I photographed an immature Little Blue Heron with bands at Jamaica Bay's East Pond today- yellow band on the left leg with "1Z" in black and a silver band on the right leg, with what looks like an engraved "4" (I can't make out if there's more). While I've been seeing Little Blues for weeks, I can't say that I've noticed bands before - not that I'm really looking at them beyond picking them out from the Snowy Egrets. But I wasn't real close to this one today and the yellow band was quite evident. So perhaps this is an arrival from another locale. It certainly seemed that Snowy and Great Egret numbers increased quite a bit. If they're congregating or staging from elsewhere, the geographic range would be of interest. I say this thinking about a Little Egret probably still floating around. Just saying.
Still a Gull-billed Tern around. I don't think it's a state late date yet, but my own recollections don't include any staying beyond August. Shorebirds? Eh. I only did the south end. For the first time in years that I can remember, a Black-bellied Plover landed on the south end, albeit way out on the algae mat. Least Sandpipers were numerous and they now outnumber Semis. I spent time working on techniques for identifying lone tweener Yellowlegs. This one works - wait for one of the other species to cross paths with it. Steve Walter Bayside, NY -- NYSbirds-L List Info: http://www.NortheastBirding.com/NYSbirdsWELCOME http://www.NortheastBirding.com/NYSbirdsRULES http://www.NortheastBirding.com/NYSbirdsSubscribeConfigurationLeave.htm ARCHIVES: 1) http://www.mail-archive.com/nysbirds-l@cornell.edu/maillist.html 2) http://www.surfbirds.com/birdingmail/Group/NYSBirds-L 3) http://birdingonthe.net/mailinglists/NYSB.html Please submit your observations to eBird: http://ebird.org/content/ebird/ --
