June Birding--9 year birds

Black-billed Cuckoo, Whitesbog

For an historically slow month, post-migration June provided some spectacular results. True, the drop-off in year birds was steep, from 34 to a mere 9, but of those 9 almost all were rarities and what rarities they were: Dickcissel in Burlco, which is regular but rare & sought after, then the amazing surprise of the Scissor-tailed Flycatcher on the playing fields of Toms River HS East (not exactly Eton, but what rare birds has Eton produced lately?), then the two forays in seldom visited Somerset County to get what was probably the rarest bird in the state this month, the Henslow's Sparrow, topped off with Friday's first occurrence in Ocean County of a duo of Black-bellied Whistling Ducks. Without those rarities, I don't know what I'd have done.

Actually, I do know what I'd have done, because I did it anyway--I wandered around obscure parts of Burlington and Monmouth Counties, places I was pretty certain not to run into a horde of other birders, and enjoyed myself and whatever birds I happened upon. It's called "birding" as opposed to "chasing." Probably the happiest of my finds which wasn't a year bird, was coming upon the Black-billed Cuckoo picture above at the back of Union Pond at Whitesbog. While I had heard a number of cuckoos this year, this was the first Black-billed I'd come upon and I was lucky enough to get close enough to have photos showing the red orbital ring. And frankly, ever since I got scolded about an out of season Black-billed Cuckoo that I listed as "heard" when it was most likely a chipmunk (!), I have been reluctant to list all the cuckoos I think I hear--especially when that scolding is reinforced by the knowledge that the Yellow-billed Cuckoo learns its cousin's song and vice versa. Which is a long way of saying, "Boy, was I happy to see this one!"

For the month I had 143 species in 6 counties
Counties birded: Atlantic, Burlington, Mercer, Monmouth, Ocean, Somerset

Species                    First Sighting

Black-bellied Whistling-Duck   Cedar Run Dock Rd.

