Island Beach SP 3/12--Northern Gannet

Last year around this time I remember a spectacular gannet show was on display at both Barnegat Light and Island Beach--thousands of birds migrating north, swirling high and diving into the ocean in uncountable numbers. 5000? 10,000? Who could tell?  

Today, hoping for a repeat, I went to Island Beach. I saw exactly two Northern Gannets, one flying low going north, one flying low going south. How I managed to avoid seeing gannets until the middle of March I don't know, but at least I got a look at a couple. Time's running out on the winter birds--no complaints, just a statement of fact. There's always a second chance at the end of the year but by then, I find, I'm often running out of steam and don't want to spend time looking for this or that species. 

I ran into Greg on Reed's Road and we birded a few spots in the park. On Spizzle Creek he spotted a female Purple Finch perched in a tree which gave me a county year bird; lots of loons on the ocean, lots of Buffleheads on the bay. Probably the most interesting species I found today was later on when we'd parted. I took a walk on the Tidal Pond trail and in the blind, on the pond, where there is almost always nothing, I found, besides two Mallards, a beautiful pair of Wood Ducks. Wood Ducks are scarce on the barrier island--not much habitat for them. My only other records of Wood Ducks there have been migrating ducks mixed in with other ducks that those with sharper eyes than mine have pointed out. I was happy that these ducks posed for a few minutes because they didn't hang around very long and flew north. 

38 species for the day. Meh.

Brant

Canada Goose

Mute Swan

Wood Duck

Mallard

American Black Duck

Long-tailed Duck

Bufflehead

Red-breasted Merganser

Horned Grebe

Mourning Dove

American Oystercatcher

Herring Gull

Great Black-backed Gull

Red-throated Loon

Common Loon

Northern Gannet

Great Blue Heron

Northern Harrier

Belted Kingfisher

Downy Woodpecker

Northern Flicker

Carolina Chickadee

Carolina Wren

American Robin

House Sparrow

Purple Finch

American Tree Sparrow

Fox Sparrow

White-throated Sparrow

Song Sparrow

Swamp Sparrow

Red-winged Blackbird

Brown-headed Cowbird

Common Grackle

Boat-tailed Grackle

Yellow-rumped Warbler

Northern Cardinal

Colliers Mills 3/10--Eastern Phoebe

Over by the abandoned house at Collier Mills (there's a story behind that house and I'd like to know it) I heard and finally tracked down my FOY Eastern Phoebe.  Phoebes amuse me because their onomatopoeiatic name is such opposition to how they actually sound, which is generally pissed off. I heard the bird a couple of times before it registered with me and then I had a hard time finding it even though all the trees were bare and the ground open. I would be a lousy bat since I can never figure out what direction a bird song is coming from. Eventually, the bird popped up on a branch then flew off north before I could focus it in my viewfinder. 

More interesting today was the number of Ring-necked Ducks on Turnmill Pond. When I first arrived I counted 24 on Colliers Mills Lake, a decent number, but no big deal. Yesterday, at Whitesbog, I had 295 in total on Rome Pond, Middle Bog, Union Pond, and Ditch Meadow. Walking up west side of Turnmill I found a large flock and counted 108. Adding that to the 24 I already had broke the eBird filter. I can claim exact count on numbers like that, but with diving ducks probably 30% of them are under water at any one time (I wonder if there is an actual study of expected percentage of underwater ducks) but I did count every one I could see. But when I got to the north end of Turnmill I saw my count was wildly off because the ducks were everywhere, so I discarded the 108 count and the notion of exact count and counted by 10's coming up to 640 ducks! That's more like scaup numbers in a bay than ring-necks on a pond, but they may be gathering to take off north. Whatever the reason, it was an impressive sight. 

