Cape May 5/31--HEERMAN'S GULL, SWAINSON'S WARBLER

Talk about chasing a bird! This morning, while I was kicking around Reeve's Bogs, Shari texted me that the HEERMAN'S GULL found yesterday in Cape May in absolutely horrific weather, was still being seen and she wanted to go down there as it was a lifer. I have to admit I was kind of hoping it would move on, as I just didn't feel like going down to Cape May and looking for a gull on a beach, and since this bird has apparently been reported all over the east coast from Florida to Massachusetts with stops at Georgia, Rhode Island, and now NJ, maybe it would continue to wander. No such luck so I came home and off we went to its last known location, the park just north of the Ferry Terminal. 

Let the chasing begin. As soon as we arrived Bill Boyle told us that the bird was being seen just a little bit north of where we were, so we doubled back a quarter of mile or so. By the time we had parked the car and walked out onto the beach (5 minutes maybe) the bird had been flushed by a dog walker and flown off. No dogs are allowed on the beach from Memorial Day to Labor Day. Check the calendar, today is--yeah Memorial Day. The bird maybe had flown south so back to the park we went and walked up the beach--nothing but Laughing Gulls and Herring Gulls. It was cold, damp, overcast and windy--not Memorial Day weather. Since I didn't want to be there anyway, because this is what I feared would happen, I told Shari my back up plan idea. 

We went to Higbee Beach WMA, which we could see across the channel from the terminal but it about a 10 mile drive to get there and walked out to the beginning of the 2nd field. For the last couple of years in the spring and summer a SWAINSON'S WARBLER has been singing in this patch of brush but I've never felt like going down just to listen for a bird even if it was a lifer. I'd never even mentioned it to Shari who was little taken aback when I told her how long it had been coming to Higbee. I played the song 5 or 6 times in the car so we'd both have it fresh in our ears and just when Shari asked me where the spot was, I heard the bird. "That?" she asked. It sang again. "That," I replied. It sang again and again and again. It has a reputation for singing its little heart out. We were standing there listening, hoping it might show when a birder came up and aske if we knew where the Swainson's Warbler was. Before we could answer, he said, "Never mind, I hear it." 

There was a little, overgrown path off the main trail and we ducked in there looking for the bird. Like a rail, it sounded like we were right next to it, but like a rail, we could not find it. It was loud though and finally we saw a bird zip from the right to left and the song continued to the left. I wouldn't say we'd seen the bird but we'd seen the bird's movement. However you view it, or hear it, we had a life bird. It might be the first Consolation Life Bird we've ever listed. 

We went off to have lunch and while we were eating, I texted Steve, who I knew was coming down for the gull and told him we had just missed it by thirty seconds. He hadn't seen it yet either, was lunching, and was going to look for it again. As we were leaving, he texted me that the bird had been seen at Franklin Avenue maybe a quarter mile north of where we'd been in the morning. Again, it was about a 10 mile drive from where we were. 

When we got to Franklin Avenue we ran into another birder we know and she said the bird had flown north. "Follow her," I told Shari. We drove about a mile before we all decided we'd gone too far when I got a text from Steve: Now the bird was at Browning. South of where we were, so we had overshot the mark. Down to Browning we drove, parked, walked to the beach, saw nothing. Started walking south on the beach with me carrying the scope and the beachgoers asking us if we'd seen "the bird." "Not yet," I grumbled and in truth, I'd given up on seeing it, as is required by the Second Law of Birding. I came to a bulwark with about a two foot drop onto the beach and I was thinking about how I was going to get Shari and her cane down it. I plunked down my scope, saw 3 gulls naked eye, got them in the scope and knew I didn't have to get her any farther down the beach. Assuming she could get to the scope before the bird took off again. Up until then, I didn't have much invested in seeing the bird, but now that I had it, for the few moments it took Shari to "run" up the beach, the anxiety level was high and banging. "Look in the scope, look in the scope." "I got it." Whew. Just then I got another text from Steve: "Now Roslyn St." I texted back: Got it!

Of course, there was no need to be anxious about losing the bird. After flying up and down the Delaware Bay coast line, now the bird just settled and sat there like a statue as birders north and south scoped it, bino'd it, photographed it, and texted about it. Steve found us and we fist bumped. I was pleasantly surprised how well we were able to see it; I had imagined trying to tease it out of huge, mixed flock of gulls, but luckily it seemed to keep pretty much to itself, even when surrounded by a cohort of Laughing Gulls. And while I'm certainly no larophile, I will concede it is a good looking gull, all gray on the body with a while head and just a dash of gray on the crown and standout bright red bill. 

It is pretty unusual for Shari and me to get two life birds in one day in New Jersey. The last time it happened was four years ago. So the moral of this story is: Pessimism, grumpiness, and a bad attitude pay off! 

Island Beach SP 5/25--SOOTY SHEARWATER

It figures that the day I go to Brig and get 3 rarities is the day that a flight of the seldom seen from shore SOOTY SHEARWATER should appear all along the Jersey shore from Cape May to Deal, including many spots in Ocean County. That's another law: Wherever you are, you should be somewhere else. 

As a Sooty Shearwater would be a life bird for me, this morning I got up and said to myself, "Let's go look for the Shitty Shearwaters." I knew from the descriptions I'd been reading that this would not be as exciting as the day I finally got my life Dovekies; all the reports had the birds far offshore; you read "by the 1 mile buoy" and you know no one is getting the field guide looks. Still, since I'm never going on a pelagic I'd better seize the opportunity. I decided that Island Beach afforded me the best chance for viewing without having to stand elbow to elbow with a lot of other birders on a jetty at Manasquan or Barnegat. I got to the dune crossing at A23 and set up my scope. As so often happens when looking for a rarity, you either find it right away or else you get it at the very end. There is no middle. Today, after a few moments I saw two dark gray birds with pointed wings that had silvery highlights, gliding low over the waves to the south of where I stood. There were the birds. It wasn't even anticlimactic. It was just species #1401. No jumping up and down with happiness as with the Dovekies. Tubenoses are not charismatic birds like alcids. If I didn't know that were around, I strongly doubt I'd ever pick them on my own. This makes the 3rd shearwater I've seen from shore. 

