Sandy Hook 12/7--King Eider, Ash-throated Flycatcher

King Eider hen (an oxymoron if there ever was one), tip of Sandy Hook

Sandy Hook has been hot lately with rarities that I also happened to need for year birds, so despite the wintery forecast, I went up there for a field trip led by Jason, Linda, and Carole. Either I was dressed appropriately (2 layers on insulated socks, long johns, flannel lined pants and shirt, Under Armour long sleeve undershirt, two pairs of gloves with hand warmers tucked in, not to mention a coat and hat) or it wasn't as cold as I expected it to be, because, aside from the death march out to the tip of the hook and long walk to the north to find the hen King Eider, where I lost all feeling in both my thumbs (where the warmth of the hand warmers do not reach), I was fairly comfortable all day. Finding year birds also tends to alleviate misery.

The King Eider was easy to find and close in. Much better than scanning a large flock of distant Common Eiders looking for the anomaly. There she was, with her Mona Lisa grin, floating in the breakers, not even diving, close enough for me to get some decent pictures. A few other ducks were out in the ocean, and the beach was lined with 3 species of gulls, but nothing else was particularly interesting, so the walk back seemed a little long, though it did allow my thumbs to thaw.

Just before we got to the parking lot, we spent some time around the Hawk Watch platform, looking for one of the two Ash-throated Flycatchers that had just been seen there. There were a phenomenal 4 (minimum) ATFLs there last week and today 3 were reported, but as I like to say, "You only need one." But one wasn't showing, so, with the report of Lapland Longspur a few beaches away, the group was preparing to caravan down to the Lot I. I was in my car, unwrapping an energy bar when there was a commotion by the trail. Someone yelled for me to come, and there, in another's birder's scope was the elusive flycatcher. Naturally, I ran from my car without my camera, though, while I did get good looks at the bird I suspect that every time I would have had a shot set up in the lens, it would have moved.

Two year birds (and rarities to boot) this late in the year is a pretty good day. That brings me up to 295 in New Jersey and now I have some regrets about the chases I didn't make this year. I could have had 300.

While I didn't have a huge list for the Hook, I did have some interesting species along with the two year birds, like FOS, Horned Larks and American Tree Sparrow, along with that Sandy Hook specialty, Black-capped Chickadee.

36 species

Brant  35

Canada Goose  60

American Black Duck  35

Greater Scaup  8

King Eider  1    

Surf Scoter  5    Tip of the hook

White-winged Scoter  1    Tip of the hook

Long-tailed Duck  4

Bufflehead  25

Common Goldeneye  2    Horseshoe Cove

Red-breasted Merganser  33

Ruddy Duck  1    Spermaceti

Horned Grebe  2

Black-bellied Plover  3

Sanderling  1

Ring-billed Gull  20

Herring Gull  200

Great Black-backed Gull  150

Black Vulture  2

Cooper's Hawk  1

Red-tailed Hawk  2

Red-bellied Woodpecker  1

Ash-throated Flycatcher  1   

Black-capped Chickadee  1    Heard

Horned Lark  3

European Starling  100

Northern Mockingbird  5

Hermit Thrush  1    Heard

American Robin  3

American Goldfinch  1    Heard

Field Sparrow  2

American Tree Sparrow  1

Dark-eyed Junco  10

White-throated Sparrow  3

Song Sparrow  6

Yellow-rumped Warbler  4

Lake Takanassee 12/5--Hen Eurasian Wigeon

Eurasian Wigeon, hen

Mike and I birded the North Shore today, hitting a lot of the ponds. We found the drake Eurasian Wigeon on Lake Sylvan almost immediately, but another wigeon, in the back pool of Lake Takanassee was more intriguing. It had a reddish head but without the "baldpate" of drakes, a blue bill, and gray back. I've seen a goodly number of Eurasian Wigeon drakes, but never, up until today, a hen. I thought that hens of American and Eurasian were virtually indistinguishable, but this duck stood out to us. Maybe we were lucky with the way the sun lit the bird.

Cackling Goose with Canada Geese

A Cackling Goose continues there (it was on the grass with some Canadas, giving a good comparison). Down at the outflow pipe of Wreck Pond we found a hen Harlequin Duck. Rare for Monmouth, no big deal in Ocean. A good day for hens!

Aptly Named

Idly scrolling through the "Explore Species" section of eBird, I came across a Sturnidae with the common name of Mysterious Starling. Looking at its statistics I found:

Observations: 0
With Photos:   0
With Audio:     0

The range map is blank.

