Sandy Hook 1/1--Lapland Longspur

First bird of the year: Carolina Wren, while I was packing the car for our trip up to Sandy Hook to "Kick Off The Year List" with Scott, Linda, Carol and about 25 other birders. I checked off the trash birds for the year (Rock Pigeon, European Starling, House Sparrow) at the Wawa in South Toms River. Our first Canada Geese of the year were flying over Seven Presidents Park as we made the turn onto 36 to drive up the peninsula to the Hook.  After that, the 29 other birds for the day came from various spots on the Hook, most of it seawatching, which, I have said many times here, is not my favorite birding activity. Watching distant ducks, grebes, gulls, even Razorbills, bob up and down in the rolling ocean, dive and disappear, or vanish behind a wave, if it doesn't make me seasick, at least tries the little patience I start out with each morning. But that's winter birding because there ain't much going on terrestrially. 

Horned Larks

I like to get a minimum of one hard to find bird to start the year and today supplied two up at North Beach: a small flock of Horned Larks (not rare, but uncommon enough to comment upon) and, remarkably, a little flock of Lapland Longspurs in the same area. Surprisingly, no Snow Buntings, which the longspurs usually mix in with ("Look for the brown one" I've heard Scott yell out when a flock of buntings took to the air). Shari & I agreed we'd seen 3 of them at one time. Others counted 4.  Considering that very few of the birders in the group, including us, could remember ever seeing more than one at the same time, makes it a memorable sighting. 

The weather was great today--sunny and in the mid-50's. And the pleasant weather made Sandy Hook a pain to bird because everyone else who isn't a birder decided to take advantage of the weather to go to that National Recreation Area and recreate. Jammed parking lots, bikes on the road instead of the bike path, and dogs on the beach made it harder than it should have been to bird the area. Had it been the more expected 20 degrees and windy, we would have had the place to ourselves and frostbite would have been our biggest concern. 

My first day list totaled 38 species. Which is almost double last year's list, when it rained all day. 

Species  First Sighting

Brant  Sandy Hook

Canada Goose  Seven Presidents Park

Mallard  Sandy Hook

American Black Duck  Sandy Hook

Common Eider  Sandy Hook

Surf Scoter  Sandy Hook

White-winged Scoter  Sandy Hook

Long-tailed Duck  Sandy Hook

Bufflehead  Sandy Hook

Common Goldeneye  Sandy Hook

Red-breasted Merganser  Sandy Hook

Horned Grebe  Sandy Hook

Rock Pigeon  Wawa South Toms River

Black-bellied Plover  Sandy Hook

Sanderling  Sandy Hook

Razorbill  Sandy Hook

Bonaparte's Gull  Sandy Hook

Ring-billed Gull  Wawa South Toms River

Herring Gull  Sandy Hook

Great Black-backed Gull  Sandy Hook

Red-throated Loon  Sandy Hook

Common Loon  Sandy Hook

Northern Gannet  Sandy Hook

Turkey Vulture  Sandy Hook

Blue Jay  Wawa South Toms River

American Crow  35 Sunset Rd

Horned Lark  Sandy Hook

Golden-crowned Kinglet  Sandy Hook

White-breasted Nuthatch  35 Sunset Rd

Carolina Wren  35 Sunset Rd

European Starling  Wawa South Toms River

Northern Mockingbird  Wawa South Toms River

American Robin  Sandy Hook

House Sparrow  Wawa South Toms River

Lapland Longspur  Sandy Hook

Song Sparrow  35 Sunset Rd

Yellow-rumped Warbler  Sandy Hook

Northern Cardinal  35 Sunset Rd

Backyard Beetles & Moths

Imperial Moth

My brother, who has been coming to the Pine Barrens for more than 30 years for lepidoptery and other insects (beetles, mostly), set up his lights and sheets in our backyard last night to do some mothing. While he was setting up, I told him the story about Vladmir Nabokov's novel, Bend Sinister. Nabokov, who was, in addition to being one of the greatest, if not the greatest, writer of the 20th century, was also an expert lepidopterist and he often inserted references to moths and butterflies in his work. The last line of the novel is, "A good night for mothing." In the first edition of the book, the copy editor, never having seen the word, changed it to "A good night for nothing."  

Harry said that people who bird are of course, "birders," but people who go mothing have a hard time since they don't want to be confused with "mothers." 

His mothing array wasn't very elaborate: two sheets, one draped over our picnic table, the other over a couple of chairs, a pair of ultra-violet lights and an incandescent 180-watt bulb, a very long extension cord, and he was all set. He also went into the woods in back and smeared bait on the trees. The bait is a mixture of beer, fermented bananas, brown sugar and, I think, molasses. Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't, like bait for fishing. Last night, it didn't work. 