Snow Goose   Brig

Canada Goose   Cloverdale Farm

Mute Swan   Brig

Wood Duck   Brig

Blue-winged Teal   Brig

Mallard   Forsythe-Barnegat

American Black Duck   Brig

Common Eider   Barnegat Lighthouse SP

Surf Scoter   Barnegat Lighthouse SP

White-winged Scoter   Barnegat Lighthouse SP

Black Scoter   Barnegat Lighthouse SP

Red-breasted Merganser  Brig

Wild Turkey   Brig

Mourning Dove   Cloverdale Farm

Yellow-billed Cuckoo   Double Trouble State Park

Black-billed Cuckoo   Whitesbog

Common Nighthawk   35 Sunset Rd

Eastern Whip-poor-will   35 Sunset Rd

Chimney Swift   Brig

Ruby-throated Hummingbird   Lochiel Creek County Park

Clapper Rail   Brig

American Oystercatcher   Brig

Black-bellied Plover   Barnegat Lighthouse SP

Semipalmated Plover   Brig

Piping Plover   Barnegat Lighthouse SP

Killdeer   Cedar Bonnet Island

Ruddy Turnstone   Brig

Dunlin   Brig

Least Sandpiper   Brig

Semipalmated Sandpiper   Forsythe-Barnegat

Western Sandpiper   Brig

Short-billed Dowitcher   Brig

Spotted Sandpiper   Brig

Greater Yellowlegs   Brig

Willet   Brig

Lesser Yellowlegs   Brig

Laughing Gull   Meadowedge Park

Herring Gull   Meadowedge Park

Great Black-backed Gull   Forsythe-Barnegat

Least Tern   Great Bay Blvd WMA

Gull-billed Tern   Brig

Caspian Tern   Brig

Common Tern   Brig

Forster's Tern   Forsythe-Barnegat

Black Skimmer   Brig

Double-crested Cormorant   Brig

Brown Pelican   Island Beach SP

Great Blue Heron   Cloverdale Farm

Great Egret   Cloverdale Farm

Snowy Egret   Forsythe-Barnegat

Little Blue Heron   Island Beach SP

Tricolored Heron   Brig

Green Heron   Whitesbog

Black-crowned Night-Heron   Double Trouble State Park

Glossy Ibis   Meadowedge Park

Black Vulture   Lake Enno

Turkey Vulture   Crestwood Village

Osprey   Brig

Sharp-shinned Hawk   Brig

Cooper's Hawk   Butterfly Bogs

Bald Eagle   GSP MM42

Red-tailed Hawk   Colliers Mills WMA

Red-headed Woodpecker   Cloverdale Farm

Red-bellied Woodpecker   35 Sunset Rd

Downy Woodpecker   Cloverdale Farm

Hairy Woodpecker   Cloverdale Farm

Northern Flicker   Cloverdale Farm

Peregrine Falcon   Cedar Bonnet Island

Eastern Wood-Pewee   Cloverdale Farm

Acadian Flycatcher   Double Trouble State Park

Alder Flycatcher   Negri-Nepote Grasslands

Willow Flycatcher   Brig

Eastern Phoebe   Double Trouble State Park

Great Crested Flycatcher   Cloverdale Farm

Eastern Kingbird   Cloverdale Farm

Scissor-tailed Flycatcher   Toms River High School East

White-eyed Vireo   Double Trouble State Park

Yellow-throated Vireo   Baldpate Mt

Warbling Vireo   Colliers Mills WMA

Red-eyed Vireo   Lochiel Creek County Park

Blue Jay   Cloverdale Farm

American Crow   Cloverdale Farm

Fish Crow   Meadowedge Park

Common Raven   Negri-Nepote Grasslands

Northern Rough-winged Swallow   Lake Enno

Purple Martin   Brig

Tree Swallow   Cloverdale Farm

Bank Swallow   Laurel Run Park

Barn Swallow   Cloverdale Farm

Carolina Chickadee   35 Sunset Rd

Tufted Titmouse   Cloverdale Farm

White-breasted Nuthatch   Cloverdale Farm

House Wren   Cloverdale Farm

Marsh Wren   Forsythe-Barnegat

Carolina Wren   Meadowedge Park

Blue-gray Gnatcatcher   Cloverdale Farm

Eastern Bluebird   Cloverdale Farm

Veery   Double Trouble State Park

Wood Thrush   Cloverdale Farm

American Robin   Cloverdale Farm

Gray Catbird   Cloverdale Farm

Brown Thrasher   Cloverdale Farm

Northern Mockingbird   Colliers Mills WMA

European Starling   Meadowedge Park

Cedar Waxwing   Cloverdale Farm

House Finch   Cloverdale Farm

Pine Siskin   35 Sunset Rd

American Goldfinch   Cloverdale Farm

Grasshopper Sparrow   Laurel Run Park

Chipping Sparrow   Cloverdale Farm

Field Sparrow   Double Trouble State Park

White-throated Sparrow   Island Beach SP

Seaside Sparrow   Brig

Saltmarsh Sparrow   Great Bay Blvd WMA

Henslow's Sparrow   Negri-Nepote Grasslands

Song Sparrow   Cloverdale Farm

Swamp Sparrow   Whitesbog

Eastern Towhee   Cloverdale Farm

Yellow-breasted Chat   Brig

Orchard Oriole   Brig

Baltimore Oriole   Double Trouble State Park

Red-winged Blackbird   Cloverdale Farm

Brown-headed Cowbird   35 Sunset Rd

Common Grackle   Meadowedge Park

Boat-tailed Grackle   Brig

Ovenbird   Cloverdale Farm

Worm-eating Warbler   Lochiel Creek County Park

Black-and-white Warbler   Double Trouble State Park

Prothonotary Warbler   Huber Preserve

Common Yellowthroat   Cloverdale Farm

Hooded Warbler   Double Trouble State Park

American Redstart   Double Trouble State Park

Yellow Warbler   Forsythe-Barnegat

Pine Warbler   Lochiel Creek County Park

Prairie Warbler   Double Trouble State Park

Summer Tanager   Huber Preserve

Scarlet Tanager   Garden State Parkway N

Northern Cardinal   35 Sunset Rd

Blue Grosbeak   Colliers Mills WMA

Indigo Bunting   Cloverdale Farm

Dickcissel   Laurel Run Park House Sparrow   Brig

Wood Duck, Ditch Meadow, Whitesbog

Cedar Run Dock Road 6/28--Black-bellied Whistling Duck

High on my wish list for both year and county bird is Black-bellied Whistling Duck. Just look at them! And the name alone makes them worth chasing. Today, (actually yesterday, but the report didn't show up on eBird until the wee hours) a pair showed up on Cedar Run Dock Road, more known as a winter birding spot than a summer one. These are the first birds recorded in Ocean County. BBWD is a regular visitor to NJ, sometimes at Brig, but more recently in Cape May, where there have been a number reported in a couple of spots this last month or so. Whether these are a couple of wanderers wandering away from those wanderers is impossible to know.