Purple Sandpipers

I walked down to the jetty. On the way I saw one more shearwater. Three seems to be about the average number of birds getting reported by any one observers. Some have 18, some only 1. Some birds down at the jetty were actually more interesting to me than seeing the flight of the shearwaters. There had been small gatherings of shorebirds all along the mile walk--oystercatchers, Black-bellied Plovers, turnstones, Sanderlings--and at the jetty, with more beautiful turnstones, was a sandpiper I didn't recognize at first. They had the conformation, beak, and leg color of Purple Sandpipers, but their plumage was all "wrong." Besides, I thought that Purple Sandpipers, a specialty of Barnegat Light across the inlet would, like the Harlequin Ducks, be long gone. However, eBird doesn't even have them as "infrequent" much less rare at this time of year. I just had never seen (or remember seeing) Purple Sandpipers in spring. 

I walked to the "back" of the jetty and found one Black Scoter. Again, not rare. However, the 110 Common Eiders I counted, those were rare. Supposedly there are a few King Eider hens mixed in with the flock. They must have been in the half that flew off in the midst of my counting. 

Common Eiders

I had 29 species in the mile and a half from the parking lot to the overlook of the Sedge Islands.

Canada Goose  14

Common Eider  110      

Black Scoter  1       

American Oystercatcher  6

Black-bellied Plover  11

Semipalmated Plover  4

Ruddy Turnstone  22

Sanderling  16

Dunlin  47

Purple Sandpiper  17

Semipalmated Sandpiper  15

Laughing Gull  100

Herring Gull  50

Lesser Black-backed Gull  1     Immature

Great Black-backed Gull  15

Common Tern  10

Forster's Tern  5

SOOTY SHEARWATER   3       

Double-crested Cormorant  20

Great Egret  2

Osprey  4

Eastern Kingbird  1

Fish Crow  4

Barn Swallow  1

American Goldfinch  2

Song Sparrow  3

Eastern Towhee  1     Heard

Boat-tailed Grackle  1

Common Yellowthroat  1

Brig 5/24--Curlew Sandpiper, Wilson's Phalarope, Red-necked Phalarope, Yellow-breasted Chat

Curlew Sandpiper

One rare sandpiper at Brig wasn't enough to induce me to go down there. The thought of looking through 2000 Dunlins made me queasy. Two rare sandpipers wasn't enough to induce me either.  We spent 3 days in Delaware looking at thousands of shorebirds--all that shimmer, all that glare. But three rare sandpipers at Brig--okay, I'll give it a shot. 

Red-necked Phalaropes

And I did get three rare sandpipers at Brig just not the one that tipped the balance. Even though I'd just seen Black-necked Stilts 3 days running in Delaware, one in NJ would have been a little ornament on the state year list. Yet it wasn't there today. I didn't make much of an attempt to look for the long staying rarity because of the aforementioned flocks of Dunlins. So, Goose Markers 4, 5, & 7 having produced nothing but some extremely attractive Ruddy Turnstones, it was on to the dogleg where I hoped to score at least one new bird for the year. I got out my scope and looked through the various sandpipers. Lots of Greater Yellowlegs, lots of peeps which, by that point, I'd stopped tallying. I moved my position a few dozen yards up the road and began another scan and then I found one Red-necked Phalarope. There were supposedly two, but I only need one to make me "happy."  I drove around to the north side of the pool and set up shop again. Another birder there said he had found the 2nd phalarope and after a bit so did I. 

Now that I had one new bird on the list and didn't feel like a total failure, I drove up the road to Jen's Trail and took my walk. I walked Jen's Trail and then down to the Overlook Pond and along the road almost to the exit, cut across on the old rail bed trail and walked to the Gull Pond. On my way back I met a fellow birder and we talked about what was and wasn't there. He hadn't started his loop around the drive yet. I walked back to the car and in the cleared field in front of the Overlook I heard, three times, the chatter and babble of a Yellow-breasted Chat. I couldn't find it. I suspect it was buried in one of the few big trees left standing but as that is an historical spot for chats and no other bird sounds quite like it, I was certain of my i.d.

I was back at the car with 4 miles of endorphins pinging around in my brain and two year birds for the day. A quick lunch and then a drive to the end so I could start a 2nd loop. And glad I am that I did instead of just bolting for home. The Black-necked Stilt wasn't there but just before the observation tower I saw my acquaintance again and the "Don't Look for Bird, Look for the Birders" Law kicked in. He was tapping away at his phone and when he saw me smiled and pointed down. Right in front of us, without having to separate it from a thousand distant Dunlins, was the Curlew Sandpiper that was found two weeks ago. And then he mentioned that there was a Wilson's Phalarope at the dogleg. "You mean Red-necked," I said. "No, Wilson's and Red-necked." 

Wilson's Phalarope (center) with Greater Yellowlegs & Snowy Egret

I'd seen one or two reports of Wilson's the last few days but dismissed them as errors. Maybe they were, but this one wasn't. I tootled along to the dogleg again and set up my scope. A birder to my left was describing the Wilson's to his friend. I scanned around and found the two Red-necked Phalaropes and right between them--the Wilson's.  So what if the birding gods were playing bait and switch with me--I'll take a year bird for a state bird every time. 

