July Wrap-up

Glossy Ibis, Great Bay Blvd. 

It is unlikely that I'll add any new birds for the month, or even have a chance to go birding since we have a couple of days on Staten Island dealing with doctors in store, so I figured I'd wrap up the month now.

Photo: Shari Zirlin

July is a tough month. The birds don't sing as much so they're harder to find, the migrating birds have moved through and until the end of the month you don't see any moving back down south. I only added 6 birds for the year: 3 shorebirds, 2 waders, and a tern. One the of the birds--Yellow-crowned Night-Heron, fell into the "finally" category. The most difficult bird to find for the month had to be the American Bittern we saw at Brigantine on Saturday.

My Bird A Day streak ended at 201 days--I could have stretched it a little, but I knew I'd never make it past this week when we'd be preoccupied. A couple of highlights for me were having a birder from Bergen County drive down on his way to the shore, just to hear the Whip-poor-will that was calling reliably in the early part of the month, and the visits we've been getting from a pair of tom turkeys every afternoon. When I walked out the side door and saw one just sitting on the lawn I thought that these guys were getting entirely too comfortable. We've named them Frick & Frack. Never did I think when we were living in Brooklyn that I'd ever be sitting on my patio, feet up, drinking a beer, watching turkeys peck at my lawn.

Frick & Frack
Photo: Shari Zirlin

For the month I managed 120 species. The underlined birds are the rarities--mostly rare for time of year not location. Birds in bold italics are FOY.
Counties Birded:
New Jersey: Atlantic, Burlington, Cape May, Ocean
New York: Kings