I'd say this bird is aptly named.

Death of a Hot Spot

The field in happier times

It was only a matter of time. A large open space in Lakewood lasting as a large open space? Impossible. But for a while, ever since the Wawa on Route 9 in Lakewood opened, the field next to it was always a reliable spot to find Killdeer in all seasons. This year, in January, on the jetty in Point Pleasant, I was talking to an obsessive birder who mentioned that he hadn't seen a Killdeer yet this year (it was only the 4th or 5th of the year), so I told him to go over to the Wawa in Lakewood; there was sure to be one there. An hour late, while I was walking around a trail in Brick I got a call from him: success.

Killdeer chick in the field in happier times

But today on my way back from getting the car inspected (and what a joke car inspection is in NJ--it takes longer for them to scrape off your windshield decal and reapply the new one than it does to "inspect" the car), I stopped at the Wawa and found that the field had been scraped clean of every blade of grass, replaced with dirt, mud, puddles, a surveyor and heavy construction equipment. Even though Killdeer use to breed in that field, the species is not on any threatened lists and I doubt if any form documentation has been done to prove their breeding status. In any case, there was no way to stop development of this patch of private property.

Too bad Sometimes I used to go out of my way and get off the Parkway early so I could stop at the Lakewood Wawa just to put Killdeer on the day list. Looks like that detour will be take less often, although...maybe, if that field stays as is for a while...it looks like perfect Horned Lark habitat, since larks seems to gravitate to the least inviting fields around (like the old dump behind the Manahawkin Costco), or, the last two Rock Wrens in NJ have been found on construction sites so maybe I will occasionally take that more northern exit.

But for now we're left with a barren landscape and the prospect of more traffic on Route 70.

November in Review--3 Year Birds, 1 Lifer

Bell's Vireo, Sandy Hook

Again, for the 2nd month in a row, only 3 year birds added to the list, but what birds! All rarities, all vagrants, and seeing them ran the gamut of how to find birds.

The first rarity, the Bell's Vireo at Sandy Hook, was the most fun because it was both unexpected and easy--we happened to be with a group a few hundred feet away from the where the bird had just been reported; we walked over, looked around for a few a minutes and there it was and everyone was surprised and happy. No chasing involved.

The 2nd year bird of the month was more of an expedition--a chase for multiple birds with only one success but it was our life bird LECONTE'S SPARROW. Shari, Mike, and I traveled down to Cape May to the "magic field" where all sorts of interesting birds were (and still are) being reported, but it took us almost all the day to finally stumble upon the LeConte's. It was bad enough that we couldn't also find the Golden-crowned Sparrow that was down there which would also have been a year bird, but when we decided to search for the Wood Stork a birder nearby turned around and said, "It's dead." That put a damper on the quest.

Finally, today was the kind of birding I dislike the most--traveling, for a 2nd time, to search a small area for a small bird. At least in the "magic field" we got to walk around a large area. Searching for the Pacific-slope Flycatcher today I walked almost 2 miles back and forth on what might have been an eighth of a mile stretch of trails.

As for the rest of the month, I spent most of it walking in my favorite spots--Assunpink, Manasquan Reservoir, Whitesbog, Manahawkin, Island Beach--plus I added a new favorite place in the extension of the Union Transportation Trail into Ocean County. While I haven't found anything new there, yet, it is only because it late in the year. I feel confident that this barely mowed power line cut will produce many warblers, sparrows, and other passerines in the new year. Plus, the hardwoods along the trail look very inviting for a Pileated Woodpecker.

Prairie Warbler,
Barnegat Light SP

Other interesting birds for the month, rare but not new, were the returning Trumpeter Swans to Stone Tavern Lake, a Cackling Goose for the county on Deerhead Lake, and a very late Prairie Warbler in the dunes of Barnegat Light.

I'm up to 293 NJ birds for the year, more than I've seen in the state any other year. If I'd been willing to chase more, or go on a pelagic, or was just a better birder, I could conceivable have 300 species which is the bogie for the state. With good weather and little less shilly-shallying, I could probably still make 300. But the weather looks lousy for the first couple days of the month and Cape May is an awful long way away.

For the month I had 136 species, all in the state, from Cape May to Sandy Hook.
Counties Birded: Atlantic, Burlington, Cape May, Monmouth, Ocean.

