Birding the Beaches ....

Small Scraps of Birding Time on Long Island in June

Saturday, June 3 - Brooklyn and Queens Counties

The day actually didn't start in Brooklyn or Queens, but rather in Somerset County, New Jersey where I chased, and disastrously dipped a LESSER NIGHTHAWK.  I don't often leave New York State when I'm birding locally but if I do it's usually because a bird catches my interest and sticks in my mind.  This bird did just that, originally identified as a Common Nighthawk and posted on-line, then re-identified as (New Jersey's Second ever record of) a Lesser Nighthawk by Ben Barkley, the bird was subsequently found to have been picked-up and re-habbed locally a few days earlier, before being released nearby.  Once free though, it settled into a nice pattern of sitting on a rail fence or along a gravel path at Lord Sterling Park allowing lots and lots of local birders to see and photograph it during its week long stay.  I got there early on Saturday after a rough drive where the Land Rover's navigation system was totally overwhelmed by the road-spaghetti that is Northern New Jersey, sending me the wrong way several times and even directing down a one-way street the wrong way at one point.  Oh and it was raining when I got there, and oh, the bird seemed to have departed during the night never to be seen again.  Not a good start to the day.

Nelson's Sparrow

So back to New York where my first stop, Plumb Beach in Brooklyn, improved my day immeasurably.  There had been reports of a very unseasonal NELSON'S SPARROW singing in the marsh here (not unusual in the Fall, but rare in the Spring) and as soon as I hiked out to the East end of the beach I could hear it singing loudly and see it sitting up in plain view.  This tiny marsh also had Seaside Sparrow and Clapper Rail (both King's County birds for me) so I felt that returning to New York was clearly the right strategy and pushed on to Jamaica Bay in Queens.

As I pulled into the reserve parking lot I picked up and email saying that Tim Healy had just had a Least Bittern at Big John's Pond, so off I went, hoping for the Bittern and perhaps a glimpse of the resident Barn Owls ... I saw neither.  Back to the West Pond where my spirits picked up when two year birds - a Gull-billed Tern and a Tricolored Heron flew into view within minutes of each other.  Back to being in a good mood and, after checking some other local coastal spots, I called it a day.

Tricolored Heron

Sunday, June 4 - New York County

The long anticipated Pelagic Trip out to the Hudson Canyon was cancelled due to weather.  No South Polar Skua for my New York list this year.

Saturday, June 10 - Suffolk County

Cupsogue again at dawn and I opted to take the shorter, calf-deep stinky mud route out to the flats .... just as gross as I remembered it.  The morning did produce a nice clutch of year birds though with Black Tern, Royal Tern, and Seaside Sparrow all joining the year list.

I also checked Mecox Inlet twice that day, hoping for a recently seen Black-necked Stilt.  While that bird was a no show, I did see four Lesser Black-backed Gulls, more Royal Terns and a nice mix of terns and shorebirds.

Common Tern, one of 7 species of terns seen over the weekend and the only
one close enough for a decent photo ...

Sunday, June 11 - Suffolk County

Back at Cupsogue again for the early tide but this time a quick sea-watch proved productive with four Wilson's Storm-Petrels close to shore (I know, Brian Patterson had a Swinhoe's Storm-Petrel in North Carolina this weekend, but I was still happy to see any Storm-Petrel given that our boat trip got cancelled).  The flats were also lively with more Royal Terns, Roseate Terns and some nice scope views of an adult Arctic Tern.  When I first moved to New York, Arctic Terns were almost never reported from the state other than on pelagic trips; now they are seen annually at various tern loafing spots along Long Island.  This doesn't seem to be a case of a change of distribution as much as a case of more observers being better at picking them up - better birders, better optics.  This bird was of course the reason I went to Cupsogue three times, so I was glad to finally get one.  Now the focus shifts to finding a Sandwich Tern!

Great and Snowy Egrets at Three-Mile Harbor in East Hampton

In addition to Cupsogue, I also hit Mecox a few more times and checked out a bunch of the local sites like Three-Mile Harbor, etc.  Nothing amazing there - a Saltmarsh Sparrow was the best bird at Sammy's Beach - but a nice local mix of breeding birds.  A very nice weekend of local birding.

Thursday, June 15 - Nassau County

There had been two Black-necked Stilts at Jones Beach for the previous two weeks ... a bit of a rarity in New York and a county bird (and state year bird) for me.  I was there at 6:00am, just in time to see a helicopter spray the area for mosquitos and flush every bird for miles around, and again at 3:00pm.  Not a stilt to be seen ....  hopefully not slipping back into a dipping phase ....