Species     First Sighting

Brant     Brigantine

Canada Goose     Brigantine

Mute Swan     Brigantine

Wood Duck     Colliers Mills WMA

Gadwall     Cape May Meadows

American Black Duck     Brigantine

Mallard     Brigantine

Blue-winged Teal     Brigantine

Wild Turkey     35 Sunset Rd

Double-crested Cormorant     Great Bay Blvd WMA

American Bittern     Brigantine

Great Blue Heron     Great Bay Blvd WMA

Great Egret     Great Bay Blvd WMA

Snowy Egret     Great Bay Blvd WMA

Little Blue Heron     Cattus Island County Park

Tricolored Heron     Cattus Island County Park

Black-crowned Night-Heron     Great Bay Blvd WMA

Yellow-crowned Night-Heron     Brigantine

Glossy Ibis     Great Bay Blvd WMA

Turkey Vulture     Crestwood Village

Osprey     Great Bay Blvd WMA

Cooper's Hawk     Brigantine

Red-tailed Hawk     Colliers Mills WMA

Clapper Rail     Great Bay Blvd WMA

Black-bellied Plover     Brigantine

Semipalmated Plover     Great Bay Blvd WMA

Piping Plover     Barnegat Lighthouse SP

Killdeer     Cape May Meadows

American Oystercatcher     Great Bay Blvd WMA

Spotted Sandpiper     Cape May Point SP

Greater Yellowlegs     Brigantine

Willet     Great Bay Blvd WMA

Lesser Yellowlegs     Brigantine

Whimbrel     Brigantine

Marbled Godwit     Brigantine

Ruddy Turnstone     Brigantine

Semipalmated Sandpiper     Brigantine

Western Sandpiper     Brigantine

Least Sandpiper     Brigantine

Dunlin     Barnegat Lighthouse SP

Stilt Sandpiper     Brigantine

Short-billed Dowitcher     Brigantine

Laughing Gull     Great Bay Blvd WMA

Ring-billed Gull     Brigantine

Herring Gull     Colliers Mills WMA

Great Black-backed Gull     Great Bay Blvd WMA

Least Tern     Great Bay Blvd WMA

Gull-billed Tern     Brigantine

Caspian Tern     Brigantine

Common Tern     Cape May Point SP

Forster's Tern     Great Bay Blvd WMA

Royal Tern     Brigantine

Black Skimmer     Brigantine

Rock Pigeon     Prospect Park

Mourning Dove     Crestwood Village

Yellow-billed Cuckoo     Whiting WMA

Black-billed Cuckoo     Whiting WMA

Common Nighthawk     35 Sunset Rd

Eastern Whip-poor-will     35 Sunset Rd

Chimney Swift     Crestwood Village

Ruby-throated Hummingbird     35 Sunset Rd

Belted Kingfisher     Crestwood Village

Red-bellied Woodpecker     Colliers Mills WMA

Downy Woodpecker     Crestwood Village

Northern Flicker     Colliers Mills WMA

Peregrine Falcon     Brigantine

Eastern Wood-Pewee     Colliers Mills WMA

Acadian Flycatcher     Cattus Island County Park

Eastern Phoebe     Colliers Mills WMA

Great Crested Flycatcher     35 Sunset Rd

Eastern Kingbird     Colliers Mills WMA

Red-eyed Vireo     Eno's Pond

Blue Jay     Crestwood Village

American Crow     Crestwood Village

Fish Crow     35 Sunset Rd

Northern Rough-winged Swallow     White's Bogs

Purple Martin     Cattus Island County Park

Tree Swallow     Colliers Mills WMA

Bank Swallow     Brigantine

Barn Swallow     Colliers Mills WMA

Carolina Chickadee     Crestwood Village

Tufted Titmouse     Crestwood Village

White-breasted Nuthatch     35 Sunset Rd

House Wren     Eno's Pond

Marsh Wren     Eno's Pond

Carolina Wren     Colliers Mills WMA

Blue-gray Gnatcatcher     Crestwood Village

Eastern Bluebird     Whiting WMA

Wood Thrush     Double Trouble State Park

American Robin     Crestwood Village

Gray Catbird     Crestwood Village

Northern Mockingbird     Colliers Mills WMA

Brown Thrasher     Brigantine

European Starling     Cape May Meadows

Cedar Waxwing     Colliers Mills WMA

Ovenbird     Crestwood Village

Worm-eating Warbler     Cape May Point SP

Black-and-white Warbler     White's Bogs

Common Yellowthroat     Great Bay Blvd WMA

Yellow Warbler     Brigantine

Pine Warbler     Crestwood Village

Prairie Warbler     Crestwood Village

Eastern Towhee     Crestwood Village

Chipping Sparrow     Crestwood Village

Field Sparrow     Brigantine

Saltmarsh Sparrow     Cattus Island County Park

Seaside Sparrow     Great Bay Blvd WMA

Song Sparrow     Crestwood Village

White-throated Sparrow     35 Sunset Rd

Northern Cardinal     Crestwood Village

Blue Grosbeak     Cattus Island County Park

Indigo Bunting     Brigantine

Red-winged Blackbird     Colliers Mills WMA

Common Grackle     Colliers Mills WMA

Boat-tailed Grackle     Great Bay Blvd WMA

Brown-headed Cowbird     Crestwood Village

Orchard Oriole     White's Bogs

House Finch     35 Sunset Rd

American Goldfinch     Crestwood Village

House Sparrow     35 Sunset Rd

Brigantine 7/27--American Bittern, Yellow-crowned Night-Heron, Western Sandpiper, Royal Tern.

American Bittern
Photo: Shari Zirlin

Well, so much for the summer doldrums; Fall migration has started in earnest. About 30 birders were led around Brigantine by Pete Bacinski, Scott Barnes, Linda Mack, Mike Mandracchia and Lloyd Shaw, and with that much birding knowledge, great sightings were sure to be had. The highlights, for me, are in the heading, along with a the Marbled Godwit that my ever-diligent wife was able to spot out among the skimmers & gulls.

The place was teeming with sandpipers--a couple of thousand Semipalmated Sandpipers is probably a conservative estimate. In among them we were able to tease out a couple of Western Sandpipers, a Least Sandpiper, a Dunlin and about 6 Stilt Sandpipers. The buildup in birds will only increase as the summer (for us)/fall(for the birds) progresses.

The Yellow-crowned Night-Heron we found was a very fresh, almost downy juvenile along the north dike. My first one of the year--amazing it took this long to find one. Royal Terns are rarities at Brig (they're more of an seashore bird) so it was fine to get very good looks at multiple examples--they're easy to pick out with their "tonsures." I guess because of their name they always remind me of vain balding kings. The other great, great, find today was on the road to the Gull Pond: American Bittern, as pictured above. This is also a true rarity, but if you're going to see one, that stretch of road at Brig is pretty reliable. Last year that's where we also saw one. There were a couple of new birders on the trip today (how I envy them: life birds almost every time they lifted their binoculars) and I told them they could go 10 years before seeing another bittern. That's a bit of an exaggeration, but I bird a lot and there are long stretches when I haven't seen one.