There's a little pond on Hawkin Road that I always check out. Usually there will be a couple of  species on the pond--maybe a heron and a few ducks, or a kingfisher and flock of blackbirds. But today, as I stealthily approached from a gas line right-of-way, I saw that it was full of waterfowl--geese, Mallards, Hooded Mergansers, a couple of Wood Ducks, and in an out of the way branch of it that you have to bushwhack to get to, a some American Black Ducks. Five Common Mergansers on CM Lake were unusual. So it is still possible to build up your list with duckage. 

I checked 3 of the 4 spots where I've seen Red-headed Woodpecker with no luck. That  was a disappointment. According to eBird's tracker, I walked 5.69 miles and in that trek recorded 31 species:

Canada Goose  78

Wood Duck  2       

Mallard  10

American Black Duck  5

Ring-necked Duck  665       

Hooded Merganser  9

Common Merganser  5       

Mourning Dove  3

Killdeer  5

Turkey Vulture  12

Red-tailed Hawk  1

Belted Kingfisher  1

Red-bellied Woodpecker  3

Eastern Phoebe  1

Blue Jay  8

American Crow  1     Heard

Fish Crow  1     Heard

Carolina Chickadee  2     Heard

Tufted Titmouse  4

Carolina Wren  3

Eastern Bluebird  6

American Robin  10

House Finch  3

Chipping Sparrow  1

Field Sparrow  1

Dark-eyed Junco  3

White-throated Sparrow  8

Song Sparrow  10

Red-winged Blackbird  10

Brown-headed Cowbird  15

Northern Cardinal  1

Pedricktown Marsh 3/6--Sandhill Crane, Osprey

Last stop was the best stop and it wasn't even a place I expected to be. 

Just before the world closed down last year, I was planning on going on Scott's annual Salem County trip, but with Shari working and my car in a precarious state of incipient collapse, I skipped it and regretted it. Of course, I would have regretted it more if I had had to call AAA from Featherbed Lane outside the lovely-named town of Pilesgrove.  Salem County is a haul from here and I don't know it well, so it isn't a place I just run down to for its potential goodies. This year, we went, wearing our pandemic masks, hoping for some of the Salem Counties specialties. 

Of which we got zero. No Cattle Egret, no Yellow-headed Blackbird, no Ross's Goose, no...we did get a Rough-legged Hawk at Featherbed, a year bird for Shari, but everything else was just good solid birding. You like big flocks of Snow Geese? They're all over but they moved around so much (hunters) that we (read: Scott) couldn't scan them for Ross's. Eagles were at nearly every stop. We saw our first one while standing in the parking lot of the Woodstown Wawa while waiting for everyone to gather. Ducks, plenty of ducks, diving and dabbling. 

After Featherbed Lane, I figured the trip was done, but Scott suggested one more stop, north, to Pedricktown Marsh which is on the border of Gloucester and Salem Counties. He said it was the last chance to get one of the area rarities. The marsh was at low tide and looked pretty empty except for some ducks and geese, but as we started to walk out onto the causeway, Scott pointed up and flying right above us was our FOY Osprey. March 6 is pretty early for an Osprey. Not the earliest I've seen one, since I remember a demented bird that overwintered in Cape May a few years ago that I saw on January 1st, but normally it would be at least a couple of weeks before I'd be on the lookout for one. I certainly didn't expect to record my first one in Gloucester County which I haven't visited for 6 years. 

Then, as we were about to leave, Barb, who was assisting Scott on the trip, said, "One more scan" of the marsh and after a moment called out, "What's that flying? The cranes!" 

And there they were, two Sandhill Cranes, a species I have been chasing around, with no luck all year in 3 counties around here. And, unlike most of the time when a rarity is spotted, they were flying toward us, not away. They flew right over the road, going north, affording excellent views. What an excellent way to cap off a long day of birding in what seems like another state (Northern North Delaware?) to me. 

My list for the day: 

Species                First Sighting

Snow Goose   Compromise Rd.

