Marshall's Pond 10/24--Eurasian Wigeon

Eurasian Wigeon

I spent two weeks in Portugal and Spain--did I see a Eurasian Wigeon in its home waters among all the Mallards, Gadwalls, shovelers, and teal?  No I did not. Instead, I had to go to a retention pond next to a shopping center in Toms River to find my find Eurasian Wigeon of the year and frankly, I'm happier seeing it 10 miles from home than I would have been had I ticked it off in Europe. 

That rather elongated pond which runs the length of the parking lot and then back toward some private houses has an inexplicable history of attracting rarities; this isn't the first Eurasian Wigeon I've seen there, though it was my best sighting. In the past, the birds I've seen there have been at the east end of the pond where the viewpoint is not ideal, and the sun is directly in your eyes in the morning. Today, it was overcast and the bird was in the middle of the pond toward the west end. It took me about 3 minutes to find it--there weren't that many ducks or geese to sort through and its red head and gray flanks just popped out against the surrounding American Wigeon. 

I usually have seen a Eurasian Wigeon well before October. For a number of years, one was faithfully showing up on the Shark River where you could get distant but decent view of it. This year, the bird did not show up. Or sometimes one would be on one of the ponds around Belmar, Avon, or Spring Lake--again, not this year. 

After seeing the wigeons I drove over to Shelter Cove and then to Cattus Island. It was pretty windy at Cattus and I was debating whether, given the dearth of birds I was finding, assuming they were all hunkering down, whether it was worth a walk around Scout Island. I decided to go over the boardwalk there and it was a good decision, because one of the warblers I saw was not the expected Yellow-rump but a Blackpoll Warbler, a bird, that looks very different in non-breeding plumage than in the spring--but the little yellow feet were the dead giveaway and let me eliminate the very similar Bay-breasted Warbler as a possibility. It even stayed still long enough for one photograph. 

Blackpoll Warbler