76 species

Canada Goose  125

Mute Swan  18

Mallard  12

American Black Duck  2

Mourning Dove  6

Clapper Rail  1     Heard

Black-bellied Plover  50

Semipalmated Plover  400

Whimbrel  5

Ruddy Turnstone  100

Red Knot  1

Curlew Sandpiper  1    

Dunlin  2000

Least Sandpiper  20

Semipalmated Sandpiper  1000

Short-billed Dowitcher  100

Wilson's Phalarope  1     GM14

Red-necked Phalarope  2     Females at GM 14.

Greater Yellowlegs  15

Willet  12

Laughing Gull  125

Herring Gull  20

Great Black-backed Gull  4

Gull-billed Tern  5

Caspian Tern  2

Common Tern  2

Forster's Tern  10

Black Skimmer  50

Double-crested Cormorant  20

Great Blue Heron  3

Great Egret  17

Snowy Egret  2

Green Heron  1     Flyover Gull pond road

Glossy Ibis  4

Turkey Vulture  4

Osprey  5

Eastern Wood-Pewee  1     Heard upland

Willow Flycatcher  1     Heard Gull pond

Eastern Phoebe  1     Heard upland

Great Crested Flycatcher  2

Eastern Kingbird  1

White-eyed Vireo  2

Red-eyed Vireo  1     Heard Jen’s Trail

Blue Jay  2

American Crow  10

Fish Crow  1

Carolina Chickadee  2

Tufted Titmouse  1     Heard upland

Purple Martin  20

Tree Swallow  15

Barn Swallow  2

White-breasted Nuthatch  1     Heard

Marsh Wren  5     Heard

Carolina Wren  4

European Starling  2

Gray Catbird  20

Eastern Bluebird  1

American Robin  3

House Finch  1     Heard

American Goldfinch  1

Chipping Sparrow  3

Field Sparrow  2     Heard upland

Seaside Sparrow  3     Heard

Song Sparrow  2

Eastern Towhee  2

Yellow-breasted Chat  1     Heard open field in front of overlook

Orchard Oriole  1

Red-winged Blackbird  115

Boat-tailed Grackle  1

Ovenbird  2     Heard upland

Common Yellowthroat  5

Yellow Warbler  3

Pine Warbler  1     Heard upland

Yellow-rumped Warbler  1     On rail bed trail   Dull. Probably female.

Northern Cardinal  3

Indigo Bunting  2

A couple of decent photographs of birds instead of doc shots:

Ruddy Turnstone

The dreaded Dunlin

Manahawkin WMA | Stafford Preserve 5/23--Willow Flycatcher, Bank Swallow

. "Fitz-bew!" 

Back to looking for birds that have been avoiding me. I don't keep records of my earliest sightings in the year for particular species, but I know I should have encountered a Willow Flycatcher by now--everybody else has--so I was kicking around Manahawkin WMA this morning looking and listening for one. I can tell you that will be my last outing to that WMA for a while--the vegetation is high and while I was Muck booted, permethrin clad with permethrin socks stuffed into permethrin pants with arms and face slathered with repellent there were sections I was just not willing to walk into because of the high tick density. I came away tick-free (almost sure) but I don't like the odds there and until they mow the paths, I'm avoiding the place. 

I did find a Willow Flycatcher when I got out of the woods and fields and onto the impoundments. I heard the "Fitz-bew" clearly then found the bird atop a dead tree. It was the first of 4 Willows that I saw and heard. 

The water was extraordinarily low--whether intentionally or because of the recent lack of rain I don't know--and the mud attracted hundreds of shorebirds (Semipalmated Sandpipers, Least Sandpipers, Semipalmated Plovers, a few Willets) but I wasn't carrying my scope so that intriguing russet sandpiper with the long straight bill will go unidentified by me. 

After that I went to what is undoubtedly the most unattractive birding spot in Ocean County, the construction site cum wasteland in Stafford Township with the bucolic name of Stafford Preserve. It is a seemingly endless project of building condominiums atop the old landfill, though I don't think they've made much progress in the year or so since I was last there. The mountains of dirt scattered around the cracked mud are the reason to go there--I counted 10 Bank Swallow holes punched in one mound and saw four of the swallows flying around. Since I am very bad at identifying fast-moving birds at a distance, this is the sure-fire way for me to see Bank Swallows, though even there, Tree, Barn, and Northern Rough-winged Swallows were also in the mix. 

Interestingly, the nests seem to be in the same hill of dirt as they were last year, or at least a hill of dirt that is, as I recall, in more or less the same spot. That's one of the reasons I say it doesn't look like much has happened in the last year. Now, will the nests be let alone? I understand that in the sand quarries that pepper the Pine Barrens the workers leave the swallows alone when they nest in a hill, but I don't know if that tradition will extend to this project. 

As a species, we have evolved to look for faces. Its a survival instinct though sometimes it goes awry which is why the Virgin Mary appears on refrigerators or in bowls of oatmeal. Or why a couple of Bank Swallow nests and a horizontal stick suddenly grabs my attention. 

Bombay Hook 5/19 & 5/21--Northern Bobwhite, Black-necked Stilt, Swainson's Thrush, Grasshopper Sparrow

Black-necked Stilt

There aren't too many birds in Delaware that we can't find in NJ, but there are a couple of specialties of the state that make a trip down there worth the while for a little 14th anniversary getaway. We started our first trip around Bombay Hook on midday Wednesday. The impoundments there seem better "controlled" for shorebirds than Brig and there were thousands of them--Dunlins, dowitchers, Least Sandpipers, semipalm and semisand, Black-bellied Plovers, the occasional tringa species. My strategy was to look for anything bigger than a Black-belly Plover and it wasn't until the far end of the Shearness Pool on our way return trip that I found one of those specialties, a single Black-necked Stilt. It just stood out with its bubblegum pink legs, towering over the peeps pecking at the mud.  Interestingly, there were no avocets this trip, while in March we had hundreds. Where do they go? It isn't like they fly north to mate, otherwise we'd be inundated with them in NJ instead of getting excited about the 3 that show up at Brig. 

