Birding at the beach

On Saturday and Sunday I went to the beach in Southampton. The first day, on the way to the beach, I saw a brown bird on the telephone pole that I watched for a while. By observing its round head, and sleek body with frayed feathers and light brown spots on a light brown body, I came to the conclusion that it was an immature black-crowned night-heron.

When I finally got to the beach, I walked through the dunes and took little paths to be sneaky and creep up on the birds. I heard many, but only saw two Herring gulls on the beach flying. I believe they were in their second winters because they were slightly brown but still gray, and I could clearly see the black tip of their beaks.

I was excited with my findings and observations. FIRST GROUP BIRDING EXPERIENCE THIS WEEK! GET AMPED! :)

although i did not have the fortune of a bird centered morning i did come across some birds on my daily route. i first saw a phalanx of blue jays wheeling and dealing in front of my house, fattening up on our premium birdseed while its still available. the next sighting occurred on my way to peters pond beach. while en route i caught a glimpse of a small flotilla of Robins, with their distinguishable rust red undersides and inquisitive little grey heads. the final sighting of the day was of a lone gull, ring billed gull to be precise, slinking along the shore. i was surprised at not noticing more birds throughout my day, but then again there is a difference between seeing and noticing.

Birding at "THE END"

LARK SPARROW! we not only spotted the lark sparrow, but each student had the chance to study its field marks and observe its behavior. Perversely we got to see the lark sparrow, which is irregularly seen east of mississippi, before studying the the song sparrow, an abundant species on long island. Its head is most distinctive by its rusty cheek patch, black stripe on the side of the throat and small dark patch on the breast. It had an amazing camouflage against the tall grass. Their call note is a sharp tsip, often repeated as a rapid series (NGS).

American Robin--It was slightly embarrassing when we were ask to identify a juvenile robin and failed to do so. After seeing over 40 american robins with their solid red/brown bellies and grey wings it was quite misleading to see the juvenile with its underparts tinged with cinnamon and heavily spotted with brown.

Peregrine falcon--The first Peregrine was a juvenile spotted by sam and it had a striped underbelly. The second peregrine falcon only I saw, so its slightly unreliable, by i was able to identify it by its long tail, pointed wing and gliding flight by Third House.

Turkey Voltures--3 (Seen in flight, wings are held in a shallow V, seldom flapping their wings)

Belted Kingfisher--1 (in flight, noticeable by its rusty belly and flanks with a blue puffy crown)

European Starling--1 (mentioned in white room by cream)

Cowbirds--100 + (brown head, dark body)

This post smells "fowl"

Although I was unable to go birding this morning I had two successful bird sightings over this weekend. I had the pleasure of watching an Osprey fly across the marsh on Sunday morning. Later in the evening I saw a flock of turkeys hanging out in a neighbors lawn. I later learned that these types of turkeys are known as Eastern wild turkeys, Melagris gallopavo sylvestris.

Photos of the Montauk Wheatear

In case anyone had not seen it (or did and wants a souvenir) here's the Northern Wheatear found by Karen and Barb Rubinstein at TRCP in Montauk a couple of weeks ago.

Judging from the size and rich rosy tones , this is almost certainly a 'Greenland' Northern Wheatear, which nests in southern Greenland and northeastern Canada. They migrate back to Europe in the fall (via Iceland) where they join up with other populations and travel south across the Sahara desert to winter in open grassland and rocky areas of Sub-Saharan Africa. So this is a bird that is very much out of place in Montauk.

Where is it now? Florida? The Caribbean? Will it successfully winter in the tropics somewhere and return north in the spring? All great questions that we do not have answers to yet. Perhaps one day we will be able to mark these birds and follow their movements better.

One thing rare birds teach us is that the world of nature is interconnected. Here's a bird that only a few weeks before was with musk ox and arctic foxes in the arctic tundra and it's parents at least may have known lions, gazelles and other animals of the savannah.

Montauk trip

What a fantastic day for birding! Our trusty group of ornithologists headed out into the wild expanses of Montauk and were justly rewarded for the effort. Our first stop was along Deep Hollow ranch, where we learned to differentiate between brown-headed cowbirds (smaller, brown head, and a conical bill) and common grackles (long tail, iridescent purple sheen). Also spotted were a pair solitary sandpipers pecking in the mud, with yellow-green legs, a white chest, speckled wings, and white eyerings, a juvenile robin, and a long-tailed, pointed-wing Peregrine falcon spotted by Mr. Sam Kramer. The Peregrine was a juvenile, with a striped underbelly. The next exciting spot of the day was the uncommon lark sparrow, recognizable with its rusty cheek patch, stripe on the side of its throat, and dark patch on its breast, sighted over by Third House. PRETTY AWESOME. Our second bird of prey sighting was the smaller, darker badass merlin falcon, espied by yours truly. Three black turkey vultures, with their fingertip wings, hung around for a while as well, and I got to see the red-winged blackbird I'd been hoping for (in addition to either a female or young male of the species, which was neither black nor red-winged. A mystery to me.). All in all, a successful day for the Ross birdwatchers.

October 2nd, Bird watching

Todays bird watching adventure was full of amazing sightings. It started off at Deep Hollow Ranch where we were able to catch sight of some very interesting birds. There were a lot of Grackles due to the cow feeding station. After observing these specimens for a little while we moved on down the dirt road into a little clearing where we were able to spot a Peregrine Falcon flying by! after standing there for a while, we headed back to the car to go to another spot, but as we were pulling out of the ranch we noticed some Sand Pipers in a puddle. Next stop was Teddy Roosevelt County Park. Here we saw a Lark Sparrow which took the bird of the day award. We also saw a Merlin Falcon, A Belted King-Fisher, and three Turkey Vultures. all in all today was a very good day in the world of us weirdo bird watchers.