When I saw the report very early this morning I was tempted to run down there, but as Cedar Run Dock Road is long and there was no specific site cited, I instead kept to my original plan of running down to Brig to search for the Black-necked Stilt (another favorite) that has been seen at the dogleg for the last couple of days. Then I planned to drive down CRDR, searching for the ducks.

I should have gone to Brig yesterday, but I wasn't in the mood to deal with the greenhead flies. Instead, I was content to explore one of the more obscure corner of Burlington County for the 2nd time this week. But I thought, last night, that if I got to Brig early enough, before the heat set in, the greenies wouldn't be too bad. A good thought, but there were just enough of them at 7 AM to still be damn annoying. More annoying was the half hour spent looking for and not find the stilt.

Then the alert came in that the BBWD were still there--with an address. Abandoning the idea of the stilt I drove the half of the wildlife drive before me without looking at anymore birds, scooted up the Parkway, miraculously avoided the LBI traffic on 72, and was on Cedar Run Dock Road before you could say "Black-bellied Whistling Duck." I got the address and didn't see any ducks, but looking behind me, to a house up on pilings, I immediately saw the pair mixed in with a few molting Mallards.

I admired them for a few minutes, took a lot of photos, and just as I was about to leave, another birder I know pulled up. They were lifers for her and we spent more time looking at the goofy birds as they rested and preened.

Mike texted me and said he was on the way. By then I was pretty much satiated with BBWD, but again, just as I was about to take off, I saw his car coming down the road, so I hung around for a few minutes. Finally, after almost an hour there, I left, handing the bird off to yet another Ocean County birder--again, a lifer listing for him too.

June has been an outstanding month in Ocean County. Two great rarities (the Scissor-tailed Flycatcher was the first) and two county lifers for me. Very hard for me to get county lifers now, since I don't do pelagics, so, after a long walk up and down Stafford Avenue (the Bridge to Nowhere at its terminus), it was happy drive home.

Negri-Nepote Grasslands 6/23--Henslow's Sparrow

Henslow's Sparrow
Photo: Mike Mandracchia

Although I've only been there 4 or 5 times, I have a fondness for the Negri-Nepote Grasslands up in Franklin Township.I don't bird Somerset County all that much. But 8 years ago, after first looking at the house from which I write this, Shari & I went up there and got our life Dickcissel.

And yesterday, Dickcissel was the bird of the day, as Mike and I went over to Laurel Run Park in Burlco so he could get it for the year, which we did, pretty easily. As we were leaving, I checked the rare bird reports and saw a report of Henslow's Sparrow up at Negri-Nepote. The only Henslow's I've ever seen was in Ohio and, remarkably, considering his list, it would be a lifer for Mike, so despite having to take a rather roundabout route to get there, we went, arriving mid-afternoon. Because of diminishing habitat (read: grasslands) Henslow's has become a rarity in NJ. The closest place to reliably find them is in central Pennsylvania. Unfortunately for us, by the time we got there the bird had gone to ground and while we were happy to find our buddy Bob Auster there along with a couple of other birders we knew, the bird never showed for us. Of course, after we left it showed up again around 6 PM.

Bob texted me that he was going back early today and Mike and I decided to do the same. By the time I arrived at Mike's house, at around a quarter after six this morning, Bob texted that he already had seen the bird. It took us about 45 minutes to get there and 6 minutes to walk to the back field where the bird was being seen. We joined a long stream of birders headed in the same direction. We were lucky to get a parking spot--as we were leaving I saw many northern and central Jersey birders I know already leaving and still the parking lot was congested.

Just because Henslow's is rare doesn't mean it is a particularly interesting bird to look at--there are not astonishing field marks as there are on say a Scissor-tailed Flycatcher. And its "song" if you will is just a stifled sneeze. Still, hard for me to get a Jersey lifer and even harder for Mike to get a lifer in Jersey, so there was great relief when the bird, which everyone assured us would "pop up" on a certain little bush in the field, actually did pop up, sing, and give great views, especially if someone kindly lent you his scope. My pictures came out smallish, but Mike's photo shows the bird to good advantage.