Canada Goose   Wawa Woodstown

Mute Swan   Salem River WMA

Tundra Swan   Salem River WMA

Wood Duck   Salem River WMA

Northern Shoveler   Salem River WMA

Gadwall   Salem River WMA

American Wigeon   Salem River WMA

Mallard   Seabrook Rd

American Black Duck   Salem River WMA

Northern Pintail   Salem River WMA

Green-winged Teal   Mannington Marsh

Ring-necked Duck   Salem River WMA

Bufflehead   Salem River WMA

Hooded Merganser   Salem River WMA

Rock Pigeon   Sharptown-Auburn Rd

Mourning Dove   Salem River WMA

Sandhill Crane   Pedricktown Marsh

Killdeer   Compromise Rd.

Herring Gull   Salem River WMA

Great Blue Heron   Mannington Marsh

Black Vulture   Salem River WMA

Turkey Vulture   Compromise Rd.

Osprey   Pedricktown Marsh

Northern Harrier   Compromise Rd.

Bald Eagle   Wawa Woodstown

Red-tailed Hawk   Wawa Woodstown

Rough-legged Hawk   Featherbed Lane WMA

Belted Kingfisher   Pedricktown Marsh

Merlin   Mannington Marsh

Blue Jay   Salem River WMA

American Crow   Featherbed Lane WMA

Fish Crow   Wawa Woodstown

Carolina Wren   Salem River WMA

European Starling   Compromise Rd.

American Robin   Compromise Rd.

Song Sparrow   Seabrook Rd

Red-winged Blackbird   Wawa Woodstown

Common Grackle   Wawa Woodstown

Highlight

 You know something is wrong with your universe when the highlight of your day comes at 5:55 AM, still dark: Four woodcocks in the Triangle Field at Whitesbog.

Great Bay Blvd 3/4--American Oystercatcher

Here's another bird I usually get a lot earlier in the year, albeit not in this county. Early every year I'd make a trip down to Brigantine Island with Mike to look for the winter shorebirds that congregate there--godwits, Willets, and oystercatchers. This year I didn't feel like driving all the way down there so it wasn't until yesterday, when I was pretty certain I'd find them, that I put American Oystercatcher on the year list. 

They were down on the beach, off to the north where I thought they might be, hunkered down with a flock of Brant. I'd seen reports of them from a couple of other spots, but one was a flyby at Manasquan Inlet and the other was on LBI where I did not feel like braving the winds just to see a bird I knew I'd eventually get. But there is a sense of accomplishment when you go looking for a specific bird in a specific spot and actually find. It gives you the illusion that you know what you're doing. 

I was thinking yesterday, at Manahawkin, then Holly Lake and Great Bay Blvd, while I was looking at all the ducks, that these are the waning days for building a big list with waterfowl. Soon the scaup, Buffleheads, mergansers, Ring-neck Ducks, Snow Geese will have flown north. The Brant tend to stick farther into the spring because their breeding grounds are so much farther north, but soon it will be Canada Geese, Mallards, black ducks, and Wood Ducks if you know where to look. Nice weather ahead, but a lot harder birding picking out the warblers from the budding trees and separating the sandpipers when the sun glare always seems to be in your eyes 

Reeves Bogs | Crestwood Community Gardens 3/3--American Woodcock, Tree Swallow

Harbingers of spring! Not exactly. Both of today's year birds are birds that are around in the winter but either in small numbers or cryptic in coloration and habit, so that it is around this time of year that I start looking for them.

Today, after kicking around a couple spots in Pemberton, I decided to check out Reeves Bogs, mostly to see how the winter had affected the dikes and makeshift bridges in case I wanted to do a more extensive walk soon. I saw that I'd have to alter my routes, because the precarious bridge made from boards and skids that goes around a breach, which only required balance and stupidity to cross, is now submerged in parts and thus out of commission. But meanwhile, there were waterfowl there, and as I was counting the Tundra Swans (51) I saw first one then two, three, and later, four Tree Swallows swooping over the bogs. Tree Swallows, in small numbers, can sometimes be found in winter since they have the ability to digest bayberries but today they were very likely feasting on the same gnats that I was swatting away from my face on this warmish morning. Glad to see them. I just wish one of them would have alighted on a shrub for a moment and posed for a picture but while they fly very close by me, they were not photographable. 