The next day Shari & I did a little exploring, going down to the southwest part of the state to tour the Delaware Botanic Gardens which are all native plantings. It was interesting, but not a place to see many birds on a hot morning. Our trip to Prime Hook yielded little, though Eastern Meadowlark in the entrance fields was a surprise and a state bird for us. Some rarities had been reported along Big Stone Beach Road which we had birded a few years ago with great success. This year, not so much--no Brown-headed Nuthatch, no Sedge Wren. A pair of Indigo Buntings that looked to be nesting was the most interesting sighting. Then we doubled back to one of our favorite spots, The DuPont Nature Center which did not disappoint with thousands of shorebirds on the beach along the jetty, including two more Black-necked Stilts, along with hundreds of Ruddy Turnstones and a dozen or so Red Knots. 

Friday, our last day, we started at Bombay Hook around 8 in the morning and it was by far the most productive of our days. Along with 3 more very entertaining Black-necked Stilts, we added 3 more year birds, two of them thanks to Shari's sharp hearing. As we started on the drive Shari asked me what sparrow made a little insect sound. Of course, I hadn't heard it. I suggested, knowing the habitat and knowing that I'd seen them there in the past, Grasshopper Sparrow. I played her the song and she said, "That's what I heard." And so did the bird because it flew right to the edge of the field and gave us brief but diagnostic looks. Later, along the Bear Swamp Pool trail we saw a thrush that wasn't one of the Wood Thrushes we'd been hearing in various spots. It stayed behind leaves but we got decent enough looks to confirm Swainson's Thrush, a thrush that for some reason eludes me pretty regularly around here. 

As we started to go around a second time after lunch, by the Grasshopper Sparrow field Shari called out "Bobwhite." She'd heard it, I hadn't. Of course. We waited but no second call came. We drove around Raymond, Shearness, Bear Swamp Pool again, skipping the tangent of Finis Pool. On our way back, just before we made the turn to take us to the HQ parking lot, we both heard BOBWHITE as if it were in the car with us. Shari was relieved that not only was she not having auditory hallucinations but that I'm not completely deaf yet. 

For our 3 days in Delaware we had 84 species plus two very good Indian meals (Flavor of India on Dupont Blvd next to the Super 8 Motel).

Species              First Sighting
Canada Goose   Bombay Hook
Mute Swan   Bombay Hook
Mallard   Bombay Hook
American Black Duck   Bombay Hook
Green-winged Teal   Bombay Hook
Northern Bobwhite   Bombay Hook
Wild Turkey   Bombay Hook
Rock Pigeon   Big Stone Beach Rd.
Mourning Dove   Bombay Hook
Clapper Rail   Bombay Hook
Virginia Rail   Bombay Hook
Black-necked Stilt   Bombay Hook
Black-bellied Plover   Bombay Hook
Semipalmated Plover   Bombay Hook
Killdeer   Bombay Hook
Ruddy Turnstone   DuPont Nature Center
Red Knot   DuPont Nature Center
Stilt Sandpiper   Bombay Hook
Dunlin   Bombay Hook
Least Sandpiper   Bombay Hook
Semipalmated Sandpiper   Bombay Hook
Short-billed Dowitcher   Bombay Hook
Greater Yellowlegs   Bombay Hook
Willet   Bombay Hook
Lesser Yellowlegs   DuPont Nature Center
Laughing Gull   Delaware Botanic Gardens
Ring-billed Gull   Bombay Hook
Herring Gull   Bombay Hook
Great Black-backed Gull   DuPont Nature Center
Forster's Tern   Bombay Hook
Double-crested Cormorant   Bombay Hook
Great Blue Heron   Bombay Hook
Great Egret   Bombay Hook
Snowy Egret   Bombay Hook
Little Blue Heron   Bombay Hook
Glossy Ibis   Prime Hook
Turkey Vulture   Bombay Hook
Osprey   Delaware Botanic Gardens
Bald Eagle   Bombay Hook
Red-tailed Hawk   Hilton Garden Inn
Red-bellied Woodpecker   Bombay Hook
Eastern Wood-Pewee   Bombay Hook
Great Crested Flycatcher   Bombay Hook
Eastern Kingbird   Bombay Hook
White-eyed Vireo   Bombay Hook
Yellow-throated Vireo   Bombay Hook
Red-eyed Vireo   Bombay Hook
Blue Jay   Bombay Hook
American Crow   Delaware Botanic Gardens
Fish Crow   Hilton Garden Inn
Carolina Chickadee   Delaware Botanic Gardens
Tufted Titmouse   Bombay Hook
Northern Rough-winged Swallow   Bombay Hook
Purple Martin   Bombay Hook
Tree Swallow   Bombay Hook
Barn Swallow   Bombay Hook
Marsh Wren   Bombay Hook
Carolina Wren   Bombay Hook
European Starling   Delaware Botanic Gardens
Gray Catbird   Bombay Hook
Brown Thrasher   Bombay Hook
Northern Mockingbird   Hilton Garden Inn
Swainson's Thrush   Bombay Hook
Wood Thrush   Bombay Hook
American Robin   Bombay Hook
House Sparrow   Bombay Hook
House Finch   Bombay Hook
American Goldfinch   Bombay Hook
Grasshopper Sparrow   Bombay Hook
Chipping Sparrow   Bombay Hook
Field Sparrow   Bombay Hook
Seaside Sparrow   Bombay Hook
Eastern Towhee   Bombay Hook
Eastern Meadowlark   Prime Hook
Red-winged Blackbird   Bombay Hook
Brown-headed Cowbird   Prime Hook
Common Grackle   Bombay Hook
Boat-tailed Grackle   DuPont Nature Center
Ovenbird   Bombay Hook
Common Yellowthroat   Bombay Hook
Yellow Warbler   Bombay Hook
Blackpoll Warbler   Bombay Hook
Northern Cardinal   Bombay Hook
Indigo Bunting   Bombay Hook

Island Beach SP 5/17--Brown Pelican, Common Tern, Bay-breasted Warbler

It's hard to think of more disparate year birds--the flying boat of the Brown Pelican and the little jewel of the Bay-breasted Warbler with a middling Common Tern thrown in, but that's what makes birding so great--they come in all shapes and sizes. (On the other hand, the shrew and the elephant are both mammals, yet I wouldn't be particularly interested in seeing them both in the same day.) 

