Manasquan River WMA | Great Bay Blvd | Brig 4/24--Gull-billed Tern, Caspian Tern, Stilt Sandpiper, Short-billed Dowitcher, Whimbrel, Great Crested Flycatcher, Marsh Wren, Blue-winged Warbler, Purple Finch, Blue Grosbeak

Cape May Warbler, Great Bay Blvd
Photo: Mike Mandracchia

A delayed reaction: I was surprised that only Mike, yesterday, went down to Great Bay Blvd to look for the Cape May Warbler I found on Sunday. He didn't have any luck with that bird, but he did come up with a lot of new birds for the year. This morning, he & I headed up to the Manasquan River WMA in search of newly arriving migrants. We did just okay there (33 species), hearing but not locating a Great Crested Flycatcher and coming across one of the specialties of the house up there, a Blue-winged Warbler. At first we heard a warbler but didn't quite recognize the call (out of practice) and then Mike saw the warbler briefly and thought it might be a Prothonotary, but the habitat (deciduous woods) was all wrong. "What other warbler is yellow with gray wings?" Mike wondered aloud.

"Blue-winged Warbler," sez I.

Ah-ha! That explained the buzzing little song we'd just heard. Just about then we saw a report that the Cape May Warbler had been refound in the same spot as Sunday. Surprised that it was still hanging around for a 4th day and since there were birds down there that we both still needed, we hied on down to the southern-most end of the county from the northern-most end. Ain't rare bird alerts grand?

We struck out on the Caspian Terns reported (though we later saw one down at Brig), but driving down Great Bay we started locating birds only one of us had seen so far--I got Blue Grosbeak (pictures so bad through the windshield I won't hurt your eyes with them), Short-billed Dowitcher, Stilt Sandpiper (rare and a tough one for me in the county [or anywhere] which I probably wouldn't have picked out on my own), and most surprising of all, a female Purple Finch at the southern end of the 2nd wooden bridge which is a nice migrant trap; while I found for Mike Black-crowned Night-Herons flying out of their usual roost at the north end of the 2nd wooden bridge (county bird only for him) and best of all, as we walked back and forth on the path in the grove at the end of the road, the Cape May Warbler popped out of seemingly nowhere, posed long enough for Mike to take a great photo, then disappeared back to nowhere.

Black-crowned Night-Herons

Gull-billed Terns, center
Photo: Mike Mandracchia

However, after my 2nd report of the bird to the Jersey Shore Alert, Cape May Warbler fever seemed to suddenly take hold and reports of the bird started to pour in for the remainder of the afternoon. By that time, though, we were making our way around the dikes of Brig.

Besides the Caspian Tern, we found a couple of Gull-billed Terns, early arrivals, thus "rare," about 7 Whimbrels, and finally heard a Marsh Wren. The Whimbrels were my 200th species of the year, all in NJ.

For our 3 hours at Brig we had 61 species, but I think the more interesting list comes from Great Bay Blvd even though it clocks in at a meager 50 species:

Brant  300

Canada Goose  1

Mute Swan  1

Greater Scaup  1

Mourning Dove  1

Black-bellied Plover  80

Stilt Sandpiper  1    

Dunlin  500

Short-billed Dowitcher  3

Greater Yellowlegs  8

Willet  15

Laughing Gull  12

Herring Gull  100

Great Black-backed Gull  4

Forster's Tern  25

Common Loon  1

Double-crested Cormorant  175

Great Egret  40

Snowy Egret  10

Black-crowned Night-Heron  5    

Osprey  6    nesting

Bald Eagle  1

Red-bellied Woodpecker  1

Northern Flicker  1

Blue Jay  2

Fish Crow  1

Tree Swallow  10

Barn Swallow  20

Tufted Titmouse  1

House Wren  1

Blue-gray Gnatcatcher  2

American Robin  1

Northern Mockingbird  4

European Starling  2

House Finch  1

Purple Finch  1   

American Goldfinch  1

White-throated Sparrow  1

Seaside Sparrow  3

Song Sparrow  6

Red-winged Blackbird  15

Common Grackle  2

Boat-tailed Grackle  100

Common Yellowthroat  10

Cape May Warbler  1    

Yellow Warbler  1

Yellow-rumped Warbler  1

Northern Cardinal  1

Blue Grosbeak  1    

House Sparrow  1    Heard Holly Lake