Polyphylla variolosa

As soon as it got dark, we had some activity, though at first, they were mostly beetles. There were two kinds of rather large beetles, both of which would go under the rubric June bug, though, as Harry pointed out, that's like saying "warbler" or "sparrow." It doesn't tell you much. Harry doesn't traffic much in common names, but the interesting beetle to him, and me, was Polyphylla variolosa, with big, feathery antennae. There are only two representatives of this genus, I believe he said, on the east coast, and this is the one you'll find in the Pine Barrens. 

He went to check his bait and I heard him call out "Ho ho," and what he came back with was not a moth, but a caterpillar that he called a "filament" something or other because of the long spike protruding from its thorax. They feed on greenbrier, of which there is plenty to feed on around here. Since he found it on the bark of a tree, he suspects it was looking for a place to pupate. It will now pupate in Westchester County, NY. 

"Filament caterpillar"

Not many moths were showing up on the sheet. I was amazed at how many of the Polyphylla we were attracting, but the one species of moth he found interesting was a Gracilis Underwing, an example of which I remembered seeing on the Wawa wall before they renovated and changed the lights. Around 11 he left for his motel, but he left the lights on. At 5:30 this morning he was back to see what had come in overnight. To me, it just looked like a smattering of uninteresting little insects, but to him, those nondescript moths are very interesting. He also told me that you have to carefully look underneath the drapes and folds of the sheet, because they often work their way in there. Sure enough, when he took the sheet off the two chairs, there on the seat, was a beauty of an Imperial Moth. And then, from underneath the table, he extracted a perfect specimen of an Apple Sphinx Moth. Along with the rare fly he found last night, he was pretty happy with his haul, since of the 3 families of moths he is most interested in, he'd found an example of each.

Apple Sphinx Moth

And then he found the really interesting moth, sitting inside the lip of his lamp. At first he thought it was Cactoblastis cactorum, but what surprised him was that its range map doesn't include New Jersey. It turned out to be Melitara prodenialis.  The caterpillars of this moth feed on prickly pear cactus, of which, again, there is plenty of around here.  There are other records of this moth in New Jersey, but not a lot, and oddly, there is a gap between NJ and North Carolina where the moth has not been recorded. Obviously, prickly pear is all along that stretch. If nothing else, if my brother hasn't come across one in his decades of mothing in New Jersey, you can be sure it is rare.

And right in my own backyard. 

Melitara prodenialis

Large Maple Spanworm

Wawa Branching Out to More Exotic Fare?

 

August Recap--Whitesbog Edition

Short-billed Dowitcher, Middle Bog

Even though I was at Whitesbog 30 out of 31 days, I did do some birding outside those friendly confines. Not much though. I successfully chased the Roseate Spoonbill down at Manahawkin early in the month. It subsequently relocated to Brig. We know this because of a tell-tale chip in its bill. Every day I get eBird rare bird alerts telling me the spoonbill continues at the dogleg but that bird is dead to me. I also made a couple of trips to the BC Fairgrounds, one of which was another successful chase for my year Upland Sandpiper. The other two year birds for the month were found at Whitesbog.

I made one trip to Tuckerton where the highlight for me was finding a Brown Pelican perched upon a piling where Tree Swallows nest earlier in the season. Nice to see a multi use facility down there.

I also added a Wawa bird this month. Yes, I keep a list of all the birds I've seen at Wawas. This month, across the street from the BC Fairgrounds a Cattle Egret was spending time in a farm field. Unfortunately, there was no place to pull over as it was on the corner of Rt 206 and Jobstown Road, a very busy intersection. But there is a Wawa across the highway, so I pulled in there, walked toward the front of the parking lot and was able to see the Cattle Egret in flight as it came over the road. 

Today I started out at Reeves Bogs, mostly because I wanted to see how bad the latest blowout is there. It's big, but because the two thirds of that trail is overgrown and leads to a yet another blow out (this one quite old), it doesn't really change my normal route. I found 13 Great Egrets feeding in the inadvertently drawn down bog there, so now I know where all the egrets we use to see at Whitesbog are. 

I made two trips around the Middle Bog after my stint at Reeves and surprised myself by adding species #104--a Peregrine Falcon which was stirring up the peeps. I expected to see the Merlin which has been dining well on shorebirds this month but this bird was huge in comparison and once it landed at the edge of the bog the facial markings were obvious. 

Because I can, I added up the hours spent and miles covered at Whitesbog this month: 160 hours, 145 miles. I could have walked to Northern NJ and back. Almost an entire week out of the month was spent there. I guess this is called doing what you love. 