Species              First Sighting

Snow Goose   Manasquan Reservoir

Brant   Sandy Hook

Cackling Goose   Deer Head Lake

Canada Goose   Manasquan Reservoir

Mute Swan   Manasquan Reservoir

Trumpeter Swan   Stone Tavern Lake

Tundra Swan   Bamber Lake

Wood Duck   Sandy Hook

Northern Shoveler   Manasquan Reservoir

Gadwall   Assunpink WMA

American Wigeon   Assunpink WMA

Mallard   Manasquan Reservoir

American Black Duck   Manasquan Reservoir

Northern Pintail   Brig

Green-winged Teal   Brig

Ring-necked Duck   Manasquan Reservoir

Greater Scaup   Brig

Lesser Scaup   Assunpink WMA

Common Eider   Barnegat Lighthouse SP

Harlequin Duck   Barnegat Lighthouse SP

Surf Scoter   Sandy Hook

White-winged Scoter   Sandy Hook

Black Scoter   Cape May-Lewes Ferry Terminal

Long-tailed Duck   Island Beach SP

Bufflehead   Manasquan Reservoir

Common Goldeneye   Assunpink WMA

Hooded Merganser   Holly Lake

Red-breasted Merganser   Sandy Hook

Ruddy Duck   Manasquan Reservoir

Wild Turkey   Brig

Pied-billed Grebe   Manasquan Reservoir

Horned Grebe   Brig

Red-necked Grebe   Brig

Rock Pigeon   Manasquan Reservoir

Mourning Dove   35 Sunset Rd

American Coot   Manasquan Reservoir

American Avocet   Brig

American Oystercatcher   Island Beach SP

Black-bellied Plover   Sandy Hook

Killdeer   Brig

Ruddy Turnstone   Barnegat Lighthouse SP

Sanderling   Sandy Hook

Dunlin   Great Bay Bvld. WMA

Purple Sandpiper   Island Beach SP

Western Sandpiper   Brig

Long-billed Dowitcher   Brig

Greater Yellowlegs   Great Bay Bvld. WMA

Lesser Yellowlegs   Brig

Laughing Gull   Manasquan Reservoir

Ring-billed Gull   Manasquan Reservoir

Herring Gull   Sandy Hook

Iceland Gull   Island Beach SP

Lesser Black-backed Gull   Sandy Hook

Great Black-backed Gull   Sandy Hook

Royal Tern   Sandy Hook

Red-throated Loon   Manasquan Reservoir

Common Loon   Great Bay Bvld. WMA

Northern Gannet   Sandy Hook

Great Cormorant   Barnegat Lighthouse SP

Double-crested Cormorant   Manasquan Reservoir

Great Blue Heron   Manasquan Reservoir

Great Egret   Great Bay Bvld. WMA

Snowy Egret   Brig

Little Blue Heron   Brig

Black-crowned Night-Heron   Brig

Black Vulture   Sandy Hook

Turkey Vulture   35 Sunset Rd

Osprey   Sandy Hook

Golden Eagle   The Beanery

Northern Harrier   Sandy Hook

Sharp-shinned Hawk   Sandy Hook

Cooper's Hawk   Sandy Hook

Bald Eagle   Sandy Hook

Red-shouldered Hawk   Sandy Hook

Red-tailed Hawk   Sandy Hook

Great Horned Owl   Brig

Barred Owl   The Beanery

Belted Kingfisher   Manasquan Reservoir

Yellow-bellied Sapsucker   35 Sunset Rd

Red-bellied Woodpecker   35 Sunset Rd

Downy Woodpecker   35 Sunset Rd

Hairy Woodpecker   Assunpink WMA

Pileated Woodpecker   Assunpink WMA

Northern Flicker   Manasquan Reservoir

Merlin   Sandy Hook

Peregrine Falcon   Sandy Hook

Pacific-slope Flycatcher   Palmyra Cove Nature Park

Eastern Phoebe   Sandy Hook

Bell's Vireo   Sandy Hook

Blue Jay   35 Sunset Rd

American Crow   Manasquan Reservoir

Fish Crow   Assunpink WMA

Common Raven   Berkeley

Carolina Chickadee   35 Sunset Rd

Tufted Titmouse   35 Sunset Rd

Golden-crowned Kinglet   35 Sunset Rd

Ruby-crowned Kinglet   Sandy Hook

White-breasted Nuthatch   35 Sunset Rd

Brown Creeper   Sandy Hook

House Wren   The Beanery

Winter Wren   Palmyra Cove Nature Park

Marsh Wren   Brig

Carolina Wren   35 Sunset Rd

European Starling   Manasquan Reservoir

Gray Catbird   Manasquan Reservoir

Brown Thrasher   Assunpink WMA

Northern Mockingbird   Manasquan Reservoir

Eastern Bluebird   Union Transportation Trail

Hermit Thrush   Sandy Hook

American Robin   Manasquan Reservoir

Cedar Waxwing   Palmyra Cove Nature Park

House Sparrow   Holly Lake

House Finch   35 Sunset Rd

American Goldfinch   35 Sunset Rd

Snow Bunting   Island Beach SP

Chipping Sparrow   Great Bay Bvld. WMA

Field Sparrow   Union Transportation Trail

Fox Sparrow   Manasquan Reservoir

Dark-eyed Junco   Sandy Hook

