-west, I don't encounter many uncommon raptors away from the hawk watches. The D&R canal is a modest raptor corridor as they follow the river for a little while on their way south, but the terrain is flat and not given to generating uplift like the hillier environment of (say) the Delaware River to the west. There was also a small falcon with it, even further west of me, so small that although I thought it was Kestrel I couldn't rule out Merlin.

When I say tame, I mean ABSURDLY tame - Prothonotary on my camera bag

2010-10-29T11:19:00.001-07:00

On Thursday a.m. I took the opportunity of a relatively warm and sunny morning to revisit Bryant Park and the Prothonotary. This bird was just as tame as before. At one point I had stored a sliced banana on top of my camera bag and the Prothonotary hopped on top to investigate. What's more, I was too close to my bag so I stepped away to get this bird within my minimum focus distance. The bird didn't care. In fact the bird didn't care much for the banana either - it preferred a piece of pastry offered by a non-birder, and I watched it consume it with great enthusiasm. Somewhat ironic, since I had placed a few slices of banana around to try and get it to eat that instead of being a carbohydrate crack addict. (Ben noted that croissant, which is what this pastry might have been, is loaded with fat too).

I once had a Prothonotary Warbler (the Raritan River bird) fly inside my lens hood on the glimpse of its reflection in my objective lens - it had been singing endlessly for weeks and was a very tweaked male, that one. This PRWA is the Big Lebowski variant of Prothonotary. Next thing it will be smoking weed and eating french fries.

No reports of this PRWA on the morning of a strong northerly wind (Oct 29th) and even stronger migration flight (mostly sparrows, robins) in NJ and NY. Please God let this bird have got a clue and gone south while it still can. Update: no subsequent reports suggest that it left during the night of Oct 28th/29th on the first of a series of good flight days of late fall migrants.

Unofficial NY City bird checklist

2010-10-29T11:16:00.000-07:00

Faced with someone asking me for a NYC bird checklist, and failing once again to find any trace of one, I decided to construct my own at:
http://www.philjeffrey.net/NYC_unofficial_list.html

Which of course brings up the thorny subject of "what is a valid sighting". So I started with the NYC Audubon list, added in species that I knew were seen in recent years, and then added in yet more species from the NYSARC reports (1977 and later). This pushed the initial list of 344 up to 355, which is pretty close to the total I'd originally guessed.

Update: more work needs to be done - for example mining old Kingbird records - but the list total is now up to 367 (Nov 11th 2010).

Prothonotary Warbler impersonates House Sparrow

2010-10-25T07:40:00.000-07:00

No, these aren't Photoshop composites, that really is a Prothonotary Warbler scavenging for food underneath and on top of trash cans and tables in Bryant Park in midtown Manhattan. This bird was discovered by Matthew Rymkiewicz on October 21st but conversations with locals suggest that it's been around for at least 2 weeks prior to that. It's feeding on crumbs and other bits of food just like a House Sparrow and will often follow the flocks around for just that purpose.

This is the eastern edge of Bryant Park along 5th Avenue and right in front of the NY Public Library. There are some trees, a few bushes and a fine display of chrysanthemums but otherwise is totally urban and about the last thing that resembles a southern swamp.

Based on feather shape the bird is a first fall immature, and by coloration and extent of white on the tail it's a male. There are pretty much never any fall records of Prothonotary Warbler in NYC for one good reason: there's no breeding population north of us. It seems likely that this immature bird is has a confused sense of direction. Unfortunately this also means that it might not reset and head south when the weather turns colder. But at least for the next week the weather looks good for its survival.

Context really alters bird behavior - not only is this Prothonotary very tame indeed, so are the White-throated Sparrows, Hermit Thrushes and in particular the Yellow-bellied Sapsuckers that were spending time in this small space. There were 4 sapsuckers working the trees along the two city blocks (40th-42nd) along 5th avenue, often at eye level and extremely approachable. There was also one Black-capped Chickadee, reflecting the invasion year that we're having. The Prothonotary hasn't started using the sapsucker holes yet, a behavior we've seen with other birds that have stayed into the winter (Cape May Warbler in Riverside Park, Western Tanager in Central Park, and possibly the Scott's Oriole).

This bird last seen on Thursday, Oct 28th.

Age and sex ID based on molt, part 2

2010-10-21T05:00:00.001-07:00

First fall immature Ruby-crowned Kinglet, Central Park, NYC, October 8th

Click on the image to get a larger view of this bird (and ignore the fact that the © statement is floating in mid-air). This is a pretty classical example of retrix (tail) and primary (wing) feather shape in a first fall immature - the feathers are somewhat pointed and in fact in this bird the feathers come to a sharp point. Adults have blunt and rounded ends to their feathers. At this time of year, when both adults and immatures have relatively recently molted their flight feathers as well as their body feathers, all of the plumages look pretty fresh. If I ever get an adult Kinglet to pose for me - these are especially frenetic birds - I shall put one up for comparison.