For the month, birding only BuCoOcCo, I had 123 species:

Species                 Location
Canada Goose  Whitesbog
Wood Duck  Whitesbog
Mallard  Whitesbog
American Black Duck  Whitesbog
Green-winged Teal  Whitesbog
Bufflehead  Whitesbog
Wild Turkey  35 Sunset Rd
Rock Pigeon  Whitesbog
Mourning Dove  Whitesbog
Yellow-billed Cuckoo  Whitesbog
Common Nighthawk  Whitesbog
Eastern Whip-poor-will  35 Sunset Rd
Chimney Swift  Whitesbog
Ruby-throated Hummingbird  35 Sunset Rd
Clapper Rail  Great Bay Blvd
Semipalmated Plover  Whitesbog
Killdeer  Whitesbog
Upland Sandpiper  BC Fairgrounds
Stilt Sandpiper  Whitesbog
Sanderling  Whitesbog
Baird's Sandpiper  Whitesbog
Least Sandpiper  Whitesbog
White-rumped Sandpiper  Whitesbog
Buff-breasted Sandpiper  Whitesbog
Pectoral Sandpiper  Whitesbog
Semipalmated Sandpiper  Whitesbog
Short-billed Dowitcher  Whitesbog
Wilson's Snipe  Whitesbog
Wilson's Phalarope  Whitesbog
Spotted Sandpiper  Whitesbog
Solitary Sandpiper  Whitesbog
Greater Yellowlegs  Whitesbog
Lesser Yellowlegs  Whitesbog
Laughing Gull  Whitesbog
Herring Gull  Whitesbog
Great Black-backed Gull  Great Bay Blvd
Gull-billed Tern  Whitesbog
Caspian Tern  Whitesbog
Forster's Tern  Great Bay Blvd
Double-crested Cormorant  Whitesbog
Brown Pelican  Great Bay Blvd
Great Blue Heron  Whitesbog
Great Egret  Whitesbog
Snowy Egret  Manahawkin WMA
Little Blue Heron  Whitesbog
Tricolored Heron  Great Bay Blvd
Cattle Egret  Columbus Wawa
Green Heron  Whitesbog
Black-crowned Night-Heron  Whitesbog
Yellow-crowned Night-Heron  Great Bay Blvd
Glossy Ibis  Manahawkin WMA
Roseate Spoonbill  Manahawkin WMA
Black Vulture  Whitesbog
Turkey Vulture  Whitesbog
Osprey  Whitesbog
Northern Harrier  Whitesbog
Cooper's Hawk  Whitesbog
Bald Eagle  Whitesbog
Red-shouldered Hawk  Whitesbog
Red-tailed Hawk  BC Fairgrounds
Eastern Screech-Owl  Whitesbog
Belted Kingfisher  Whitesbog
Red-bellied Woodpecker  Whitesbog
Downy Woodpecker  35 Sunset Rd
Hairy Woodpecker  Whitesbog
Northern Flicker  Whitesbog
American Kestrel  BC Fairgrounds
Merlin  Whitesbog
Peregrine Falcon  Whitesbog
Eastern Wood-Pewee  35 Sunset Rd
Eastern Phoebe  Whitesbog
Great Crested Flycatcher  Whitesbog
Eastern Kingbird  Whitesbog
White-eyed Vireo  Whitesbog
Red-eyed Vireo  Whitesbog
Blue Jay  35 Sunset Rd
American Crow  35 Sunset Rd
Fish Crow  Whitesbog
Common Raven  Whitesbog
Carolina Chickadee  Whitesbog
Tufted Titmouse  Whitesbog
Northern Rough-winged Swallow  Whitesbog
Purple Martin  Whitesbog
Tree Swallow  Whitesbog
Bank Swallow  Whitesbog
Barn Swallow  Whitesbog
White-breasted Nuthatch  35 Sunset Rd
Blue-gray Gnatcatcher  Whitesbog
House Wren  Whitesbog
Carolina Wren  35 Sunset Rd
European Starling  Whitesbog
Gray Catbird  Whitesbog
Brown Thrasher  Whitesbog
Northern Mockingbird  BC Fairgrounds
Eastern Bluebird  35 Sunset Rd
American Robin  Whitesbog
Cedar Waxwing  Whitesbog
House Sparrow  35 Sunset Rd
House Finch  Whitesbog
American Goldfinch  Whitesbog
Chipping Sparrow  Whitesbog
Field Sparrow  Whitesbog
Seaside Sparrow  Great Bay Blvd
Song Sparrow  35 Sunset Rd
Swamp Sparrow  Whitesbog
Eastern Towhee  Whitesbog
Bobolink  Whitesbog
Orchard Oriole  Whitesbog
Baltimore Oriole  Whitesbog
Red-winged Blackbird  Whitesbog
Brown-headed Cowbird  Whitesbog
Common Grackle  Whitesbog
Boat-tailed Grackle  Great Bay Blvd
Ovenbird  Whitesbog
Black-and-white Warbler  Whitesbog
Prothonotary Warbler  Whitesbog
Common Yellowthroat  Whitesbog
Hooded Warbler  Great Bay Blvd
Yellow Warbler  Whitesbog
Pine Warbler  35 Sunset Rd
Prairie Warbler  Whitesbog
Northern Cardinal  Whitesbog
Blue Grosbeak  Whitesbog

