Bay Parkway 3/30--Snowy Egret

Snowy Egrets, Waretown

While I was on LBI yesterday, a big flock of White Ibises was found in the marshes of Forked River and Waretown on the western side of Barnegat Bay. White Ibis isn't the event it used to be, but it isn't a guaranteed species in Ocean County either. I enjoy birding those marshes anyway, so this morning I went to look.  I started off on Spoonbill Court (where the Roseate Spoonbills were last year) and worked my way south to Bay Parkway with no luck. I was especially annoyed after walking up and down Bay Parkway in Waretown to find that if I had skipped the first stop, I probably would have seen the flock, since it was reported before I got there. There's a lot of inaccessible marsh there, so they could have been behind a stand of trees by the time I arrived. Wherever you are, you should be somewhere else. 

Snowy Egret, Lighthouse Ctr

All I saw, at first, were 3 Great Egrets in the marsh and a Greater Yellowlegs, along with the expected, lingering winter waterfowl like Brants and Buffleheads. As I was driving north, though, I saw 3 egrets roosting in a tree and 2 of them were smaller. I pulled over and confirmed that I had my first Snowy Egrets of the year. 

I then drove farther south to the Lighthouse Center, hoping that its marshes would host the white ibises--I've seen the species a few times there. I ran into another birder and she gave me the "Oh you just missed it" story, but what I had just missed--Little Blue Herons and Tricolored Herons--I already had for the year--from the Lighthouse Center as it happens. They were rare in the winter and they're still considered rare, but judging from reports, the window of migration may have shifted.  Later, standing on a bench so I could overlook the phragmites, I found a few far back against the woods, and then later, closer in. What I did miss that she had were Willets and a Glossy Ibis--but those birds are guaranteed unless something catastrophic occurs--to me or to Ocean County. There were at least 5 Snowy Egrets there also along with more Great Egrets. Oddly, Great Blue Herons are getting harder to find. So I had to settle for the Snowy Egrets for my one addition to the year list. 

Little Blue Heron, Lighthouse Ctr