I started off on Reed's Road, that warbler trap, on Island Beach early this morning--the vagaries of admission let me in well before 8 AM. I ran into a birder who asked me about a bird he'd just seen that he'd hoped was a Red-eyed Vireo. Having just seen one, I said yeah, probably. Turns out he was a new birder and it was a lifer for him. Now I wasn't so blasé about the bird and we quickly refound it. He also had a Blackpoll Warbler in the oak tree near us, and that was a lifer for him. Later, we saw a yellow and black warbler fluttering in the oak tree and identified it as an American Redstart. He looked puzzled until I explained that the  females and young birds were yellow. I didn't even go into the Yellowstart  spiel, out of pity for a new birder, but that was his third lifer for the morning. How I envied him. I have to make a real effort to get a lifer nowadays. 

I was soon joined by Steve and we continued into the bowl where, if I'd had my eBird tracking on, our wanderings would have made a meander look like a straight line. Plenty of warblers in there, just nothing new. And we, at this point in the year, want new. 

It wasn't until we were almost at the end of the trail that we both finally got a new warbler for the year, the aforementioned Bay-breasted Warbler. We were trying to track down a singing bird that neither of us could identify when I spotted the warbler high up in a tree. Playing its song we definitely eliminated it as the invisible singer. 

After that we went our separate ways. I wanted to walk along the beach at the south end of the park. If I was lucky (and I was) I'd get my first Brown Pelican for the year. There really wasn't much of anything along the mile walk to the jetty, but there was one pelican I spotted, naked eye. They're big. A couple of Common Terns cruising the breakers completed my day. Kind of late in the year to be getting your first Common Tern but that's birding for you. 

11 species of warblers. 50 species altogether. 

Mute Swan
Mallard
Mourning Dove
Ruby-throated Hummingbird
American Oystercatcher
Willet
Laughing Gull
Herring Gull
Great Black-backed Gull
Common Tern
Forster's Tern
Double-crested Cormorant
Brown Pelican
Great Egret
Glossy Ibis
Osprey
Red-tailed Hawk
Red-bellied Woodpecker
Great Crested Flycatcher
White-eyed Vireo
Red-eyed Vireo
Fish Crow
Carolina Chickadee
Red-breasted Nuthatch
House Wren
Carolina Wren
Gray Catbird
Veery
American Robin
American Goldfinch
Chipping Sparrow
Song Sparrow
Eastern Towhee
Baltimore Oriole
Red-winged Blackbird
Common Grackle
Ovenbird
Black-and-white Warbler
Common Yellowthroat
American Redstart
Northern Parula
Magnolia Warbler
Bay-breasted Warbler
Yellow Warbler
Blackpoll Warbler
Black-throated Blue Warbler
Black-throated Green Warbler
Scarlet Tanager
Northern Cardinal
Rose-breasted Grosbeak

Great Bay Blvd | Huber Preserve 5/16--Pacific Golden-Plover, Acadian Flycatcher, Prothonotary Warbler

Pacific Golden-Plover, Great Bay Blvd (digiscope)

My plans for today of a long walk around Reeve's Bogs followed by a trip to the Huber Preserve were disrupted by yesterday's incredible find of a Pacific Golden-Plover down on Great Bay Blvd.  I was down in Tuckerton on Friday but couldn't do the whole road due to a brush fire just before the second bridge. Ironically, just a few dozen yards north of the fire is where the plover was found the next day. Was it there Friday and I missed it in the hubbub? My pride tells me no. By the time I found out about it yesterday it was mid-afternoon and while I could have rushed right down there, fecklessness kept me at home.

But I awoke at 4 this morning and said to myself, "Well, if I want to go to Reeve's, I better go down to Tuckerton now." I arrived there at 5:45 AM, just about at lowest tide and started looking. There was one other birder there, which surprised me but I was happy to have beaten the frenzy. Of course, all the mud flats I looked at were full of birds I didn't want to see today, whereas normally I'd be thrilled with the variety. Up the road I saw the birder who'd found the plover originally and her friend scanning the marsh. Rule #4 of Zirlin's Laws of Birding says 

    Don't look for the bird, look for the birders

so I ambled up there and set up my scope with them. No luck though she did find a couple of Whimbrel (new for the county for both of us) and I found a Ruddy Turnstone sticking out brightly against the drabness of the distant peeps. 

She wandered down the road toward the boat launch area that had been on fire Friday. Rule #5 says

    If you want to see good birds, hang out with good birders.

I figured, she found it once, she can find it again. And, just about when I caught up with her she said, "Check out that bird, I think it's the one." I put up my bins and saw a plover that didn't look Black-bellied, but it was moving in and out of the marsh grass. Happily I was lugging my scope so instead of haplessly trying to find the bird with it, I ceded it to her and she got on it almost immediately. Yep, that's the plover. She called for the other birders to come down and four of us tramped a little way into the marsh, set up our scope and started watching the bird in earnest, losing it for a moment behind clumps of vegetation, refinding it, losing it again. Naturally, I'd left my camera in the car, though I suspect I wouldn't have done my much good, given the lighting conditions and distance of the bird. I was able to digiscope photos that document my sighting and really, that's all I cared about. 