I was able to photograph a pair of Rusty Blackbirds in the maple swamp and post one of those pictures here for illustration, since they are a much sought after icterid in these parts. 

This afternoon, being warm and more importantly calm, I thought I'd go to my traditional spot to look for American Woodcock, which have been reported in a lot of different spots the last couple of weeks. But I'd rather avoid driving into Toms River or along some Pine Barrens road in Burlco if I can just scoot down the road to the community gardens five minutes away. Sunset was 5:51 today and I arrived at 5:54. I was ready to start listening for a "peent" when the church on Schoolhouse began playing its carillon at 5:56. And it's a whole concert, not just a quick ding-dong. By the time it stopped it was past 6 though still not dark yet. And no peents. It is such good habitat there--mud, a big puddle, and an open area for the woodcocks to do their aerial display. No peents though tonight. It isn't too early because I've heard that they're peenting in other spots. But, as I turned around to walk back to the car, a woodcock game out of the garden, flying right by me, and disappeared onto the hill that is on one side of the dirt driveway. I stayed for a few more minutes in the hopes of a peent or a display, but that one woodcock, which I at least saw perfectly, was all for the night. 

And as Zirlin's Sixth Law of Birding says:

You only need one

February Summary--10 Year Birds

Snow Geese, Pineland Preservation Alliance

The only good thing to say about February, my least favorite month (or is that November?) is that it's only 28 days long (this year). Quite a few of days were spent cooped up in the house due to snow, rain, or the dreaded wintry mix. A lot of those days were spent stomping through crusty snow and gingerly walking on ice. I only fell once. Use to be, if I fell, I was more worried about the optics I was carrying. Now I think that replacing a camera is lot easier than replacing a hip.  

Somehow, in the limited amount of time I had to bird, I managed to add 10 year birds to the list--some favorites, like Redhead and sapsucker, and a some hard ones, like Virginia Rail and Snowy Owl. Notice I don't call them "rare." They really aren't, they're just difficult to find, you either need luck, like with the rail, or the willingness to trudge a few miles searching dunes for the Snowy. 

Snow Bunting, Pinelands Preservation Alliance

I passed up the opportunity to pad the list with feeder birds around the state; I have become less interested in the "Hey kids, collect them all" aspect of birding than I used to be. Experience has taught me that it isn't much fun for me to stand around a stranger's feeder waiting for a bird to turn up, where I may be with other birders I may or may not like, especially when one of the spots (I'm told) required an appointment to view the feeder. I'm having a hard enough time getting an appointment for a vaccine, damned if I'll make one to see a bird. 

Within the three counties I birded in February--Burlington, Monmouth, & Ocean--I managed 107 species, markedly down from the previous year's pre-pandemic 126. The comparisons for March might be interesting. The list in February was:

