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.

Barnegat to Shawangunk - early signs of spring

A refurbished car (new tires, replaced wheel bearing) led me to do an epic road trip from the NJ shore to the Shawangunks on Saturday.

At Barnegat Inlet at 0700 the surf was up, driven by high tide and brisk northern winds, so few ducks were along the north-facing side of the breakwater. Surf Scoter, Black Scoter and Common Eider were along the mouth of the inlet. Long-tailed Ducks were everywhere, vocal and starting to molt. Common and Red-throated Loons were scare - the Common Loons themselves starting to molt into breeding plumage. A few shorebirds were present - Black-bellied Plover, Dunlin and Ruddy Turnstone - but no Purple Sandpipers. Not a bad start but the weather reduced the opportunities.

Barnegat List:
Common Loon
Red-throated Loon
Brant
Common Eider
Surf Scoter
Long-tailed Duck
Red-breasted Merganser
Great Cormorant
Black-bellied Plover
American Oystercatcher
Ruddy Turnstone
Dunlin
Horned Lark
Savannah Sparrow
Boat-tailed Grackle

After that I went north and stopped at Belmar and Spring Lake for Glaucous Gull and Pacific Loon and didn't find either. Gull #s were low, and the only loons were very obviously Commons.

Then north-west to DeKorte Park in the Meadowlands where I failed once more to find Northern Shrike but did find three Fox Sparrows and a couple of Brown-headed Cowbirds. A Red-winged Blackbird was singing.

Then north-west some more via a somewhat non-optimal route to Wallkill NWR, or more specifically the Oil City Road parking lot on the NY side of the NWR. Here Crows and Turkey Vultures were common (Canada Geese and American Crow being the most common bird over that whole area). I did find two pale and one dark morph Rough-legged Hawk but they were well to the north of Oil City Rd and buried in the heat haze - it was a fairly warm day - for unsatisfying looks. Also of interest was a kettle of Black Vultures headed north.

Finally, the last 45 minute sprint of the day got me from Wallkill NWR to Shawangunk NWR for 5pm. Two Short-eared Owls were already up and perched in the sun, but not all that active apart from periodic harassment of the Northern Harriers (about 6 of them). No Rough-legged Hawks but a local birder told me they were there early in the day and often move off if the human activity is too much. I heard a Common Raven croak but did not see it. I also heard a Barred Owl sound off a couple of times but didn't see that either. After sunset, and about 6pm as it was starting to get pretty dark, I counted 4 Short-eared Owls over the center of the grassy areas. The previous night it was apparently 5. On the walk back to the car I heard the peenting of an American Woodcock and heard it twitter during its song flight.

Then all that was needed was a 2:15 drive home in the dark......

Update: suspicion that the Black Vultures I saw on Sat were migrating was bolstered by the observation of migrating Turkey Vultures over Manhattan on the subsequent Monday. Spring has sprung for the Vultures too.