The trip ended on a dramatic note, when at the end of our 2nd loop, on the upland section near the exit, Scott found a Cooper's Hawk entangled in the greenbriar. We guessed that it had attacked a bird, missed, and got caught in nature's barbed wire. The bird's breast was actually pierced by a stem of the greenbriar, but Scott, Linda, and a couple of others worked hard and very carefully and the team was able to free the hawk, which astoundingly flew away. I was sure it was going to need to go to a raptor rehabilitation facility.

In June I was on a trip at Assunpink with Scott and others. Jimmy Lee was wearing a t-shirt I really admired. A couple of weeks later, out of nowhere, my friend Eileen came to the house with the shirt, knowing nothing about Jimmy or the shirt. Her sister, who doesn't even know me, but knows of me, had bought it as a goof. A great present. And I was mortified, mortified, I tell you, when I saw that Jimmy and I were both wearing the shirt today. Wish I had tucked it in before Shari took the photo--I look like a slob next to him.

And, as if to bring home that Fall is rapidly approaching, when we got home this afternoon, Shari called me to the window to see, in the backyard, our first White-throated Sparrow of the season--but which season?

Chipping and White-throated Sparrow
Photo: Shari Zirlin

Two trips around the Wildlife drive yielded 64 species for us--the group as a whole had about 86 species.
Canada Goose  500
Mute Swan  6
Wood Duck  1
American Black Duck  25
Mallard  30
Blue-winged Teal  2
Double-crested Cormorant  3
American Bittern  1    
Great Egret  25
Snowy Egret  20
Little Blue Heron  1    gull tower
Black-crowned Night-Heron  1
Yellow-crowned Night-Heron  1    From North Dike
Glossy Ibis  10
Osprey  10
Cooper's Hawk  1    
Clapper Rail  2
Black-bellied Plover  1
Semipalmated Plover  15
American Oystercatcher  6
Spotted Sandpiper  1
Greater Yellowlegs  2
Willet (Eastern)  3
Lesser Yellowlegs  15
Whimbrel  3
Marbled Godwit  1    From South Dike before observation tower. 
Ruddy Turnstone  1
Semipalmated Sandpiper  2000
Western Sandpiper  2
Least Sandpiper  1
Dunlin  1
Stilt Sandpiper  6
Short-billed Dowitcher  50
Laughing Gull  50
Ring-billed Gull  1
Herring Gull  50
Great Black-backed Gull  10
Least Tern  15
Gull-billed Tern  5
Caspian Tern  1
Forster's Tern  50
Royal Tern  3
Black Skimmer  50
Peregrine Falcon  2
American Crow  15
Fish Crow  3
Purple Martin  10
Tree Swallow  5
Bank Swallow  1
Barn Swallow  10
Marsh Wren  3
Gray Catbird  1    Heard
Northern Mockingbird  1
Cedar Waxwing  2
Common Yellowthroat  4
Field Sparrow  1    Heard
Seaside Sparrow  4
Song Sparrow  2
Northern Cardinal  1    End of upland trail, by COHA
Blue Grosbeak  1    Dogleg
Indigo Bunting  1    South dike, on phragmites
Red-winged Blackbird  25
Boat-tailed Grackle  2
American Goldfinch  1    Heard

Bird A Day--The Streak is Over

This has been an interesting experiment in OCD--Ornithological Compulsive Disorder. The streak ended yesterday at Brigantine with 201 days in a row logging a unique species. I went to Colliers Mills this morning in the hope of finding a pheasant or a bobwhite to stay in the game a little while longer, but I wasn't able to come out with one.

I could have continued the streak at least to the end of this month until personal matters will get in the way, but it would have required more driving than I feel like doing. For instance: I could have driven back down to Brig today--if I had, I probably would have seen a Reeve (a female Ruff) and would have been quite excited about it Bird A Day or not. Just yesterday, on the trip with Scott and Pete, we were talking about the possibility of one showing up (one already has, a male, for one day this summer) and today Pete and Mike Mandracchia found 2 (two!) Reeves. Between Atlantic and Cape May Counties I could have kept the streak alive, but that's a lot of driving just to find a bird.