While this wasn't a life bird--the last one I saw was on Lady Elliot Island off the coast of Australia--it did check a lot of boxes:

    Year bird✅

    County bird✅

    State bird✅

    US bird✅

    ABA bird✅

    Western Hemisphere bird✅

It was about 7:15. A couple of birders arrived and I said goodbye. I could feel the onrushing tide of birders coming down and let's just say I wanted to make room for them. In 45 minutes I was where I originally planned to be, Reeve's Bogs, glad to see that the front bogs were low and that they were attracting the commonplace sandpipers like Solitary, Spotted, Least, and Lesser Yellowlegs. I was wearing my new Muck Boots and fearlessly sloshing through the flooded trails, checking out an amazing number of insectivorous pitcher plants growing along the edge of what I believe is called Bear Pool, as well as Spoonleaf Sundew. Not a good place to be a fly. I also heard a Hooded Warbler, my first for Reeve's. 

Prothonotary Warbler, Huber Preserve

I was dithering about whether Huber would be active in the late morning but decided that the one bird I hoped to see would probably be around. I walked in to the wood bridge, hearing, but not seeing, a good variety of birds (cuckoos, pewees, Ovenbirds, and, of course, Prairie Warblers) until I got to the T where I saw an Eastern Phoebe. I decided to hang out at the bridge for a half hour and see what flew in. It didn't take long for my target bird to arrive--a beautiful Prothonotary Warbler. I'm pretty certain they nest in the vicinity of the stream. It is almost a dead certainty that in the spring you'll find one there. Also "singing" and flitting around in the crown of the trees was an Acadian Flycatcher: Pizza! Having heard Hooded Warbler, I decided again venturing down the trail any farther to the spot where they nest. It was almost noon and I'd had enough. I bird every day, but I don't bird all day.

I looked at the eBird reports on my phone. 30, 40, 50 reports of the plover. The fishermen and crabbers must have wondered what the hell was going on down there. I was glad to be 30 miles away.

Brig 5/13--Least Tern

I did two loops around Brig today with Bob Auster and, with 81 species, thought I had done pretty well until I looked at some other lists, including Bob's, and noted what I'd missed. Part of the problem is that Bob hears a lot better than I do, so I missed a couple of warblers. Some of it is just luck (bad on my part)--after we parted, he had a Scarlet Tanager on the way out of the refuge. 

While standing on the north dike, scoping a huge flock of Dunlin, I said to Bob that I'd never be the one to find a Curlew Sandpiper in amongst them. I see a huge flock of birds all the same size and I get what I can only describe as visual fatigue very quickly; I just can't look at that many birds all the same size, all the same color. If a godwit or Long-billed Curlew was standing in the middle of the flock, sure, that I'd find, but not a bird that looks more or less like all the others. I specialize in easy rarities--spoonbills, lapwings, Scissor-tailed Flycatchers, White Ibises. The Western Sandpiper we saw today wasn't found by me--that was Bob's perspicacity.  

And, in between our two trips, a group arrived led by a much, much better birder than either of us. Sure enough, there was a Curlew Sandpiper at Brig today, right around Marker 4 where Bob & I spent a lot of time scanning in the morning. In the afternoon, on our second trip, the water was much higher and there were few birds in the pools, so we didn't stop to scan again. Of course, had we, I wouldn't have found the bird; Bob probably yes. 

American Avocet

For a day list of 81 species, I would hope for more than one year bird, but, I guess I've seen a lot of easy birds this year because only the Least Tern we saw at the NE Corner was new for me, although the "returning" American Avocets at the dogleg were a state year bird--I'd seen hundreds earlier this year in Delaware . Last year there was a small contingent of avocets all through the summer, so when I heard there were avocets again at Brig for the third year running, I didn't feel any urge to immediately rush right down. In fact, I hardly ever feel that urge anymore. But, I was happy to see them today, they being one of my favorite birds. 