White-crowned Sparrow   Sandy Hook

White-throated Sparrow   Manasquan Reservoir

LECONTE'S SPARROW   The Beanery

Nelson's Sparrow   Brig

Savannah Sparrow   Sandy Hook

Song Sparrow   Manasquan Reservoir

Lincoln's Sparrow   Brig

Swamp Sparrow   Assunpink WMA

Eastern Towhee   Brig

Eastern Meadowlark   The Beanery

Red-winged Blackbird   Great Bay Bvld. WMA

Common Grackle   Assunpink WMA

Boat-tailed Grackle   Great Bay Bvld. WMA

Palm Warbler   Sandy Hook

Pine Warbler   Whiting

Yellow-rumped Warbler   Manasquan Reservoir

Prairie Warbler   Barnegat Lighthouse SP

Northern Cardinal   35 Sunset Rd Boat-tailed Grackle, Barnegat Light SP Great Black-backed Gull, Barnegat Light SP

Palmyra Cove Nature Park 11/30--Pacific-slope Flycatcher

Pacific-slope Flycatcher

I got up early.

I gritted my teeth.

I girded my loins.

I gassed up the car.

I was going to Palmyra.

Palmyra Nature Cove Park, on the banks of the Delaware, is a terrific birding spot but it is a royal pain for me to get to, a long ride on Rt 70 and then north on Rt 73 with its constant traffic lights along an increasingly ugly industrial corridor as you near the river. You want to get there early and on a weekday, with rush hour traffic...I don't have the patience. If I did, I'd have a lot bigger Burlco list because this is a great migrant and vagrant trap. And the western vagrant it has been hosting for almost the last month I finally could not stand not having on my state and county lists, so today, a quiet Saturday, I made the journey and was happily surprised that it only took about an hour. 

Now all I had to do was find the bird. This wasn't my first attempt. About 3 weeks ago, Mike & I tried for the bird, going down there mid-afternoon and missing it by about an hour. This, like most flycatchers, is a very active bird that seems to have settled into semi-regular route, so I walked down to the intersection of the Cove and Perimeter Trails and started looking around. I met a trio of Palmyra regulars, but since the bird was old hat for them, they weren't actively looking for it. Soon I ran into an old friend (the man who taught Shari & me the song of the Field Sparrow, back when we were novice birders) and we, along with another birder, after exchanging phone numbers, spread out and reconvened for a couple of hours, never straying very far from the intersection. 

After more than 3 hours of hunting up and down the same trails, I was getting pretty disgusted. I was thinking that I have to make a decision about next year: either I'm going to drop everything and chase as soon as I hear about a bird or else I'm going to bird the places I like and find what I find and get over my FOMO (Fear of Missing Out), because this year's dilly-dallying diffidence has only led to frustration. And then...

Just as Tom, the birder who originally found the bird, came up the trail, my phone rang and 50 feet away one of the guys said that the birder next to him had just had the bird and we all (there were a few more seekers now) hurried up the trail. Tom stepped up into the woods, said he heard the bird (it makes a high "tseet" call, which is how it was separated from the nearly identical Corderillan Flycatcher) and then found the bird in a tree. Brief moment of panic while I looked and could not see but then it flitted from branch to branch as I checked off the field marks--wing bars, greenish back, tear-shaped eye ring, flicking tail, bang! Pacific-slope Flycatcher.

The bird lived up to its reputation as extremely active, flying onto the path for a second, then into the underbrush on the other side of the path, perching up for a moment, diving down, reappearing, as we all crept along following the directions of Lloyd who was best able to keep his eye on it. I climbed up a small hill next to the path just as the flycatcher flew across again to the west side and miraculously I was able to get pictures of the bird, perched low in the reeds. 

