Last Monday, not being too cold and not, amazingly, raining, snowing, or sleeting, I took my winter hike along Holgate, walking, according to eBird's tracker, 1.85 miles through the sand, keeping to the upper part of the beach where I could see the bay. The tide was very high and the waves were coming right up to the edge of the dunes. I turned around where the clamming trail starts since the water had broken through to the bay side. I wasn't going to wade through a foot of seawater just to not see more birds.
I actually did as well as I could expect, though I didn't find any new shorebirds (plovers, oystercatchers, or something really odd) for the year which was what I was hoping for. I did though, see a Snowy Owl, which is why this entry is delayed a week. Even though everyone knows they're there, I still feel uncomfortable reporting a Snowy Owl contemporaneously. A lot of photographers lurk on eBird looking for recent sightings; let them find their own birds.
While I was walking back to the parking lot, Zirlin's 3rd Law of Birding was once more demonstrated. The Law states, that Wherever you are, you should be somewhere else. Steve texted me that he had two Pileated Woodpeckers in Plumsted which was roughly 50 miles from where I was. Pileated is "rare" in Ocean County; I have seen them in Burlington, Mercer, Monmouth, Somerset, though never in my home county. But there was no way I was going all that distance after trudging up and down Holgate. (I tried the next day for the birds--three times--and never got them. Can you say "frustration" boys and girls?)
My list for that day:
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