Green Heron, Whitesbog

FREC 3/27--Blue-Gray Gnatcatcher

Blue-gray Gnatcatcher, FREC

Pre-pandemic, Mike led a series of "Birds of Jackson" trips where the group would explore a number of locations from late winter to early spring.  The trips have obviously been a no-go the last two years but there was no reason Mike & I couldn't recreate one. Yesterday, a Saturday, which is the day the trips were held, Mike and I met up at FREC (Forest Resources Education Center) a bit earlier than the trip would have started but from thereon we essentially did the full trip in order, including a stop at a Wawa on County Line Road. Besides FREC, we stopped at Butterfly Bogs for ducks, Lake Enno, which is a really obscure spot that practically no one birds but is a great place to pick up Baltimore Oriole a little later in the spring, then Wawa, a retention pond at Jackson Mills, Prospertown Lake, which still had Common Mergansers, one of the few places in the county you can find this duck, and finally, Colliers Mills, though we didn't drive up the length of Success Road out to Rt 571 as we do on the trip. 

My only new bird for the year was a little tricky to get. At FREC, just as we crossed the bridge over the mighty Toms River (barely a trickle this far upstream) Mike said he heard Blue-gray Gnatcatcher. My first reaction was, "Nah, too early." Blue-gray Gnatcatcher is just at the lower bottom of the highest calls I can hear, but I wasn't hearing this one. However, eventually the little bird showed itself high up in just-budding tree. Early, perhaps, but Saturday all of sudden, lots of gnatcatchers were reported all around Ocean County, so there must have been a push of them overnight. Later, as we walked on the other side of FREC which is just outside the limits of the Pine Barrens, we saw another and I was able to document it. 

I missed hearing Northern Waterthrush as Mike did because I was hearing a woodcock softly peent us and didn't catch the warbler in front of us. Would like to get that bird, but would really like to get LouisianaWaterthrush, a much more difficult species to find. I'll have to start haunting Double Trouble soon to see if I can stumble upon one. 

Red-headed Woodpecker, Colliers Mills

Our other accomplishment occurred at Colliers Mills. I asked Mike if he wanted to try to track down the Red-headed Woodpecker, since he needed it for the year and of course he did. We went into the woods north of the Success Road and started looking around--bluebirds and robins abounded but no woodpeckers. I told Mike I had a 50% hit rate and since I didn't see it last time I was there, we should find it. Finally, near the edge of the woods we heard the bird and started walking towards its "Queer" cry. Mike spotted the bird first and we watched it move it around but it kept coming back to one dead tree full of holes and we realized that was its nest or at least it was investigating it as one. And the tree is very easy to find with a series of landmarks but of course I'm not going to reveal that information. I'll be curious next time I'm there to see if one of those holes is occupied. 

For the day we had 51 species, an excellent count for the township:

Species          First Sighting
Canada Goose   FREC
Wood Duck   FREC
Gadwall   Butterfly Bogs
Mallard   FREC
American Black Duck   Prospertown Lake
Green-winged Teal   Butterfly Bogs
Ring-necked Duck   Butterfly Bogs
Bufflehead   Butterfly Bogs
Common Merganser   Prospertown Lake
Mourning Dove   FREC
Killdeer   Colliers Mills WMA
American Woodcock   FREC
Herring Gull   Prospertown Lake
Double-crested Cormorant   Prospertown Lake
Great Blue Heron   Butterfly Bogs
Great Egret   Butterfly Bogs
Turkey Vulture   Jackson Mills Pond
Red-tailed Hawk   Lake Enno
Red-headed Woodpecker   Colliers Mills WMA
Red-bellied Woodpecker   FREC
Downy Woodpecker   FREC
Hairy Woodpecker   Colliers Mills WMA
Northern Flicker   FREC
American Kestrel   Colliers Mills WMA
Eastern Phoebe   FREC
Blue Jay   FREC
American Crow   FREC
Fish Crow   FREC
Carolina Chickadee   FREC
Tufted Titmouse   FREC
Tree Swallow   Prospertown Lake
Red-breasted Nuthatch   FREC
White-breasted Nuthatch   FREC
Blue-gray Gnatcatcher   FREC
Carolina Wren   FREC
European Starling   FREC
Northern Mockingbird   Prospertown Lake
Eastern Bluebird   FREC
American Robin   FREC
House Finch   FREC
American Goldfinch   FREC
Chipping Sparrow   FREC
Field Sparrow   FREC
Dark-eyed Junco   FREC
White-throated Sparrow   FREC
Song Sparrow   FREC
Red-winged Blackbird   FREC
Brown-headed Cowbird   FREC
Common Grackle   Lake Enno
Pine Warbler   FREC
Northern Cardinal   FREC