Saturday, June 17 - Western New York State

And while I was out of town, a BROWN BOOBY was found at Nickerson Beach in Nassau County .... argh!  This species is now a good candidate for my official New York State nemesis bird given the number of times I've missed it in the state (it's either this species or Mew Gull).  I was 450 miles to the West when it was found and briefly considered driving back overnight to be there at dawn to see it.  In the end I was just too tired to do that safely so gave up, and was glad I did as the bird was found dead the next morning.  To drive eight hours to see a dead Booby would not have been a fun thing.....

The reason I was out of town was a good thing though.  One of my goals this year was to have a life list in each of New York's 62 counties.  I was close to this goal, but given a quiet, free weekend, decided to finish it off with a 1,000 mile drive through the West of New York State, filling in the last of the counties.  The birds weren't very exciting, but the birding was pleasant and I got to see some new places and bird some new habitats.  A nice outdoorsy, if very introverted, weekend ... sometimes us introverts need quiet time.

All done.  Now I just have to keep adding to the lists.

Saturday, June 24 - Suffolk County (The Hamptons)

Started the day with a sea-watch from Amagansett and royally messed up.  I had a lot of stuff to schlepp out to the house on Friday so I opted to leave my camera behind .... NEVER leave your camera behind!  As soon as I walked on to the beach I saw two birds that I would really have liked to photograph ... big, dark skua/jaeger types of the sort that could have been big, dark, (rare) Pomarine Jaegers or (much rarer) South Polar Skuas.  In sea-watching you don't get a lot of time as birds hurtle past so, if I'd had my camera, I could have taken a few shots to study later at leisure and work on the ID.  So in the end I had to report these birds as Skua/Jaeger sp. a real lost opportunity.

The day did get better though when I had some friends from the city, some local fishing friends and some of the local hotshot young Long Island birders over for dinner.  Cooked Paella and made Olive Oil Cake ... yes, I can cook ... a very pleasant evening.

My Paella - my giant Paella Pan is one of my prize possessions ....

Sunday, June 25 - (local) East Hampton Spots

Hit a half dozen local spots.  Saw nothing remarkable, but felt good about putting in some local coverage time.

Overall a good June.  Saw a lot of birds, none terribly rare, but I did feel like I spent time with New York's breeding birds for the first time in a few years.  And so on to more adventures in July ....

Whiskered Tern in Cape May, New Jersey

A quick twitch for another European vagrant.  A tale of three twitches.

Twitch #1: In 1985 I was a rabid teenage birder simply itching to see new species.  With no car, and no birders in the family, my options were limited but desperate to see new things I decided to start hitch-hiking to chase rarities in the UK.  One of the first twitches was to chase a WHISKERED TERN that had shown up in Devon.  Three rides, three hours, and I got the bird!  So easy (although I did meet some "interesting" people on the way).  I thought the trip a great success and many similar trips were to follow in the coming years.

Twitch #2: Fast forward 8 years to 1993 and I was living in New York when a Whiskered Tern showed up at Cape May, and was later re-found in the Bombay Hook area of Delaware.  By that point I'd seen the species in several countries (and have since seen it in several more) but, this being an ABA bird, Philip Dempsey and I drove down to try to see it.  We dipped....

Twitch #3: Fast forward another 21 years and on Friday I heard that Louise Zemaitis had found another Whiskered Tern in Cape May, NJ.  I woke up on Saturday morning to a barrage of photos of the bird on Facebook - it seemed to be sticking, so perhaps I should try again?  Some quick texts to old birding buddies Philip Dempsey and Michael Duffy and come Sunday morning we were on our way at 6am with a 3+ hour drive ahead of us.

Cape May Lighthouse (photo: Michael Duffy)

On the way down we were a little troubled at the lack of reports and the puzzling silence on Facebook.  Had the bird left?

Stopping for coffee somewhere in central Jersey we all anxiously checked our phones and (to our great relief) got word that the bird was still being seen.  When we got to Cape May at 9:15am the news wasn't great though; the bird had been seen a couple of times early in the morning but hadn't been seen for some time.  We'd come all this way though so we settled in to watch and an hour later the word got out that the bird had reappeared on the beach in the tern/gull roost.

Whiskered Tern - dead center in this long-distance record shot.

Mission accomplished - although too far away to get decent shots.  So after watching the bird until it wandered off, we decided to do the same and hit some local birding spots.  Heading back to the beach an hour or so later we again got distant views of the bird and watched it until it picked up and flew over to feed at Bunker Pond.  While I never did get more than record shots we did get to watch the bird for 20 minutes as it fed over the fresh water.  An interesting feeding style, swirling over the pond then dropping to grab damselflies (?) on the water surface.  Nice views, great bird.  Only the 3rd record for the ABA ever.  Very glad we came.

