Luck was with me today. Over the weekend, at Brig, it was discovered that the odd sandpiper photographed by one persistent birder who, admirably, is always looking for what shouldn't be there was, actually, a mega-rarity. On Sunday the Bird Jam began, with hundreds of birders flocking (pun intended) to the area between markers 3 & 4. I was texted by Mike while I was at Palmyra, but I had no intention of getting involved with that craziness. Just the images of 40 or 50 cars "parked" haphazardly, with a hundred thousand dollars worth of scopes lined up along the dike made me light-headed. The crowds continued on Labor Day. I abstained.
I wasn't really that interested in the bird. I had to remind myself while I was mentally sneering, that for most of those birders, a Little Stint (for that indeed was what the odd sandpiper turned out to be) was a life bird, a rare wanderer from the Eastern Hemisphere. However, I'd already had Little Stint a couple of times in South Africa and, compared to the other shorebirds I was seeing at St Lucia and Muzi Pan (African Jacana, Blacksmith Lapwing, Crowned Lapwing, Kittlitz's Plover, White-fronted Plover, Three-banded Plover), the stint was just another sandpiper. It would be great to have it on my ABA list, my Jersey list, and so forth, but not at the price of my nerves. (Not to mention the possibility that it could become the first birding super-spreader event, though, to their credit, almost everyone today was wearing a mask and I hear it was similar behavior the previous two days.)
So this morning, hoping that most people who wanted it would have seen it already, and hoping that it would stay, I drove down there without any real enthusiasm. It felt like something I should do and I hate being told what I should do, even if I'm the one telling myself.
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2/3 of a Little Stint
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My plan was to try to get some walking in by leaving the car in the lot and hoofing it down to the area on the south dike, but when I saw an email that the bird was present, I figured, let's just get this bird and drove over to marker 3 where 5 or 6 birders were congregated. It was then, while getting my bins out of my backpack, that I discovered that I'd left the camera at home. I shouldered my scope, walked up to the first guy I saw, asked about the stint. He had his iPhone attached to his scope and showed me the bird on the screen. I was then able, after a minute or so, to find the bird on my own (ain't an official sighting until I see it in my scope) and got most of the field marks--spindly legs, pale head, mottled appearance, hint of rufous on the body. I couldn't really see the "braces" on its back because of the angle I was at. The bird moved around a lot, playing 3 card monte with some other peeps, but I was able to track it pretty well. The only digiscope photo I was able to take is horrible--through the vegetation, if you look hard, you can see about 2/3 of a Little Stint.
Then a Peregrine Falcon came along and buzzed the birds which all took off. This has been going on, I understand, since the bird was originally rediscovered. I drove down the dike a bit but the bird was not to be found until a few hours later. But I only need to see it once. And I only saw it once because I nixed the walking idea--luck.
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Brown Pelican with Laughing Gull
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Frankly, the more interesting birds to me were the two
Brown Pelicans I found on the north dike, just before the dogleg. I've seen white pelicans at Brig numerous times, but these were the first brown one I'd ever encountered. They are "infrequent" according to eBird. And,
I found them.
All in all the day exceeded my expectations, which were admittedly low. Because there has been some speculation that this stint is the same stint that summered on a beach in Rhode Island, I had the notion that it might stick around. But I was almost positive I'd need help getting on the bird. As someone said today, "If that bird had landed on the hood of my car, I wouldn't have known it was a stint." So all praise to the birder who originally found it, a great guy, who studies every peep as if he's never seen one before. That's birding.
For the loop and Gull Pond, I managed 57 species. I probably could have done a little better walking on Jen's Trail, but the mosquitoes were awful.
Canada Goose 110
Mute Swan 39
Wood Duck 1 Gull Pond.
Blue-winged Teal 6 Gull Pond
Mallard 35
American Black Duck 1
Mourning Dove 1 Atop Visitor's Ctr
Ruby-throated Hummingbird 1 Gull Pond Road
Clapper Rail 2
American Avocet 11 Exact count
American Oystercatcher 1 NE Corner
Black-bellied Plover 18
Semipalmated Plover 8
Little Stint 1 MEGA
Least Sandpiper 50
White-rumped Sandpiper 1
Semipalmated Sandpiper 25
Western Sandpiper 1
Greater Yellowlegs 1 Heard flyover
Lesser Yellowlegs 2
Laughing Gull 300
Herring Gull 100
Great Black-backed Gull 2
Caspian Tern 29
Common Tern 1
Forster's Tern 65
Royal Tern 4
Black Skimmer 30
Double-crested Cormorant 320
Brown Pelican 2
Great Blue Heron 8
Great Egret 85
Snowy Egret 28
Little Blue Heron 5
Black-crowned Night-Heron 1 Roosting in tree along road to Gull Pond
Yellow-crowned Night-Heron 4
Turkey Vulture 4
Osprey 10
Northern Harrier 1
Bald Eagle 1
Northern Flicker 1
Peregrine Falcon 2
White-eyed Vireo 1 Heard Jen’s Trail
Blue Jay 3 Heard
American Crow 4
Carolina Chickadee 3 Heard
Tufted Titmouse 2
Tree Swallow 100
Marsh Wren 1
Carolina Wren 2
European Starling 150
Gray Catbird 2 Heard Gull Pond Road
American Goldfinch 2
Song Sparrow 2
Red-winged Blackbird 75
Ovenbird 1 Jen’s Trail
Black-and-white Warbler 1
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Brown Pelicans with Herring Gull, Double-crested Cormorant, and Great Egret
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