To a large degree, I'm relieved that I don't have desperately look for a new bird tomorrow. It was fun to get birds on my normal birding rounds, but when, in the last month or so, I found myself going to specific places to get specific birds, the whole "game" started to feel more like an obligation, a job, and I like being retired.

The positive aspect of the challenge is that it did make me a better birder by making me match up habitat and date with desired species, as well as just the practice I got, especially ear birding. I think my observation skills, while still far from what I'd like them to be, have move up a notch or two.

Now I can get back to my regularly scheduled obsessions, like building up my Ocean County year and life list: I've already broken my 2012 record of 182 species, and I'm tied for the #4 spot on the county all time list. But also, I can just go out, walk around, look for birds and enjoy finding what I find. I'd noticed that I was rushing through a place until a found a unique species--only after I'd bagged one could I relax.

Will I take the challenge next year? I don't think so, for the same reason I'll probably never do a big year: while I enjoy birding more than just about anything, there are some mornings when I just don't feel like going out and there are remote places in the state that sometimes I just don't feel like driving to.

To see a complete list of my 201 days of Bird A Day, click the the link in the sidebar.

Meta-Memory Loss

I just remembered

While brushing my teeth

That yesterday I couldn't

Remember  someone’s name

But I can't remember

Whose name I couldn't

Remember and I can't even

Remember if it was a dream

That I couldn't remember

Someone’s name

Or something else. 

Brigantine 7/20--Stilt Sandpiper

Group at Gull Pond
Photo: Shari Zirlin (from tower)

We went to Brig this morning to take a couple of turns around the Wildlife Drive with Birders Supreme, Scott Barnes & Pete Bacinski. It is hot as hell, but to shorebirds, this is already fall and southerly migration has begun. Huge numbers of Short-billed Dowtitchers (and a couple of candidates for Long-billed) and Semipalmated Sandpipers were all along the drive. A couple of Whimbrels in the marsh were a treat--they're already on their long journey to South America from the Arctic.

But it was the FOY Stilt Sandpipers we saw on the North Dike that were the highlight of the day for me (as well as what may turn out to be the final Bird A Day entry). The lesson there was to look carefully, as I always have to remind myself. Had we been going around by ourselves I would probably have dismissed the birds as more Lesser Yellowlegs (which we also saw), without looking closely to see the differences in structure, bill, and, what is usually the big tip off to me, feeding behavior. Because as soon as Scott pointed out the Stilts, I saw that as they fed they stick their rears high up in the air, whereas Lesser Yellowlegs, with slightly longer bills, can reach the water just be dipping down their heads.

The other cool lesson I got today was a good way to distinguish Lesser & Greater Yellowlegs by behavior: Greater Yellowlegs (along with American Avocets) are the only shorebirds that eat fish, so if you see a yellowlegs swishing its bill through the water (as avocets also do) you can be pretty confident you've got a greater.

For the 2 trips around the drive we came up with 49 species but a few other taxa:
Canada Goose  500
Mute Swan  6
Mallard  1
American Black Duck/Mallard  2
Double-crested Cormorant  17
Great Blue Heron  2
Great Egret  50
Snowy Egret  25
Little Blue Heron  3
Tricolored Heron  1
Black-crowned Night-Heron  1
Glossy Ibis  45
Osprey  10
Clapper Rail  1    Heard
Black-bellied Plover  2
Semipalmated Plover  2
American Oystercatcher  8
Greater Yellowlegs  2
Willet  10
Willet (Western)  3
Lesser Yellowlegs  15
Whimbrel  2
Semipalmated Sandpiper  1000
Least Sandpiper  4
Dunlin  1
Stilt Sandpiper  10
Short-billed Dowitcher  1000
Short-billed/Long-billed Dowitcher  1
Laughing Gull  50
Herring Gull  25
Great Black-backed Gull  5
Gull-billed Tern  2
Caspian Tern  2
Forster's Tern  50
Black Skimmer  5
Mourning Dove  2
Peregrine Falcon  1
Eastern Kingbird  1
Blue Jay  1    Heard
crow sp.  3
Purple Martin  15
Tree Swallow  20
Bank Swallow  2
Barn Swallow  10
Carolina Wren  1    Heard
Gray Catbird  2
European Starling  20
Chipping Sparrow  1    Heard
Seaside Sparrow  3
Song Sparrow  1
Blue Grosbeak  1
Red-winged Blackbird  75
American Goldfinch  3    Heard