Whiskered Tern - two distant flight shots.

The bird was good but perhaps the best part of the day was catching up with old friends.  I don't often get to bird with Michael and Philip these days (Michael became a world-lister and Philip a surfer).  I also got to spend time with Louise Zemaitis and Michael O'Brien, Jeff Gordon, Mary Gustafson, etc.  A veritable who's who of the birding world in one place.  Who knows, perhaps I should twitch more often ....

Photo: Michael Duffy

Postscript: 8 days later and the bird is still there (no doubt having been seen by every serious ABA lister by now).

I'd assumed that Whiskered Terns ate small (tasty-looking) damselflies but I've since seen photos that show it eating large migrant dragonflies.  Given the location, and the abundance of large migrating dragonflies, there's no reason it wouldn't stay for another week or two before (presumably) heading South to the dragonfly-rich wetlands of Florida.  Potential for many other state firsts here ....

Crested Caracara in New Jersey.

Took a spin out to Mercer County, New Jersey today to look for a Crested Caracara that had been seen by many over the weekend.  There have been a few recent records in the NorthEast and, while everyone (rightly) debates the origin of these long-distance wanderers, I think the consensus is coming around to them being good birds.

Got to the site (a recently cut alfalfa field near West Windsor) by about 9am, only to hear that the bird had been seen well by many but was now out of sight.  The bird had apparently flown across the field and vanished behind a small 'ridge' not 15 minutes before I got there - 'you snooze, you loose'.  Sat and waited for a good three hours before getting antsy and heading off to drive nearby roads checking other alfalfa fields and open spaces.  Coming up empty I headed back to the original site and, as I rounded the corner, saw that the birders had all moved a quarter of a mile down the road and had scopes all focussed in the same direction!  Sure enough, the bird had flown out from behind the ridge not two minutes after I'd left.

Crested Caracara (2 shots)

Got some distant shots and celebrated my second New Jersey State Bird of 2012 (after Brown Booby). Then I got greedy and tried to add the Elegant Tern at Sandy Hook on the way home; but no luck on the double for the day.  Still, a nice bird, and a change of (state and) scenery, so well worth the trip.

Brown Booby in New Jersey

So, I'm laying in bed at 5am this morning, wondering whether to go to Cupsogue or to Jamaica Bay, and I realize that I'm honestly not all that excited to do either.  My usual morning troll through bird alerts and e-mails, fails to come up with any other exciting New York options but, while I'm wondering if there's something else to do, I see the chatter from New Jersey.  Apparently a Brown Booby has popped up at a small, inland lake in Warren County.  Even though I know I'm not supposed to cheat on New York this year, I just know instantly that I'm going to go for it this morning.  I need a break from New York so I crawl out and nudge the car past the Brooklyn Bridge and over to the Holland Tunnel.

For some historical context: through the 90s (back when I was a serious local birder), even though I lived in New York, I birded mostly in New Jersey.  Birding for me back then meant heading South or West, and almost never East.  I spent a lot of time at Cape May and, while participating in four World Series of Birding, spent a ton of time scouting the state in the Spring.  Even in Winter, I was more likely to be found along the Jersey Shore (or at Cape Anne) than at Montauk.  In fact, when I slipped into World Listing in the 00s and stopped birding locally, my New Jersey list was still bigger than my New York list.  Fast forward 20 years though, and I haven't really done any birding in the state since; so am excited to add a State Bird for the first time in many years.

The drive out is easy and the navigation system on the Range Rover guides me easily into the parking lot at the lake.  Walking over to the shore, I see Rick Wright and a couple of other locals with scopes set.  The bird is sitting at the far end of the lake on a dock and apparently had just finished a fishing trip so will probably be sitting there for a while.  Now what on earth is a Brown Booby doing in this small, shallow freshwater lake in the heavily wooded farmlands of Warren County?  Birding is full of mysteries ....

After a half hour of waiting for closer flight views I end up joining a group of local birders who hike a trail (the Blue Trail) over towards the bird.  The trail ends at a gravel road, but it isn't posted so we make our way closer to the lake.  Before we get there however, we hit some black and red "no-entry" signs, and while they don't look very official, I demure when some of the group push on.  At that point though I'm close to the water, so I take advantage of the fact that I'm wearing sandals (I live in Teva River-Runner shoes) and wade out into the lake.  The lake bottom is hard (Marl?) and just 20 feet out I find myself with a distant (50m) but unobstructed view of the Booby.

Got my "proof shots" and so headed out.  The guys who got closer (found a way to work around the signs and stay on public property) got truly excellent shots.  A very cool bird for New Jersey.  Now if I could just get one in New York .....