Snow Goose  2

Brant  22

Canada Goose  80

Mute Swan  20

Wood Duck  2

Mallard  14

American Black Duck  100

Pied-billed Grebe  1     Exit pond.\

Mourning Dove  5

Clapper Rail  4

American Avocet  3    

American Oystercatcher  2

Black-bellied Plover  9

Semipalmated Plover  15

Whimbrel  25

Ruddy Turnstone  11

Stilt Sandpiper  1

Dunlin  1600

Least Sandpiper  200

Semipalmated Sandpiper  50

Western Sandpiper  1     Reddish back slight droop to beak east dike w Dunlin

Short-billed Dowitcher  400

Greater Yellowlegs  50

Willet  15

Lesser Yellowlegs  50     Large flock

Bonaparte's Gull  3

Laughing Gull  30

Ring-billed Gull  20

Herring Gull  25

Great Black-backed Gull  4

Least Tern  1

Gull-billed Tern  15

Caspian Tern  4

Forster's Tern  30

Black Skimmer  145

Double-crested Cormorant  15

Great Blue Heron  10

Great Egret  24

Snowy Egret  4

Turkey Vulture  5

Osprey  10

Bald Eagle  2

Red-bellied Woodpecker  1     Heard

Northern Flicker  3

Eastern Wood-Pewee  1     Heard parking lot

Great Crested Flycatcher  5

Eastern Kingbird  4

White-eyed Vireo  2     Heard

Blue Jay  8

American Crow  1

Fish Crow  15

Carolina Chickadee  3     Heard

Tufted Titmouse  2     Heard

Northern Rough-winged Swallow  8

Purple Martin  50

Tree Swallow  20

Barn Swallow  10

House Wren  1     Heard picnic area

Marsh Wren  3     Heard

Carolina Wren  1     Heard

European Starling  5

Gray Catbird  30

Eastern Bluebird  2

Wood Thrush  1     Jen's Trail

American Robin  4

Cedar Waxwing  1

House Finch  5

Chipping Sparrow  3

Field Sparrow  2     Heard

Seaside Sparrow  5     Heard

Saltmarsh Sparrow  1

Song Sparrow  3

Eastern Towhee  4

Red-winged Blackbird  150

Brown-headed Cowbird  5

Common Grackle  1

Boat-tailed Grackle  3

Ovenbird  2     Heard

Common Yellowthroat  15

Yellow Warbler  10

Northern Cardinal  3

Ruddy Turnstone

Manasquan River WMA 5/9--Blue-winged Warbler

Blue-winged Warbler

My psyche had skidded past disgust and was about to crash into self-loathing. For the 3rd time in a week I had spent hours circling the fields at Manasquan River WMA without even the hint of a Blue-winged Warbler.  This is supposed to be the place to get that warbler; any other bird you might come across there I have other, closer spots to check. And yet I couldn't find one. I played the song on my phone to get to get it fresh in my mind. "I'll never hear that," I told myself, "I can barely hear it on the phone." 

So there I stood in the far corner of the far field, head down, stymied, seething, giving up, ready to go home and watch deGrom pitch. And then I heard "Bzz bzz." I looked up, amazed I could hear such a soft sibilant sound. And upon looking up, I saw movement, and upon raising my binocular, I saw the bird, and it even stayed still for a moment for a half-assed photo. And thus, another demonstration of Zirlin's Second Law of Birding, to wit:

You will not see the bird until you have truly given up.

Earlier in the morning I witnessed the most peculiar behavior by a Cooper's Hawk. Walking along the northern side of the far field, I flushed a Coop out of a tree's low branches. It flew about 100 feet ahead and landed in a leafless bush or sapling. It then hung upside down, wing (you'll forgive the conflicting species expression) spread-eagled. I thought it was caught in brambles; I once saw that happen at Brig. I approached cautiously and the bird flapped around, seemingly helpless, but then, as if to demonstrate that the show was over, it simply let go of the branch with one claw and stood on the ground, staring balefully at me. I have no idea what was going on with the hawk and, as Wittgenstein said, if it could talk, I wouldn't understand it. 

A couple of other birders there had warblers and flycatchers I would have liked to have seen and/or heard, but I was happy to finally get what is supposed to be an "easy" bird. 

41 species

Ruby-throated Hummingbird  2

Great Egret  1     Flyover

Turkey Vulture  9

Osprey  1

Cooper's Hawk  1       

Red-bellied Woodpecker  5

Great Crested Flycatcher  2     Heard

Eastern Kingbird  8

White-eyed Vireo  5

Red-eyed Vireo  3

Blue Jay  9

American Crow  6

Carolina Chickadee  6

Tufted Titmouse  1     Heard

Tree Swallow  10

White-breasted Nuthatch  1     Heard

Blue-gray Gnatcatcher  1

House Wren  1

Gray Catbird  40

Brown Thrasher  1

Eastern Bluebird  2

Wood Thrush  4     Heard

American Robin  3

American Goldfinch  6

Chipping Sparrow  1

Field Sparrow  12

White-throated Sparrow  2

Eastern Towhee  1     Heard

Brown-headed Cowbird  7

Common Grackle  3

Ovenbird  15     Heard

Blue-winged Warbler  1

Common Yellowthroat  15

American Redstart  2

Magnolia Warbler  1

Black-throated Blue Warbler  1

Prairie Warbler  4

Black-throated Green Warbler  1

Northern Cardinal  6

Blue Grosbeak  1

Indigo Bunting  7

Great Bay Blvd 5/8--Saltmarsh Sparrow

Saltmarsh Sparrow, in flight

In baseball, you hit 'em where they ain't. In birding, I go where it ain't raining. A crescent of precipitation was encroaching on my favorite spots this morning from Pemberton to Pt. Pleasant, but Tuckerton, on the radar, looked dry. I didn't expect much warbler activity, but there might be a few interesting birds down there to see. 

I drove the 4+ miles from the first bridge down to the inlet and, while the waders and shorebirds were in good numbers both in quantity and diversity, it wasn't until I was walking the mud flats at the in lets where I kicked up one of the birds I usually find there, a Saltmarsh Sparrow.  The one photo I managed shows the bird flying away, but that's more than I usually get. 

Red Knots

This time of year also provides a good window for Red Knots, and while they were on my list, they were lousy looks from Brig, so when I saw three foraging around the feet of lingering Brant I was happy. Other interesting sights included two Clapper Rails running across the road right in front of my, luckily, slow moving car; an unusual for the spot Blue-winged Teal; and a couple of small groups of Gull-billed Terns. The only warblers I found were the expect Common Yellowthroats, Yellow Warblers, and one Magnolia Warbler just before the 2nd wooden bridge. 

I spent over 5 hours at Great Bay Blvd, driving its length and walking from the inlet up to the first wooden bridge and back. I managed 53 species on the cool, breezy, but essentially dry day. 

Brant  122

Canada Goose  4

Mute Swan  1

Blue-winged Teal  1

Mallard  1

American Black Duck  4

Mourning Dove  5

Clapper Rail  9

American Oystercatcher  1

Black-bellied Plover  230

Semipalmated Plover  22

Red Knot  5

Dunlin  280

Least Sandpiper  7

Semipalmated Sandpiper  1

Short-billed Dowitcher  25

Greater Yellowlegs  20

Willet  12

Lesser Yellowlegs  2

Laughing Gull  25

Herring Gull  75

Great Black-backed Gull  4

Gull-billed Tern  9

Forster's Tern  50

Common Loon  1

Double-crested Cormorant  19

Great Blue Heron  1

Great Egret  45

Snowy Egret  25

Tricolored Heron  3

Black-crowned Night-Heron  5

Glossy Ibis  8

Turkey Vulture  2

Osprey  8

Bald Eagle  1

Blue Jay  1

Fish Crow  5

Tree Swallow  5

Barn Swallow  25

Gray Catbird  1

Northern Mockingbird  1

American Robin  2

House Finch  2

Seaside Sparrow  5

Saltmarsh Sparrow  2

Savannah Sparrow  1

Song Sparrow  6

Red-winged Blackbird  50

Boat-tailed Grackle  30

Common Yellowthroat  7

Magnolia Warbler  1

Yellow Warbler  2

Northern Cardinal  3

Clapper Rail

Double Trouble | Whitesbog | Collinstown Road 5/6--Chuck-will's-widow, Veery, Blackpoll Warbler

