Waretown Bay Parkway 1/9--Redhead

2 Greater Scaup, hens (left) 3 Redheads (drakes & hen)

Unexpected birds are always satisfying. This blustery morning at the end of Bay Parkway in Waretown (which overlooks--surprise!--Barnegat Bay) I brought out the scope to look at ducks. I saw a big flock right off shore to the north but upon closer examination, they turned out to be decoys. Hunters were hiding in the brush just off the point. But, in front of me were some ducks, a couple hundred yards out. With just my bins, one of them appeared to have a red head. Scoping them, they turned out to be 6 ducks, 3 hen Greater Scaup + 1 hen and 2 drake Redheads. 

Not decoys

Last year I had no Redheads in New Jersey--it wasn't until we were in Oregon that I finally saw one. Usually there is a flock of them off some of the points in Brick, but I almost never go up there. Now, I don't have to. To find them off Bay Parkway was quite the surprise--it's a first for me at this spot and no one else has ever listed one from there either. 

However, there was a nagging thought: After seeing those decoys, I couldn't help but think there was the possibility that those were loose decoys bobbing along, pushed by the wind. I didn't see any of them dive or spread their wings. The light was gray and the birds (if they were birds) distant. I walked up the marsh into the woods and when I got back to the end of the road, saw the two hunters wading through the water in what is usually the eel grass covered beach. I asked them about their decoys and was happy to hear they had no Redheads in their spread--just scaup. They were surprised to hear that I'd seen the Redheads, an opportunity missed I guess. To be clear, I have nothing against duck hunting--I'm a member of Ducks Unlimited which does great work maintaining and rehabilitating marshes, but hunting sea ducks doesn't make a lot of sense to me since I can't imagine they're edible, given what (and where) they eat. They had shot one scaup and one merganser which they thought was a common but, looking into their bucket, I told them it was a red-breasted. Still, we all left Bay Parkway happy. 

(Update: That goose yesterday at Harvey Cedars was a Cackling Goose)