Odds & Ends & My 10,000th (Complete) List

 Lost time is not found again

                                                --Bob Dylan

White-eyed Vireo, Manahawkin WMA

After 10 days of Mexican birds, it seemed imperative--and simultaneously a little silly--to get out and try to find the new birds that had arrived here during our absence. As the late Pete Bacinski once said to me after I reeled off some of the birds we'd seen in Trinidad, "Yeah, but those aren't New Jersey birds." 

The obvious place to start, it seemed to me, was Island Beach SP, but it was not an auspicious beginning. Despite walking every bayside trail and surveying the beach and ocean from a couple of different spots I was only able to add Forster's Tern and Common Yellowthroat to the year list and the yellowthroat was a single "heard only" on Reed's Road. This is not an atypical experience for me at Island Beach. Half the time I'm there I feel like I should be somewhere else where the action is and half the time I'm not there I feel like I should be. 

The next day I tried Double Trouble SP where I was minimally more successful adding 5 new species: Prairie Warbler, Black-and-white Warbler, White-eyed Vireo, Purple Martin, and Broad-winged Hawk, the hawk being the only species that isn't a gimme in the county. Yellowthroats were singing everywhere and yet I still hadn't seen a one. 

Friday I figured I'd go somewhere that I just like to be--the Ocean County side of Whitesbog and while I walked around the bogs and woods with my friend and his dog, I didn't add a new species to the list, though I did finally get some looks at yellowthroats. It wasn't until I was home that afternoon, reading on the patio when I heard a familiar buzz. Out of the corner of my eye something zipped past. It took a few minutes, but, just before the lawn guy started to roll onto the grass with his noisy machine, I saw our first Ruby-throated Hummingbird. Of the two feeders we had out, one was dry and the other half-filled, so I quickly made up some sugar water and filled one of the feeders. Today Shari put out the full complement. 

Today I put on my permethrin pants and socks and gave Manahawkin WMA a try, parking the car on Stafford and walking in with the scope to view the impoundments. The very first bird I saw was a Willet so I was thinking that perhaps my luck had turned. It had, to a degree, but the target bird I'd come for--Blue-winged Teal--was not present that I could see, despite looking at every member of a huge flock of Green-winged Teal. There was also a flock of Dunlin with the teals (they're almost the same size) and the one smaller sandpiper in with the Dunlins was a Least Sandpiper. 

While I was walking around, I got a text from Steve telling me that an American White Pelican, which been in Manahawkin last week while I was gone, had been seen flying over the Barnegat impoundments. Since I wasn't very far away from there, I decided to give it shot, knowing it was unlikely that I'd find the bird. I pulled into Meadowedge Park when I saw the birders who'd reported it and they told me that it flown south. I gave the bay at the municipal dock a quick look, thinking that it might have plunked down in there somewhere, then drove over to the impoundments. They had told me they'd seen a couple of Short-billed Dowitchers there and after some peering through the phragmites (the path into the impoundments is sadly long-gone) I spotted them. There was a third bird with them that I couldn't quite grasp, feeding with an up and down motion but smaller than the dowitchers. Then I recalled that a Stilt Sandpiper had been reported off and on there for the last few days and, after convincing myself that this bird was not a Dunlin (especially after I actually saw a Dunlin for comparison), I listed the Stilt Sandpiper. Completely unexpected because that's a hard bird to get, especially in spring, but satisfying to list. 

My Manahawkin list today was the 10,000th complete checklist on eBird. I had thought about making it a Whitesbog list, since, aside from my backyard, I have the most lists there, but the timing just didn't work out. 10,000 lists and that doesn't include the 2580 "incidental" lists I've made which, since eBird doesn't consider them "complete" don't go into their statistics, as I understand their protocols. 10,000 lists and do I get a congratulatory email, a shower of virtual confetti, a free bird? Apparently not. 10,000 lists--I don't know if I should be proud or embarrassed. But here is list #10,000:

44 species
Canada Goose  2
Mute Swan  7
Mallard  6
American Black Duck  5
Green-winged Teal  72
Mourning Dove  3
Dunlin  18
Least Sandpiper  1
Greater Yellowlegs  6
Willet  2
Herring Gull  10
Forster's Tern  8
Great Blue Heron  1
Great Egret  4
Snowy Egret  3
Tricolored Heron  1
Glossy Ibis  3
Osprey  2
Belted Kingfisher  1
Red-bellied Woodpecker  1
Downy Woodpecker  2
Hairy Woodpecker  1     Heard
Northern Flicker  2
White-eyed Vireo  1
Blue Jay  1     Heard
Fish Crow  2
Carolina Chickadee  4
Tufted Titmouse  2     Heard
Tree Swallow  50
Barn Swallow  3
Blue-gray Gnatcatcher  3
Carolina Wren  1     Heard
Gray Catbird  1
Brown Thrasher  1
American Robin  10
American Goldfinch  1
White-throated Sparrow  3
Song Sparrow  4
Eastern Towhee  3
Red-winged Blackbird  30
Brown-headed Cowbird  6
Common Yellowthroat  15
Yellow Warbler  1     Heard
Northern Cardinal  1     Heard