Barnegat Inlet, Dec 23rd

The lure of alcids brought me to the NJ coast just before Xmas, but I was to be thwarted on the quest for either Razorbills or Dovekie.  In fact Barnegat Inlet was pretty quiet initially.  Long-tailed Ducks had put in an appearance in numbers compared to my last visit, Common Loons were around in decent numbers but everything else was pretty slow.  Minor novelties were a Canada Goose flock, probably bouncing down the coast as the weather hardens, and Hooded Mergansers flying up the inlet into the bay.  One female Black Scoter was at the bay end of the inlet and a female or subadult male Surf Scoter was along the rocks at once point.  Notable by their absence were any Great Cormorants (regular here in winter).


Red-throated Loon
Common Loon
Northern Gannet
Double-crested Cormorant
Common Eider
Harlequin Duck
Surf Scoter
Black Scoter
Long-tailed Duck
Hooded Merganser
Red-breasted Merganser
Ruddy Turnstone
Purple Sandpiper
Dunlin
Bonaparte's Gull
Yellow-rumped Warbler

Dec 15th: White-winged Crossbill and CPK #200 (actually 204)

A brief visit to Central Park on the morning of Dec 15th was entirely mercenary with one species in mind: White-winged Crossbill.  Having dipped on Evening Grosbeak and Red Crossbill previously I was immensely relieved to find three female White-winged Crossbills in Mugger's Woods (charming name, historically accurate) feeding on sweet-gum seeds.  While Evening Grosbeaks were seen earlier that day they continued to evade me.  A Barred Owl was still present, although the vanishing leaves had led it to move roosts to an evergreen over its previous deciduous.

Other birds were an ongoing swarm of Tufted Titmice at the Ramble feeders, a Brown Creeper, a flock of Cedar Waxwings at Strawberry Fields feeding on holly, and a late Baltimore Oriole.  Judging from tail feather shape this oriole was a first winter bird.  Hopefully it heads south quickly because despite a fairly mild start to the winter I cannot imagine it's going to be as mild as last winter.

On Saturday I was elated about the Crossbills at least in part because I thought they were Central Park bird #200.  In fact I'd seriously undercounted and they were #204:

• 204: White-winged Crossbill
• 203: Brant (Nov 17th 2012)
• 202: Barred Owl (Nov 17th 2012)
• 201: Grasshopper Sparrow (May 4th 2012)
• 200: Acadian Flycatcher (May 3rd 2011)

Given that #198 and 199 were Western Tanager Dickcissel (2008) and Varied Thrush (2010) it's clear that 2012 was a far better-than-average year for difficult park species and equally clear that I'm getting laissez-faire with my editing of some of my location species lists - Central Park is actually one of the ones I pay attention to, allegedly.

I'm still missing Red Crossbill and Evening Grosbeak in what is an invasion year for both, however.

Psychotic chasing: Cape Cod

While I'm not an obsessive chaser, the lists that I take seriously are my Life List, Year List and Central Park List.  I'm willing to travel a little distance to plug holes in my Life List, especially now that I'm at 675 and new birds are difficult to find to advance the goal of reaching 700.

So it didn't escape my notice that a Little Egret had been found the previous weekend on Cape Cod.  Although New England is a lot more compact than, say, the American west, it's still 325 miles of driving one way to get from central NJ to Hyannis.  That's a pretty long round trip and as I'm increasingly older also toward the upper limit of what I'm tempted to do in one day.

Nevertheless, Little Egret is something I've tried for and struck out on in the past, and it would make a nice "pairing" with the Western Reef-Heron in Brooklyn (July 2007).

So off I went up a dark and wet I-95 all the way from NJ, through NY, CT, RI and finally MA for a fifth state pre-dawn, ending up at Hyannis on the south side of Cape Cod around 8:45am.  I rolled into the first of two sites that the bird frequented - and where it was seen multiple times the previous day - whereupon an especially helpful birder told me it was over at the other location only a couple of miles west.  Within 10 minutes of looking, I was watching a Little Egret hunt down small fish at the outflow of a marsh using a foot-trembling method to disturb the mud and/or flush the fish.  All the expected ID marks where there - a more massive bill with gray-ish lores, greenish legs with yellowish feet, overall structure intermediate between Snowy and Great Egret.  While the ID is not trivial at range, this was a good look at a bird that could not be confused with a Snowy Egret.

