Conine's Millpond | Pole Farm 2/17--Greater White-fronted Goose, Short-eared Owl

Greater White-fronted Goose in the middle
(digiscope)

And sometimes it all works perfectly. Mike and I had a plan today and it worked better than we expected. We met at 1 in the afternoon instead of our usual morning rendezvous and headed up to the fields around Assunpink. We were looking for rare geese--both Barnacle and Greater White-fronted Goose have been in the area. We made a stop at a field where the GWFG had been reported yesterday but there was nothing there but standard-issue geese. "We should check the lake," Mike said, being Conine's Millpond in Allentown. All the geese there were at the back of the lake, away from the fishermen, so while they were a little jammed up, at least we didn't have to scan the entire body of water. We came up with quite few different species of ducks mixed in with the Canada Geese before Mike found the Greater White-fronted stuck behind a couple of larger geese. It was too far away for either of our cameras, but after much frustration because the goofy goose would drift behind another goose, it finally came out into a clear spot on the water and I was able to digiscope some truly terrible documentary photos. You can click on the photo above to make it larger and more awful.

We still had time before the main part of our plan kicked in, so we went up to Assunpink and scanned the lake with some other birders and came up with 10 species of waterfowl including a few Canvasbacks and Lesser Scaups. Then we went to the semi-secret spot to look the Long-eared Owl. I'd seen it last week. Funny story: When we first saw it in January, as I was being positioned by our friend into the exact spot I had to stand, my hat snagged on a twig and fell off. Last week, while kicking around in the same spot I couldn't find the owl. I was just about to quit when my hat snagged on a twig. I looked up. In a beam of sunlight, there was the owl. Today, I did not lose my hat. The owl (there is most certainly more than one in there) was in a different tree, even though the fresh pellets were scattered around the tree where we originally saw it.

This was all prelude to the main part of our plan, the reason we met so late. We drove over to the Pole Farm in Mercer County--crepuscular owls were our goal. As it seemed to be for many, because when we arrived at 4:15, the parking lot was more than half-full and photographers were assembling their artillery onto tripods while others were already set up on the muddy path between two grassy fields.

Northern Saw-whet Owl

Before stopping there though, we walked back to grove of trees and looked for the (again, "the" is a misnomer, there are more than one) Northern Saw-whet Owl and after a little searching, Mike found one about 10 feet off the ground. The photographers we'd asked, on our way in, seemed disappointed that only one owl was showing, but that's because it was so tucked in that getting a clean shot was for them impossible. However, since on my tombstone it will say "HE ONLY NEEDED ONE" I was perfectly fine with the owl we saw and perfectly satisfied (well, not "perfectly" with the photo it allowed me.

Finally, we were prepared to settle in for the main event. Sunset today was 5:35. We were back on the muddy path at just about 5:10. We figured a good half hour before we saw anything. Northern Harriers still had the field (including one beautiful Gray Ghost). They are supposed to punch out at sunset and leave the field for the night shift. But probably because the sky was overcast and the winds were calm, we hadn't been standing there for more than a few minutes when I spotted a raptor that was flying like a bat, not a harrier. It was the first of the 3 Short-eared Owls that we saw today. The harriers were not happy with the competition and there were a couple of skirmishes that we watched. A harrier and an owl were parrying low to the ground when they both disappeared into the high grass. Neither came back up, that we could see. Much speculation but who knows?

This was a much better result than we had anticipated--usually it is some dim by the time the owls make their appearance that they are merely silhouettes in the gloaming. Today we got to see them in graylight, with their rufous tails and buffy bodies. They were fun to watch as they flopped above the fields. Much too far for photography for us. I'd be curious to see what the artillerymen came up with.

On our way back to the parking lot we saw 5 Savannah Sparrows in the muddy path and just near the rudimentary restrooms, a few Eastern Meadowlarks finished the day for us.

Savannah Sparrow