I took advantage of today’s beautiful weather and decided to do some CBC scouting, focusing my efforts in the Napeague area.
I began the day at Walking Dunes, Goff Point and Hicks Island where I spent several hours and encountered a good variety of birds which was highlighted by a late BALTIMORE ORIOLE. An Orange-crowned Warbler was among a flock of Yellow-rumped (Myrtle) Warblers. Additional nice, yet expected, species were three Eastern Meadowlarks, a single Razorbill and my first of season Horned Grebes. Snow Bunting and Horned Lark numbers were surprisingly low with one and two, respectively. Next, I headed to Napeague Meadow Road and parked at the foot of North Road where I hiked east slowly detailing the pitch pines and bayberry groves with hopes of digging up some lingering, warmer season migrants. No such luck but three Pine Warblers associating with a flock of chickadees and kinglets were a nice addition to the day. I was near the end of my hike, very close to where the marsh meets Napeague Harbor, and began to focus my attention on an upland “Island” patch of vegetation (41.0038, -72.0634) where I encountered an adult male YELLOW-RUMPED (AUDUBON’S) WARBLER. Unfortunately my cell phone battery had expired so I could not get the location specifics out as timely as I would’ve liked to. I spent the next 1.5 hours trying to relocate the bird and in that timeframe only saw it for a cumulative 10 seconds. It would be great to relocate this bird during the Montauk CBC on 16 December. Folks interested in trying to refind this bird may also want to try the east end of Crassen Boulevard which is just north of the above coordinates and is holding nice numbers of Myrtles. An additional species of interest, this far east on the south fork, was a Common Raven calling from the distant cell tower to the south. Record photos of the Audubon’s Warbler can be viewed here in my eBird checklist. http://ebird.org/ebird/view/checklist/S40870838 Best, Derek Rogers Sayville -- NYSbirds-L List Info: http://www.NortheastBirding.com/NYSbirdsWELCOME.htm http://www.NortheastBirding.com/NYSbirdsRULES.htm 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://birding.aba.org/maillist/NY01 Please submit your observations to eBird: http://ebird.org/content/ebird/ --