If the Egret wasn't remote-enough odds, it was standing right next to a Black-headed Gull, itself a relatively rare bird in the USA.  Both of these species I've seen in Britain (memorably I once had about eight Little Egrets in GB in one day in February) where Little Egret have become far more numerous than when I used to live there and where Black-headed Gull is abundant.

In retrospect that quick and easy success with the egret (modulo 5.5 hours of driving) should have led me to turn around and head toward home, not least of all because it was drizzling with low cloud the entire day.  Instead I rolled the dice and when 50 miles further up the Cape to Provincetown in search of Thick-billed Murre.  I'd seen the murres this past summer in AK, but wanted a look in the East.  This was a trip I'd considered during the previous winter - and almost executed - but always delayed it due to bad weather and the sheer distance involved.  Provincetown appears to be one of the better mainland sites for finding TB Murre, however luck wasn't quite with me.  I had three Razorbills at MacMillan Wharf along with Common Loons and one Red-throated, Red-breasted Mergansers, American Black Duck, both Cormorant sp, but no murres.  Race Point at the northern edge of the cape had limited visibility (fog, rain) but had Northern Gannet and one Black Scoter.  Herring Cove on the western tip added White-winged Scoter, a quick return trip to the harbor netted exactly the same species, so I headed back down the cape to check First Encounter Beach where the low tide precluded finding any water bird within the visible range, and Corporation Beach in Dennis where there were a good select of water birds just off the breakwater (new: Horned Grebe) but no alcids.  I did have a single fly-over Redpoll here but simply could not find it in the dark gray sky.  The southerly wind that brought the moisture and relatively mild conditions wasn't exactly conducive to winter finch flight so I was unable to track down any (other) Redpolls or Crossbills.

Heading back to Hyannis once more and finding that the Egret had become elusive (various birders were looking for it) at either of its regular spots, so I decided to make an early start on the return trip, and left the cape around 2:30pm to start the 6+ hour drive home in rather heavier traffic conditions than the early morning outbound trip.

Little Egret (Egretta garzetta) - US bird #676

Van Cortlandt Park/Alley Pond Park Dec 1st

Some days my predictions are luckier than others.  A Barnacle Goose that originally frequented Inwood Hill Park (found Nov 11th, seen over the next few days) had pulled a vanishing act - I went looking for it myself and struck out - and given that there's precious few flat grassy areas in that area I made the prediction via my venerable list eBirdsNYC that it might turn up in Van Cortlandt Park, geographically close albeit in the Bronx and not Manhattan.   In one of those uncommon alignments between plausibility and actual events the Barnacle turned up in Van Cortlandt Park on Nov 26th.

So although I was denied a nice rarity for my Manhattan (NY County) list, I did find my NYC list Barnacle Goose on Dec 1st amongst a large flock of Canada Geese feeding on the parade grounds area on the west side of Van Cortlandt Park.  Taking its cue from the other tame Canadas in this park the Barnacle was not particularly wary, although the light was pretty bad for photography and the bird decided to take a nap, further limiting photo options.  Took me all of 5 minutes to find the bird after finding street parking.  In retrospect I should have stuck around and looked for a Cackling Goose - a rare bird in NYC - amongst the large Canada flocks rather than head out to Queens.

However, flushed with easy success for one NYC bird, I headed out to Alley Pond Park in Queens to search for a more elusive one - the persisting Virginia's Warbler.  Although present for a while it had acquired the reputation for being difficult since it covered a large area in a non-demonstrative way.  In real habitat Virginia's Warbler is rather skulky and difficult to find, too.  Alley Pond Park had clearly taken a beating from Hurricane Sandy with a lot of felled trees although the parks dept had cleared up all the trails.  I predictably failed to find the warbler, and there was really only one part of the park that was at all birding with a mixed flock including chickadees, titmice, robins, Winter Wren and multiple Fox Sparrows.  Most of the woodland was pretty quiet with only a few sparrows.