I'm not sure there's any meaningful plumage difference between sexes at this stage, so I'm not even going to try.

Yard birding Oct 17, 18th

2010-10-18T08:30:00.001-07:00

In the yard in Ewing on Sunday morning there was evidence of migration, with my Red Oak full of Yellow-rumped Warblers, White-throated Sparrows and Chipping Sparrows in small flocks around the yard, and a fly-over Purple Finch. The other resident species were milling around, perhaps attracted by the flocks: White-breasted Nuthatch, Carolina Chickadee, Tufted Titmouse, Downy Woodpecker and Red-bellied Woodpecker.

On Sunday PM just one Yellow-rumped Warbler was still lurking around.

On Monday morning at least one Yellow-rumped was sounding off, and there was a Ruby-crowned Kinglet passing through.

Griggstown, Oct 17th

2010-10-17T20:29:00.000-07:00

Despite Franklin Twps best attempts to degrade the habitat by mowing it to death, I went to check out Griggstown Preserve on Sunday morning. There was relatively low activity around the parking lot initially, nor in the sections of recently mown fields that used to be full of sparrows (Savannah mostly, but several species at this time of year). I did track down a Palm Warbler in the unmown section of the far south-west corner. A single American Kestrel was hunting the fields.

I checked out the maintenance section (I've nicknamed it the Trash Heap but it's cleaner now) at the southern end of the preserve and this was the best area for sparrows: Song, Swamp, Savannah, White-throated and an adult White-crowned. Several flocks of Purple Finches passed over while I was there, although only one or two were seen perched.

Back at the parking lot a group of Eastern Bluebird was hanging around the fence line, there was a small flock of House Finches and a single Chipping Sparrow. There wasn't much sign of a hawk flight although three Red-tailed Hawks passed overhead and an immature Bald Eagle was seen heading north at some distance to the east. A Sharp-shinned Hawk was hunting another corner, and this looked like an opportunistic migrant rather than a resident bird.

Migration winds down (Oct 16th)

2010-10-16T23:01:00.000-07:00

Not so much necessarily numbers, although the park was relatively quiet on Saturday, but the diversity. Gone are the multiple warbler species, the numerous sapsuckers etc. Now it's mainly sparrows and the Yellow-rumped Warbler. Exemplifying that: time spent at Tanner's Spring on Saturday came up with 7 species of bird, and there were only singles of the Black-capped Chickadee, Eastern Towhee and Gray Catbird in contrast to the large numbers of the other species (Grackle, American Robin, House Sparrow, White-throated Sparrow). Hermit Thrushes were numerous but I saw no other Catharus.

What there was a small burst of was sparrows at Hernshead, with two immature White-crowned, two Swamp, and in addition a few Indigo Buntings.

Cooper's Hawk
Eastern Phoebe
Black-capped Chickadee
White-breasted Nuthatch
Carolina Wren
Winter Wren
Ruby-crowned Kinglet
Hermit Thrush
Yellow-rumped Warbler
Pine Warbler
Eastern Towhee
Song Sparrow
Swamp Sparrow
White-throated Sparrow
White-crowned Sparrow
Indigo Bunting
American Goldfinch

Sunday - sparrows -

2010-10-10T23:43:00.000-07:00

Lacking a hoped-for large migration movement this weekend - it seemed to be concentrated on other sites like Sandy Hook in NJ - I ended up late into the (Central) park on Sunday and saw relatively little. By far the most interesting venue was the Maintenance Field, where there was a fine collection of sparrows:

Eastern Towhee
Chipping Sparrow
Field Sparrow
Savannah Sparrow
Song Sparrow
Swamp Sparrow
White-throated Sparrow
White-crowned Sparrow
Dark-eyed Junco
American Goldfinch (yes, OK, this one's a finch)

in conjunction with other birds like a couple of bill-snapping Eastern Phoebes and several Hermit Thrushes. Warblers were few and far between. The rest of the list:

Yellow-bellied Sapsucker
Eastern Phoebe
Carolina Wren
Winter Wren
Ruby-crowned Kinglet
Hermit Thrush
Gray Catbird
Magnolia Warbler
Yellow-rumped Warbler
Palm Warbler
American Redstart

Friday - not quite

2010-10-08T13:47:00.000-07:00

As a presage to a weekend that promises a decent migration on Sunday, Friday looked to have potential. Potential that wasn't quite borne out - there were migrants, mostly sparrows, but numbers were not especially high. Most were one or two of a species, with more numerous individuals being Yellow-rumped Warbler, Sapsucker, Flicker and Ruby-crowned Kinglet. Purple Finch and White-crowned Sparrow again put in an appearance.