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

BC Fairgrounds 1/28--Short-eared Owl, American Kestrel

The big blob is a Short-eared Owl

In yet another proof of Zirlin's 2nd Law of Birding (You will not see the bird until you sincerely give up)...

I arrived at the Burlington County Fairgrounds at 4 PM. Sunset today was 5:11, but I wanted to give myself a little leeway. My mission was to get a Short-eared Owl. They don't come out until just before, or just after sunset. If they come out. I thought it might be a bit too windy for them to hunt, but seeing a couple of  Northern Harriers encouraged me. Harriers punch out at dusk and the shorties take the night shift.

My biggest worry was getting locked in. It isn't clear when the rangers lock the gates and while they're supposed to sweep the area before they do, suppose they don't? Standing there all alone was making me a little nervous.

American Kestrel

In the meantime, I had raptors to entertain me. Aside from the harriers, I had a Red-tailed Hawk, two Bald Eagles (on nest) and an American Kestrel. I've driven miles back & forth on Colliers Mills Road this month looking for a kestrel (everyone else has seen one), so of course, when I'm not looking for one I find a female perched up on stick. Nice, but not an Ocean County bird.

Just before 5 a couple of other cars pulled in to keep me company. In one was a birder I know (Terry), but the other birder was a stranger to me. He caught sight of the eagles in his little bins and was just hyperventilating about them. To do my good deed for the day, I put them in the scope for him and he just kvelled.  Meanwhile, Terry & I were going "huh huh, huh huh," where's the Short-eared Owls?

The sun set. The harrier was still roosting in a small tree. A 5:12 it was gone, but no owls replaced it. Terry & I waited. It was getting darker. And colder. Much colder than I expected. When do you give up? After all, I did have kestrel as a new year bird.

Finally, Terry & I gave up. We were turning toward our cars when she shouted out she had one. Where? Between the two trees. Lotta trees there. But, as luck would have it, I saw a bird with a moth-like flight just above the silhouetted trees then between the two trees. Then it alighted in the tree to the left where she & I were able to view it in the scope. I hope her photographs came out better than my digiscopes. In my defense, it was so cold I couldn't hold my hand steady of the scope's eyepiece with my phone.

We high fived and she high-tailed out of there. I was working on my list when I saw the park ranger's flashing lights behind me. Time to go. I finished my list in the Wawa parking lot.

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.

Waretown Wawa Teardown

I was driving north on Route 9 yesterday in Waretown when I saw a cloud of dust up ahead. As I approached the traffic light at Wells Mills Road, I saw that the cloud was rising from what was the Wawa Market as an orange excavator smashed down repeatedly on its roof tearing big chunks of the building away.

In happier days

Now, this was never my favorite Wawa. It was on an oddly shaped plot, it was hard to get into (a tough left turn off 9) and harder to get out of (an impossible left turn onto Wells Mills) and it was shabby inside, but, it was a Wawa, and if you didn't stop at the one at Barnegat, you had to drive all the way up to Lacey for the next one (like a whole 3 miles).  Because the land it was standing on was small and of an indescribable geometric shape, there is no room to rebuild it as a "Super Wawa" (i.e. "gas station"), so there is one less Wawa in the world.

It's been a bad month for Wawas: my local one in Whiting has been closed down for renovation since Oct 22 (not to reopen until the 22nd of this month), which has meant no end of inconvenience for me and my brother & I fear that with the alterations made to the exterior of the building, plus new lighting it will cease to be a mothing hot spot. The equivalent of a nice patch of birding habitat getting mowed down, except that it really isn't ideal for moths to cling to the surface of a building out in the open--easy pickings for predators, not to mention "hunters." We really won't know until spring what the change means for lepidoptera in Whiting until the spring. Not many winter moths around.