Thanksgiving Weekend birding

Thursday: a nice little foray into Staten Island netted Eurasian Wigeon at Tottenville Train Station - this bird had been reported last year and is likely the same individual that sometimes was seen at Perth Amboy waterfront last winter.  This time I was far luckier than my Perth Amboy forays and actually saw it in a small flock of American Wigeons.  Then the maint target for the day: Cave Swallows at Cemetery of the Resurrection adjacent to Mount Loretto.  This flock had been upwards of 60 birds a week earlier but between 8 and 20 still persisted when I was there, visiting the pond to hawk insects.  The number is ambiguous because I wasn't sure if I saw the same flock 3x or three different flocks.  A single Tree Swallow was present and also fly-by Pine Siskin and Purple Finch.  Then back into NJ with a visit to Roselle where finding the Greater White-fronted Goose and Cackling Geese wasn't especially hard at Warinanco Park.

Friday: back into NYC in Central Park, where there was no Brant on the Reservoir, no Rufous Hummingbird at the Conservatory Garden, a single Barred Owl in the usual location and a few Fox Sparrows in the Ramble but not a great deal else.  Noteworthy was so many Tufted Titmice it almost constituted a plague.

Saturday: despite strong winds following the passage of a cold front I went out to Barnegat Inlet hoping for a little coastal finch movement - to no avail.  However in challenging conditions I found a late Brown Pelican flying up the inlet, a Royal Tern amongst the Forster's Terns and a larger Bonaparte's Gull flock, and the usual Harlequins.  The rest of the sea duck count was very low, with only two Long-tailed Ducks and 20 Black Scoters.  Down at Brigantine div. of Forsythe NWR where the violence that Hurricane Sandy had done to the wildlife drive (closed even to walking) was quite evident, I did snag a Cave Swallow over the open section of drive toward the gull tower.  Otherwise things were quite distant (abundant waterfowl) or keeping their head down in the strong wind.

Sunday: failing yet again to find Crossbills in NYC - this time in Prospect Park - I did manage to find a single Rusty Blackbird, and a couple of Pine Siskins at the Breeze Hill feeders.

Inwood and Central Parks, Nov 17th: Barred/Bluebird/Brant but no Barnacle

The possibility of a Barnacle Goose lured me all the way up to the tip of Manhattan and Inwood Hill Park early on Saturday.  The Barnacle was nowhere to be found, although I checked all the grassy areas.  A consolation prize - and apparently my first ones for Manhattan - were a flock of 10 American Pipits on the eastern ball fields.


The rest of the day turned out rather more successfully, and by the time I limped off to the train I'd covered a few miles and added three Central Park birds to my list, which now numbers 199.  A little walk across the north end of the park brought me to the Conservatory Garden where the northern (circular) flower garden is an absolute riot of color.  It's understandably lured in a Rufous Hummingbird  that's been there for about a week - I got enough poor tail-spread photographs to be sure it was a female Rufous and not any other Selasphorus, and the incomplete emergent gorget spot suggests it's an immature although I'm not totally certain on age.  This is not the first hummingbird seen in this location - there was an Allen's in 2002, and it's not the first Rufous I've seen in the park since there was an adult female Rufous in 2004.  As long as those flowers keep going and there's not a hard frost the hummingbird should do well for some time at this location.  (Update: it was gone by the following Friday).  I spent some time at this very colorful and warm location and also noted two Ruby-crowned Kinglets and a Yellow-bellied Sapsucker but not a great deal else - although there were crossbills reported from more coastal locations there did not seem to be a flight over the park.