Yes. Brief moment of satisfaction. And then my thoughts turned toward the birds I was missing: Ash-throated Flycatcher at Sandy Hook, Mountain Bluebird in Cape May, White-winged Dove in Point Pleasant which would be a home county bird...birding is like baseball, it is, as Bart Giamatti wrote, "designed to break your heart."

The Beanery 11/21--LeCONTE'S SPARROW

LeCONTE'S SPARROW
Photo: Mike Mandracchia

Cape May has been the place to be the last week or so, particularly the Beanery (or the field across the road from it) which has hosted a couple of very rare sparrows, a "western" flycatcher, and a Wood Stork, along with less rare rarities like Dickcissel and Clay-colored Sparrow. Some birders jump in their car the moment they see the alert for a rarity and they have a better than even chance of finding the bird. Others, less motivated, like me, think, that's a long ride for a bird I might not see and hesitate and the longer you hesitate, the less chance you have of seeing the bird and the less chance you have of seeing the bird the more you hesitate until Mike says let's go to Cape May and I say "what the hey" and Shari isn't working today so she comes too and we three end up in a field shoulder high with vegetation, looking for birds I don't expect to find.

Golden Eagle

After spending about an hour in the field and hearing someone call out one of the rare sparrows which we missed because it flew deep into the undergrowth, I said let's go across the road and at least get the Wood Stork, figuring it's big and we can't miss that. That's when another birder told us it was dead. Gone is one thing; it might come back. Dead really puts a damper on the day. So we continued to circle the field and while we found just about every kind of sparrow you could expect, still we didn't have any luck with the rarities or even the semi-rarities. The best birds, I thought, were the Eastern Meadowlarks that flew above us and landed in a tree.  Or maybe the Golden Eagle we all saw flying over the field which gave us the diagnostic field marks and wasn't just the shape of a hawk flying in the distance, an "if you say so" bird.

But after a walk over in the Beanery proper, we returned to the field for one more circuit, hoping to find a lifer. We spread out, which is never a good idea because if one person spots the bird, it is almost a certainty someone is going to miss it. Almost. Mike was midway in the field, I was a the far end, and Shari a little farther behind me, when another birder called out that she had the bird. We all converged on her spot, pushing away the brush, stumbling on reeds and weeds and of course the bird, which was conveniently perched up for her, had dived down. Mike got a picture (above) and I saw movement and Shari, last to the scene, saw zilch. I wasn't about to count the zipping shape I saw. We continued to looked, hoping the bird would flush. It did, then dove down into what might be called a bush but was really just a collection of sticks. It move a tad to the left, stood on the ground, and I could see it well enough, and long enough, to describe some field marks. Happily, Shari was looking at the same bird and happily, it was a lifer for the three of us, a LeCONTE'S SPARROW, but unhappily, we didn't see it well enough to get the "field guide" looks we always desire. Still, a lifer is a lifer and I don't get that many in NJ. Considering how I was feeling when I was not seeing the bird (ranging from quitting birding for good to suicidal), it turned out to be a good day, especially when you throw in the Barred Owl we heard calling as 10:30 in the morning.

But I can never shake the sense that I'm fighting with Cape May, that it doesn't give up its birds willingly, only grudgingly, and that, all in all, I'd rather be in Ocean County, where the birds really count.

List for The Beanery, including the field across the road:

41 species

Canada Goose  2    Heard

Mute Swan  2

Mourning Dove  5

Killdeer  1    Heard

Great Blue Heron  1

Black Vulture  10

Turkey Vulture  15

Golden Eagle  1

Bald Eagle  3

Red-shouldered Hawk  2

Red-tailed Hawk  1

Barred Owl  1    Heard

Red-bellied Woodpecker  1    Heard

Northern Flicker  1    Heard

Eastern Phoebe  2

Blue Jay  1

American Crow  1    Heard

Fish Crow  1    Heard

Carolina Chickadee  1    Heard

House Wren  2    Exact count

Carolina Wren  2

Gray Catbird  1    Heard

Eastern Bluebird  1    Heard

American Robin  30

House Sparrow  1

House Finch  1

American Goldfinch  1    Heard

Chipping Sparrow  1

Field Sparrow  1

Fox Sparrow  1

Dark-eyed Junco  1

White-throated Sparrow  50

LeCONTE'S SPARROW  1   

Savannah Sparrow  10

Song Sparrow  50

Swamp Sparrow  15

Eastern Towhee  1    Heard

Eastern Meadowlark  6    Flyovers landed in tree very yellow breasts

Red-winged Blackbird  10

Yellow-rumped Warbler  3

Northern Cardinal  1