I had promised to help out
Shai Mitra and Pat Lindsay with the NYC Audubon walk that was scheduled for October 11th at
Robert Moses State Park. After clearing a mix-up with the National Park Service on a program that I was supposed to run at Jamaica Bay, I confirmed my availability. The walk was to begin sometime around 11:00 a.m. once the contingent from NYC had arrived. In my opinion, 11:00 a.m. is much too late to catch the morning birds, but that was the time this trip was scheduled. Anyway, there was no way I was going to begin my birding day that late so, I was at the
Coast Guard Station at Jones Beach, by 6:55 a.m. where I met birders who were already there. Seth Ausbel, Tom Burke, Gail Benson and someone else whose name I did not get. Together, we birded a bit around the Station, picking up quite a number of
Kinglets – both
Ruby and Golden Crowned,
Swamp Sparrows and numerous
White Throated Sparrows. Eventually, we all moved on to bird separate areas. I found myself with Seth and his friend while Tom and Gail headed towards the fisherman’s parking area. The birding was not bad, but the diversity was minimal; slowly, I added to my day list picking up
Northern Flicker,
Hermit Thrush,
Yellow-rumped Warbler and others. About an hour into birding, I got a call from Shai, who indicated that Pat had found a
Dickcissel. Yes, there is such a bird as Dickcissel as there, is one called
Titmouse...I am not yanking your chain.
I passed the word to Seth and decided I would immediately convene to where Shai and Pat were located. On my way to my vehicle, I saw Tom and Gail and relayed the message only to find out that they had also gotten the call from Shai and were on their way as well. Tom and Gail waited for me and I followed them to the area where the Dickcissel was seen. When we got there, Pat and Shai were at the end of the strip and so Tom, Gail and I walked and birded heading their way. Along the strip, we again had a plethora of
Kinglets,
Chipping Sparrows and a couple of Field Sparrows. At one point, Tom and I heard the call of the Dicksessel, but could not locate the bird and after that one call we did not hear it again. We finally met up with Shai and Pat; by then, we were joined by two other birders, Ken and Sue Feustel. Shai stayed behind to speak with Ken and Sue, while Tom, Gail, Pat and I continued to backtrack where Shai and Pat had just left, in hopes finding the bird. We had gotten about half way down the stretch and Tom and I were parsing through some Sparrows, when Ken called out to us, they had found the bird. We hurried back towards them and spotted the Dickcissel feeding in the grass with some other sparrows. After getting our fill of the Dickcissel and pointing Seth and some other arriving birders to the location of the bird, Shai, Pat and I left to prepare for the Audubon walk.
Shai rode with me while Pat headed off to get some sandwiches for herself and Shai. Me, I was pretty much prepared with my usual staple of PB&J packed sandwiches to carry me throughout the day. Shai and I arrived at Robert Moses State Park field 2 where we waited for the Audubon group. While waiting I went off and did a brief Sea Watch, which was not productive save for a few
Northern Gannets way out. In about 15 minutes after arriving at Robert Moses, the bus with the NYC birders pulled into the parking lot. About 30 birders disembarked with their Audubon leader Joe Guinta. Shai went over to the bus, introduced himself and talked a bit about birding the barrier beaches. After Shai’s introduction we began birding the edges of the parking lot. It was much quieter now that it was almost 12:30 and birds were not easy to get.
The first bird we got the group on was a
Savannah Sparrow and everyone all got good looks. As we moved further along the central median, we picked up
Dark-eyed Juncos,
White-throated Sparrows,
Northern Flickers, numerous
Yellow-rumped Warblers and
Eastern Phoebes. We also had a few flybys of one
Merlin, a couple of
Kestrels and 2
Peregrines. As we got closer to the Hawk Watch, Pat came towards our group and told me she had received a call from Tom Burke who had found a
Lark Sparrow. I told Pat that I was going to join her if she was going for the bird.
After speaking with Shai, I excused myself from the group and left with Pat. We arrived within 15 minutes at the location and saw Tom and other birders who were trying to relocate the bird. Pat, Gail, and I spoke to one local resident in the area and asked if we could walk behind the houses on the boardwalk. We were told that we could since it is accessible, to the public and so we began checking that section while other birders remained in the front. We had gone a few yards when I heard a familiar voice yelling, “I got the bird”…it was Bobby Kurtz. And sure enough, the bird had moved back to an area we had just checked and was feeding with some field Sparrows. We all keyed in on the bird and got great looks. After a while Pat and I headed back to rejoin the NYC Audubon group. Along the way, I spotted Eastern Meadowlarks along the median and we pulled over, confirmed the ID and got some good looks. The group by now had walked the area around the light house and then headed to field 2. We joined them and did some more birding picking up another
Eastern Meadowlark,
Palm Warbler, another
Sharp Shinned and many of the usual species.