I met Junko at the hummingbird who told me about a Brant at the Reservoir.  I managed to miss this on the way down the park the first time but looped back up there on my way out of the park and got good looks at an immature Brant hanging out with Canada Geese.  Wood Ducks, Hooded Mergansers, Gadwall, Northern Shoveler, Bufflehead and Ruddy Ducks were some of the more interesting waterfowl on the Reservoir, mostly clustered at the north end.

The I headed down to what has become a reliable spot for Barred Owl.  Barred Owl would normally be exceptionally rare in the park but there was one on the western edge of the park last winter (also roamed the Upper West Side, apparently) and this winter there may be as many as three Barred Owls here.  Despite once being a pretty regular Long-eared Owl roosting spot, Central Park hasn't hosted any regularly roosting owls in years.  Thankfully (and rather unlike the Long-eared) the Barred Owl roost is a long way off the ground, immune to curious onlookers.  A lot of passer's by were curious about this owl, so my skyward-pointed camera turned out to be mostly used a spotting scope.  I've accumulated a pretty good list of owls seen in the park (Long-eared, Northern Saw-whet, Great Horned, Barn, Barred, Boreal) but this was one of the better ones and one that I never expected to see here.

Finally, I was alerted to an Eastern Bluebird feeding at Sparrow Rock.  This bird seemed pretty tame for a Bluebird, considering a small crowd of birders gathered to admire it, and was in immature male plumage - still pretty resplendent in deep sky blue and red but with a little brown shading to the blue color on the scapulars and nape and pointed retrices.  Also there was a Hermit Thrush, which the Bluebird seemed to be using at times to detect insects and then attempted to steal them from it.  The Bluebird seemed to be doing fairly well on insect hunting, and the continuing fairly sunny and milder conditions (high in the 50's) suggest that all the park rarities should do fine for at least the next week.


Brant                              
Wood Duck                            
Gadwall                              
Northern Shoveler                    
Bufflehead                            
Hooded Merganser                      
Ruddy Duck                            
Pied-billed Grebe                                                
Barred Owl
Rufous Hummingbird
Yellow-bellied Sapsucker              
American Kestrel                      
White-breasted Nuthatch              
Carolina Wren                        
Ruby-crowned Kinglet                  
Eastern Bluebird                        
Hermit Thrush                        

Update: the Barnacle Goose seems to be more reliably seen at Van Cortlandt Park in the Bronx, which is geographically close to Inwood.

Northern LapwingS

Northern Lapwings at a distance - record shot only

An unprecedented fall-out of Northern Lapwings has occurred in the north-east with between 5 and 11 individuals being spotted - it depends on your philosophy about how related individual sightings are, and my own suspicion is that there have to be more than this since Lapwings are fond of farm fields where they are not always obvious to birders passing by.   The current sightings are summarized in this piece on the ABA blog.  The nearest Lapwing population is Iceland, and I assume they head south-east in fall to Britain for winter.  Most European Lapwings head south-west in response to harsh weather.

I birded Central Park on Sunday morning (Nov 11th) and drove into NYC with the strategy that if the Lapwings were re-found I'd head out to Montauk.  Central Park had a modest finch flight, so I had Pine Siskins and Purple Finches but alas not the elusive White-winged Crossbills or Evening Grosbeaks.  More conventional early winter species like Ruby-crowned Kinglet, White-crowned Sparrow and quite a few Hermit Thrushes were around.  Much of the Ramble was closed off for post-storm tree clean-up (both Sandy and the following week's Nor'easter had an impact on the park).

Then I saw an email reporting the Lapwings and I was back in the car by 10am.

The Midtown Tunnel had  re-opened just the previous Friday after being flooded by Sandy so after leaving Manhattan the first part of the trip was speedy (L.I.E., Rt. 27/Sunrise Highway).  But the problem with Montauk - and the reason I rarely go there any more - is that the next 35 miles are a tortuous wind through Southampton, Bridgehampton, Easthampton, Amagansett and other picturesque towns with very low speed limits.  There's a couple of fantasy 55mph zones near Montauk but most of the time you're closer to 35mph, which is about half the speed you were doing to for the last hour+.