Coming in and going out we built up a pretty good list without really birding hard--most of the typical grassland birds can be found there, like Grasshopper Sparrow, Indigo Bunting, Blue Grosbeak, etc. We found 'em all and then some, including one flycatcher which we could swear was calling "Free Beer" like an Alder Flycatcher, but, considering the rarity of that bird and the fact that everyone else was reporting Willow Flycatcher (common) we relented and defaulted to the "Fitz-bew" bird. Since both birds look exactly alike (and were once conspecific) you can only really separate them by voice. Too bad, still need Alder for the year.
The list, covering a 1/2 mile to the sparrow spot:

35 species

Mourning Dove  3

Chimney Swift  1

Red-tailed Hawk  1

Willow Flycatcher  1    

Great Crested Flycatcher  1    Heard

Eastern Kingbird  5

Blue Jay  1    Heard

American Crow  2

Fish Crow  1    Heard

Tree Swallow  20    Feeding young

Barn Swallow  6    Nesting in blind

House Wren  4

Carolina Wren  2    Heard

Eastern Bluebird  1

American Robin  2

Gray Catbird  5

Brown Thrasher  1

Northern Mockingbird  1

European Starling  4

Cedar Waxwing  4

American Goldfinch  7

Grasshopper Sparrow  1

Chipping Sparrow  1

Field Sparrow  1    Heard

Henslow's Sparrow  1    

Song Sparrow  5

Eastern Towhee  1    Heard

Orchard Oriole  2

Red-winged Blackbird  10

Brown-headed Cowbird  2

Common Grackle  4

Common Yellowthroat  4

Yellow Warbler  1    Heard

Blue Grosbeak  1    Heard

Indigo Bunting  2

Island Beach SP | Toms River HS East 6/17--Brown Pelican, Scissor-tailed Flycatcher

Scissor-tailed Flycatcher

I was eating lunch at home when the first somewhat vague report came in of a Scissor-tailed Flycatcher at a high school in Toms River. I slapped the table in frustration--45 minutes previous I was in Toms River, on my way back from Island Beach SP where I finally was able to see a dozen Brown Pelicans, one flock of seven looking like, to jam a couple of similes together, a squadron of prehistoric flying boats.

Brown Pelicans

I was hesitant to just burst out the door for a couple of reasons--first of all the report was second-hand from a Facebook group (I don't have a Facebook account) and secondly because schools and binoculars don't mix. I had to run an errand anyway and figured that in the time the errand took, more information would come through. After some back and forth in the group it was determined that school was out, so it was safe to go even if the location was still in doubt as to which high school in Toms River it was. As I was pulling out of the parking lot of CVS, left would take me to Toms River, right would take me home. I made a left, what the heck, and just as I did, my phone pinged again--bird was there.

It took me about a half hour to get there and by the time I did more messages had come in that gave more precise location directions--from the Google map the high school looked like it was on a big campus. I parked in the first lot and hoped for the best, walking toward the athletic fields, since I knew that would be a likely area for the flycatcher. As soon as I turned the corner to get to the back of the school I saw the cream of Ocean County birders standing at the fence line and rushed to join them. There was no need for me to run. The bird was in plain sight, sitting on a fence, occasionally making sorties to hawk a bug. And it was spectacular. It would almost be worth living in Oklahoma, just to have this be a common bird. Maybe not. But the bird, aside from its incredible form, is beautifully and subtly colored in shades of gray and salmon.

More birders kept showing up--the power of social media. I took a few photos (like 50) and was going to leave but before I did, I texted Mike to see if he was available. The bird was putting on quite a show, I told him. He was able to get away, so I hung out until he got there--there's this bizarre concept of handing off a rarity--and it took him around a half hour to get there. Still more birders arrived; I count right now 26 reports on eBird and not everyone uses eBird and not everyone gets their reports in immediately.

This flycatcher was found by a teacher at the school who is not a birder but just happened to notice the strange bird on the fence and posted it to Facebook. I was talking to another birder about how randomly some rarities are reported--the Mississippi Kite in Waretown is a perfect example of a bird that would have gone overlooked if a birder didn't happen to live across the street from where it roosted. Birders go to the "hot" spots, but who knows what rarities are in the marshes on the Parkway that we can't access, or the playing fields of schools where we'd be considered creeps, or the waste treatment plants that are off limits due to "security" (and, well, the smell)? I remember there was a Prothonotary Warbler at the NY Public Library for a week before a birder noticed it--the guards thought it was canary and were feeding it corn chips!

And yet, 99% of the time, stopping at random field will yield you exactly nothing, never mind something rare. Sometimes you can look at acres and acres of open land and not see even a starling. You'll look at a lake and say, "How can there not be one duck on this water?" But 1% of the time, someone (a few times that someone has been me) will see something and say "What the hell is that?" and we all come running.

The last report, at 8:25 tonight, was that the bird had flown off, whether to find a place to sleep for the night or to continue its out of range wanderings we'll only know tomorrow.