We wrapped up the walk with a brief Seawatch, where Pat and I saw Royal Terns, Black Scoters and Northern Gannets. It was hard to get people on the seabirds because they were moving fast and by the time you tried to get someone on the scope the birds were out of the field of view. At 4:30 PM, Joe decided that it was time to head back to NYC and so we bid the group farewell. After the group left, Shai, Pat and I did a little bit of birding then Pat and Shai decided to call it a day. I headed back to Queens and birded
Jamaica Bay Wildlife Refuge for a bit before calling it a day around 7:00 pm. It was another good day of birding the barrier beaches of Long Island.
Tags:
Birding,
Robert Moses State Park,
Dickcissel,
Lark Sparrow
On Saturday November 7th, I joined my friend Howard Fischer for some birding out in Staten Island. My first stop would be Mount Loretto; a place I had not visited since participating in the NYC Million Tree initiative with NYC Audubon, back in November of 2008. After arriving at Mount Loretto, I headed in to meet up with Howie; on my way in, I picked up a couple of Eastern Bluebirds working the field to my right. Unfortunately, I could not get Howie on them as he was on the other side of the field and that was the only Bluebird sighting for the day. By the time I met up with Howie, I had already tallied another 8 species.
We decided to do a little sea watch out into Raritan Bay to look for any Grebes and other species that might be lurking nearby. That was not as productive as we would have liked, but we did add both Common and Red-throated Loons and a few Gannets way out along with some other species. As we continued up the pat towards the Ranger’s quarters, I spotted a warbler flitting around near a clump of Virgina Creeper. It flew into a patch of Goldenrods where we got a better look and identified it as a Male Blackpoll Warbler; a late one for this time of the year (not sure what the record is for Staten Island). We tried to get clear open photos, but the bird was not too cooperative and soon we left it to continue its foraging.
We headed back near the field by the parking lot and visited the first of two ponds that are connected by a small creek. On our way to the pond we saw Swamp Sparrows, American Kestrels, Cooper’s Hawk and a Downy Woodpecker. At the ponds, we picked up Hooded Mergansers, Black Ducks, Northern Shovelers, Canada Geese and Green Winged Teal. We had left the ponds heading to look for the reported Cackling Geese, when Howie spotted an Adult American Bald Eagle soaring over the church; the Eagle caused all the Geese in the fields across the road to take flight and they headed into the ponds. We headed back to the ponds in the hopes of finding the Cackling Geese and we did. One bird looked like a typical "Richardson's" Cackling Goose, the other dark-breasted bird is POSSIBLY an example of B.h. minima? I am sure the Staten Island birders are having quite the discussion on this as Howie indicated.
We left Mount Loretto and headed for the Great Kills area. Along the way we spotted a Red-tailed Hawk on one of the roadside light poles and pulled over for a few photos. We continued to Great Kills and birded there for a bit, but it was quite slow. Howie left shortly for other commitments and I continued to bird an area called “The Flats”, where I picked up American Wigeons, Buffleheads and an Osprey fishing quite close to the shore.
Leaving Staten Island I headed back to Queens, first stopping at Plum Beach in Brooklyn for a bit of birding. It was rather quiet birding though I enjoyed looking at the large numbers of Brandts milling around, which was well over 500. Sadly, I also observed behavior that bothered me given the importance of that area to wildlife. Beach goers with their dogs off their leashes and several times the dogs playfully ran at the Brandts that were feeding close to shore. In another instance, I observed Jet skiing close to an area that had Sanderlings feeding that took off once the "Yahoo" got close. I am not sure why NPS cannot enforce the rules that are in the books at this area. I helped NYC Audubon with a Shorebird/Horseshoe Crab monitoring project this past Spring and this site was designated as important to migrant shorebirds. Why then, is there not more monitoring done to safeguard the migratory species that use the area is beyond me.
My next and last stop was Jamaica Bay Wildlife Refuge. With the light fading, I birded the West Pond. Many of the usual winter Waterfowl were present; I also picked up a few new arrivals in a Male and Female Redhead Ducks. Also new were about 6 Common Goldeneyes, 5 females and one male Drake. Over in Pumpkin Channel across from the West Pond, the number of Horned Grebes had increased – I counted around 23 with definitely more around. I finally wrapped up my day of birding around 6:45 p.m. ending with a total of 62 species for my day list:
Mount Loretto Staten Island, 
Cackling Goose, 
Jamaica Bay Wildlife Refuge
South Ozone Park Queens NY
Ash-throated Flycatcher
Sunken Meadow State Park
Pink-footed Goose