Nevertheless, I made it out the east side of Montauk and to Deep Hollow Ranch (aka Theodore Roosevelt County Park) and found the Northern Lapwings without a problem.  This location is where I saw both Barnacle and Pink-footed Geese in 2007. Here's where it got both surreal and mundane.  I've seen thousands of Lapwings in Britain where they are relatively common on arable land, but it was a species I'd never really anticipated seeing in the United States, much less two of them hanging out together.  I had spent the preceding morning (Saturday) looking for the Lapwing that had been reported near Allentown NJ on Thursday with no success.  Lapwings look quite exotic to American birders, with the irridescence, crest and face pattern, but less so to Brits like me.  However Lapwings as a family are often quite spectacular in plumage.

Much of the time these Lapwings were distant and somewhat wary, being flushed by a passing Red-tailed Hawk (which looks pretty similar to the Common Buzzard, Buteo buteo if you're a prey species) or people on horseback.  So I did see them in flight and their relaxed flight style on broad wings belies the fact that these birds are long-distance migrants in Europe.  Which explains how they made it this far in the first place - something like a Greenfinch would splash down in the Atlantic from exhaustion.

The ABA blog for Hurricane Sandy also speculates that this amazing Lapwing event is correlated with a high pressure system that was present over the north Atlantic Ocean.  It's stretching the correlation to beyond breaking point to suggest that the Lapwings were related to Hurricane Sandy - but if their simulations are right one of the weather systems that led Sandy to turn westward and make landfall in NJ are the same weather systems that made quite a few Lapwings make landfall in the USA.  It just wasn't Sandy that did it.

Update: as of December 8th the one Lapwing on mainland MA and the two on Nantucket Island are still present, the two Montauk birds have long since left, and there was a fleeting report of one in Virginia.  Likely all of them are still on the east coast, but there's a lot of farm land out there.

Post-storm Birds (NJ)

After getting hammered by wind all night and losing power (still out 2.5 days later; was out for 5 days) I went out around 10am to slowly wind my way to local water spots in search of hurricane-displaced birds.  I found a little, but nothing tremendously interesting - most of the action was in New York Harbor or down on the Delaware, out of the range of any sane driving the morning after that hurricane.  Lots of power poles split or downed and multiple downed trees with the inevitable widespread power outages. Mercer Meadows - Rosedale Park lake: 2 Forster's Terns; 2 Ospreys; 1 Bald Eagle; flock of Tree Swallows; 1 Cave/Cliff Swallow - appeared quite dark on forehead and throat but also wet so ID inconclusive but likely a Cave - seemed to be passing through Mercer County Park lake: 3 Common Loons (1 adult and 2 immatures) plus one fly-over 1 Forster's Tern; 2 female Surf Scoters; 3 Bald Eagles (2 adults and 1 immature).    This amounted to a few extra birds on my Mercer County list but not much else.

Storm Birds

Hurricane Sandy did not drop any shearwaters in my back yard but it was remarkable how determined the local birds were to keep feeding even during the strengthening storm on Monday.  Sparrows mainly had their heads down (a few Juncos, one White-throated, one Chipping) but the Chickadees and Titmice were at the feeder all day, so much so that I switched to the larger one and zip-tied it to the feeder stand to stop it from swaying wildly when the winds started to gust >35 mph. By the time the eye passed to the south the wind had been gusting to 60mph but the feeder stayed intact.

I also finally had Pine Siskins, being apparently the last feeder in the whole of NJ to get them.  On Sunday I had a short visit from a flock of ~5 of them, aggressively defending perches on the seed and thistle feeder.  On Monday I had a single individual.

Now we'll see if the hurricane eye deposits anything unusual on the local water spots as it blasts through the area overnight.


Postscript: nothing new on the passerine front after the storm, save one Red-breasted Nuthatch on the Wednesday and a roving flock of Pine Siskins on Thursday - I'd been getting one Pine Siskin but this flock was 10+ birds.  The birds seem to have survived, at least based on feeder activity, although very enthusiastically using the seed feeder perhaps to make up for all that lost energy (or lost food sources?).