 One of the things I like to do this time of year is to stand on a cross-dike at Whitesbog and let the swallows swirl around me. If you've ever done something like that, you'll understand how Twitter got its name.* I had 4 species of swallows swooping over the reservoirs on the Ocean County side--Purple Martin, Northern Rough-wing, Barn, and Tree Swallows. Couldn't find a Bank. 

Ovenbird, Whitesbog

I wound up there after spending the early morning at Double Trouble. I had intended to spend all morning there, but a screw-up with an appointment at the house cut my visit short, so after dealing with that matter, I drove over to Whitesbog where I was pleasantly surprised at how many birds were still active mid-morning. Whitesbog is not the warbler hot spot that Double Trouble can be, and yet I did just as well there as I did at DT, including getting my year Blackpoll Warbler while standing at the spot where Yellow Warblers tend to nest. I also had good looks at Black-throated Blue Warbler, Prairie Warbler, Northern Parula, American Redstart, and finally, after hearing and hearing and hearing dozens of Ovenbirds over the last few weeks, I got more than a fleeting glimpse of one, singing on a branch, eye-high, as they tend to be. You'd think a bird that you don't have induce warbler neck to see would be easier to find. Well, as I used to say to my employer: You'd think that and you'd be wrong. 

Solitary Sandpiper, Double Trouble

Double Trouble just seemed to be getting started when I had to leave. There were a few happy surprises while I was there--a Solitary Sandpiper in the bogs behind the packing house, along with a couple of Glossy Ibises, the singing Hooded Warbler heard in its usual place on Mud Dam Road, and my first Veery of the year, also on Mud Dam Road. 

With the Mets having played a day game (a win that felt like a loss, because the Cards played so poorly the Mets should have beaten them by 10 runs) the evening looked pretty empty. So after Jeopardy (a dismal performance from the challengers), Shari & I drove down to Collinstown Road in Barnegat. Sunset was 7:56 tonight but it wouldn't be dark for 20 or 25 minutes after that. The dimming of the light gives me a chance to use one of favorite words: Crepuscular. About 15 minutes after sunset, we heard Chuck-will's-widow calling from the woods. Unlike our persistent Whip-poor-will, Chucks are crepuscular, calling as the light fades or dawns so the timing is important. A Great Horned Owl also hooted making for an interesting duet. 

*How did a word that, when applied to human speech, means speaking inanely and foolishly, come to be the name of a gigantic communications platform? I understand that the name is apt and appropriate, but I don't believe Jack Dorsey really understood the meaning of the word when they trademarked the name. 

Manasquan River WMA 5/5--Red-eyed Vireo, Orchard Oriole, American Redstart, Black-throated Green Warbler

Black-throated Green Warbler

Could the light be any crappier? I suppose 10 o'clock on a moonless night might have afforded lower visibility, but for daylight hours, no, the milky cloud that hung over the fields at Manasquan River WMA and wrapped the tree tops in a gauzy light made it very difficult for these old eyes to find the birds that have abounded there of late. The WMA is the go to place for Blue-winged Warbler and I have gone to it twice this week and come up empty both times. I did see a lot of flitting warblers obscured by mist and budding leaves high in the tree tops and a couple of times was tempted to call them blue-winged but in all honesty they could have been any warbler--or vireo for that matter. 

That said, I did manage to add 4 species. Red-eyed Vireos were singing though not visible but two new warblers (out of the 10 species I listed there) were new and one them I mirabile dictu even photographed. Of the icterids, Orchard Oriole was a new addition. The odd icterid was an Eastern Meadowlark, a new species for me for that patch. Lowering skies kept the raptors down on their roosts. I was there for just under 4 hours; when the raindrops on my binocular lenses became too annoying to look through, I left with 45 species in the fields and woods. 

Canada Goose  3     Heard flyover and near river

Mourning Dove  1

Herring Gull  2

Great Blue Heron  2

Red-bellied Woodpecker  4

Downy Woodpecker  1

Northern Flicker  1     Heard

Great Crested Flycatcher  4     Heard

Eastern Kingbird  9

White-eyed Vireo  2     Heard

Red-eyed Vireo  4     Heard

Blue Jay  3

American Crow  2     Heard

Carolina Chickadee  2

Tufted Titmouse  3

Tree Swallow  8

Carolina Wren  1     Heard

Gray Catbird  17

Wood Thrush  2     Heard

American Robin  6

American Goldfinch  7

Chipping Sparrow  1

Field Sparrow  10

White-throated Sparrow  2

Song Sparrow  1

Swamp Sparrow  1

Eastern Towhee  2     Heard

Eastern Meadowlark  1

Orchard Oriole  1

Baltimore Oriole  4

Red-winged Blackbird  1

Brown-headed Cowbird  1

Ovenbird  25

Black-and-white Warbler  2

Common Yellowthroat  20

American Redstart  1

Northern Parula  1

Yellow Warbler  1     Heard

Black-throated Blue Warbler  2

Yellow-rumped Warbler  2

Prairie Warbler  4     Heard

Black-throated Green Warbler  1

Northern Cardinal  5

Blue Grosbeak  1

Indigo Bunting  1