Northern Harrier
Yellow-bellied Sapsucker
Northern Flicker
Eastern Phoebe
Black-capped Chickadee
White-breasted Nuthatch
Brown Creeper
Carolina Wren
House Wren
Winter Wren
Golden-crowned Kinglet
Ruby-crowned Kinglet
Swainson's Thrush
Hermit Thrush
Wood Thrush
Gray Catbird
Brown Thrasher
Northern Parula
Magnolia Warbler
Black-throated Blue Warbler
Yellow-rumped Warbler
Blackpoll Warbler
Black-and-white Warbler
American Redstart
Common Yellowthroat
Eastern Towhee
Song Sparrow
Lincoln's Sparrow
White-throated Sparrow
White-crowned Sparrow
Purple Finch

Sunday - slower

2010-10-04T12:24:00.000-07:00

Although I'd hoped that the weekend's migration might peak on the 2nd day, it was not the case - it was markedly slower in Strawberry Fields and elsewhere in the park. In contrast to the "5 Magnolia's in a tree" morning of Saturday I saw precisely NO Magnolias on Sunday. The migrants had left on the strong northerly breeze. But the Chickadee movement continued and there were new additions: White-crowned Sparrow and my first Purple Finch for the entire year.

Later in the day I went up to check out State Line hawk watch and found the flight winding down for the day, but nevertheless a few raptors came by (Cooper's and Sharp-shinned, Osprey, two Ravens, Bald Eagles, Red-tailed Hawk, two Kestrels and multiple Turkey Vultures).

Osprey
Bald Eagle
Northern Harrier
Sharp-shinned Hawk
Cooper's Hawk
Red-tailed Hawk
American Kestrel
Chimney Swift
Yellow-bellied Sapsucker
Northern Flicker
Eastern Phoebe
Blue-headed Vireo
Red-eyed Vireo
Black-capped Chickadee
Red-breasted Nuthatch
White-breasted Nuthatch
Brown Creeper
Carolina Wren
House Wren
Winter Wren
Golden-crowned Kinglet
Ruby-crowned Kinglet
Swainson's Thrush
Hermit Thrush
Wood Thrush
Gray Catbird
Cedar Waxwing
Northern Parula
Chestnut-sided Warbler
Black-throated Blue Warbler
Yellow-rumped Warbler
Black-throated Green Warbler
Pine Warbler
Palm Warbler
Black-and-white Warbler
American Redstart
Common Yellowthroat
Scarlet Tanager
Eastern Towhee
Field Sparrow
Song Sparrow
Swamp Sparrow
White-crowned Sparrow
Dark-eyed Junco
Purple Finch

Oct 2nd: Better morning

2010-10-02T12:12:00.000-07:00

Strawberry Fields was loaded with migrants at 6:50am, although nothing actually rare amongst them. A small flock of Chickadees was the first invasion migrants I'd seen in a while. A relatively subtle Bay-breasted Warbler was the best of the bunch. In the rest of the park - or at least the parts of it I visited - there were some birds but not in anywhere near as great numbers. Nevertheless it finally added up to 16 warblers with the assistance of a Yellow-breasted Chat that was shy even by Chat standards - I saw only it's head. A Rusty Blackbird in the Maintenance Field was a nice find in a place you don't normally find them.

Double-crested Cormorant (two V-flocks flyover)
Sharp-shinned Hawk
Cooper's Hawk
Yellow-bellied Sapsucker (many)
Northern Flicker
Eastern Wood-Pewee (1)
Eastern Phoebe
Blue-headed Vireo
Red-eyed Vireo
Black-capped Chickadee (a few groups)
Red-breasted Nuthatch
White-breasted Nuthatch
Brown Creeper
Carolina Wren
House Wren
Winter Wren
Golden-crowned Kinglet
Ruby-crowned Kinglet
Swainson's Thrush
Hermit Thrush
Wood Thrush
Gray Catbird
Brown Thrasher
Nashville Warbler
Northern Parula
Chestnut-sided Warbler
Magnolia Warbler
Black-throated Blue Warbler
Yellow-rumped Warbler
Black-throated Green Warbler
Pine Warbler
Palm Warbler
Bay-breasted Warbler
Blackpoll Warbler
Black-and-white Warbler
American Redstart
Ovenbird
Common Yellowthroat
Yellow-breasted Chat
Scarlet Tanager
Eastern Towhee
Song Sparrow
Lincoln's Sparrow
White-throated Sparrow
Dark-eyed Junco
Rusty Blackbird (Maintenance Field)