Species              First Sighting
Snow Goose   New Egypt
Brant   Great Bay Bvld. WMA
Canada Goose   Shelter Cove Park
Mute Swan   Marshall's Pond
Tundra Swan   Whitesbog
Wood Duck   Whitesbog
Gadwall   Holly Lake
American Wigeon   Marshall's Pond
Mallard   Marshall's Pond
American Black Duck   Riverfront Landing
Northern Pintail   Holly Lake
Green-winged Teal   Manahawkin WMA
Canvasback   Riverfront Landing
Redhead  Brick
Ring-necked Duck   Marshall's Pond
Greater Scaup   Great Bay Bvld. WMA
Lesser Scaup   Riverfront Landing
Common Eider   Holgate
White-winged Scoter   Sandy Hook
Black Scoter   Sandy Hook
Long-tailed Duck   West Creek Dock Rd.
Bufflehead   Cattus Island County Park
Common Goldeneye   Tip Seaman CP
Hooded Merganser   Holly Lake
Common Merganser   Pemberton Lake WMA
Red-breasted Merganser   Cattus Island County Park
Ruddy Duck   Shelter Cove Park
Pied-billed Grebe   Manahawkin Lake
Rock Pigeon   Wawa South Toms River
Mourning Dove   35 Sunset Rd
Virginia Rail   Cattus Island County Park
Killdeer   Shelter Cove Park
Sanderling   Holgate
Dunlin   Holgate
Wilson's Snipe   Cloverdale Farm
Greater Yellowlegs   Great Bay Bvld. WMA
Ring-billed Gull   Riverfront Landing
Herring Gull   35 Sunset Rd
Great Black-backed Gull   Cattus Island County Park
Common Loon   Great Bay Bvld. WMA
Double-crested Cormorant   Riverfront Landing
Great Blue Heron   Great Bay Bvld. WMA
Tricolored Heron   Manahawkin WMA
Black Vulture  West Creek Dock Rd.
Turkey Vulture   Cattus Island County Park
Northern Harrier  West Creek Dock Rd.
Cooper's Hawk   Birmingham Rd
Bald Eagle   Great Bay Bvld. WMA
Red-shouldered Hawk  Parker Run Dock St.
Red-tailed Hawk   Tip Seaman CP
Rough-legged Hawk   BC Fairgrounds
Snowy Owl   Holgate
Short-eared Owl   BC Fairgrounds
Belted Kingfisher  West Creek Dock Rd.
Yellow-bellied Sapsucker   35 Sunset Rd
Red-bellied Woodpecker   35 Sunset Rd
Downy Woodpecker   35 Sunset Rd
Hairy Woodpecker   Assunpink WMA
Northern Flicker   Assunpink WMA
American Kestrel   New Egypt
Merlin   Great Bay Bvld. WMA
Peregrine Falcon   Manahawkin WMA
Blue Jay   35 Sunset Rd
American Crow   Tip Seaman CP
Fish Crow   Plumsted Recreation Park
Common Raven   New Egypt
Carolina Chickadee   35 Sunset Rd
Tufted Titmouse   35 Sunset Rd
Horned Lark   Tip Seaman CP
Golden-crowned Kinglet   Tip Seaman CP
Ruby-crowned Kinglet   Assunpink WMA
Red-breasted Nuthatch   35 Sunset Rd
White-breasted Nuthatch   35 Sunset Rd
Brown Creeper   35 Sunset Rd
Carolina Wren   35 Sunset Rd
European Starling   35 Sunset Rd
Gray Catbird   Assunpink WMA
Northern Mockingbird   Riverfront Landing
Eastern Bluebird   Plumsted Recreation Park
Hermit Thrush  Parker Run Dock St.
American Robin   Ephraim P. Emson Preserve
House Sparrow   Shelter Cove Park
American Pipit   Tip Seaman CP
House Finch   35 Sunset Rd
Common Redpoll   Great Bay Bvld. WMA
Red Crossbill   Tip Seaman CP
Pine Siskin   35 Sunset Rd
American Goldfinch   35 Sunset Rd
Snow Bunting   Birmingham Rd
Chipping Sparrow   Colliers Mills WMA
Field Sparrow   Assunpink WMA
American Tree Sparrow   Cedar Run Dock Rd.
Fox Sparrow   Cattus Island County Park
Dark-eyed Junco   35 Sunset Rd
White-throated Sparrow   35 Sunset Rd
Savannah Sparrow   Shelter Cove Park
Song Sparrow   Cattus Island County Park
Swamp Sparrow   Cedar Bonnet Island
Eastern Meadowlark   Ephraim P. Emson Preserve
Red-winged Blackbird   Cattus Island County Park
Brown-headed Cowbird   New Egypt
Rusty Blackbird   Whitesbog
Common Grackle   Assunpink WMA
Boat-tailed Grackle   Great Bay Bvld. WMA
Pine Warbler   35 Sunset Rd
Yellow-rumped Warbler   Cedar Bonnet Island
Northern Cardinal   35 Sunset Rd

Brown Creeper, Backyard