Hi Chris and all, Stuart, Dave and I headed north today. The white caps at Myers were wild, but at Puddlers off Towpath Road, we also had white caps. We also thought we saw some in the large puddles on Towpath Road. A very windy day!
Birding was good. Stewart Park had MANY Chimney Swifts in the air. At the boat dock at Union Springs there were 23 Common Terns, 20+ Dunlin (Dave counted them). Stuart needed Common Terns for the year, so he saw lots. I think the high count for Bonaparte's Gulls was 6. (I left my notebook at home so I couldn't record stuff). At the main pool at Montezuma there were many Least Sandpipers, Semi-palmated Plovers, 8 Black-bellided Plovers in different plumages, and a Lesser Yellowlegs. The Dunlin were numerous. We saw all swallows except for Cliff. No Glossy Ibis showed up for us at Bennings or Mays Point. At the beginning of Towpath Road near the first dike, Dave found a young Orchard Oriole which gave us great looks swaying with the tree branches. Further up the road we saw 3 Great Egrets and 2 Trumpeter Swans. Our next great event was Martin's Tract where Stuart saw a Virginia Rail in the water, then it flew, then the guys saw it. It grunted soon after that. The only other event was seeing an Osprey catch a fish on VanDyne Spoor Road. It was moving around with the fish like it was showing off. Then an immature Bald Eagle decided to chase it. We got out of the car to watch the drama, but the eagle flew off. Maybe we accidentally scared it away. Oh, well. Good Birding, Ann On Sat, May 25, 2013 at 4:01 PM, Chris R. Pelkie <chris.pel...@cornell.edu>wrote: > I went up to Myers/Salt Pt on a lark, so to speak, knowing the NW winds > were fast and furious. And they were! White caps, 2-3 foot waves, rollers, > crashing on the shore, spray hitting the side of the Myers lighthouse which > I was soon standing behind. > > Now, you might expect there would be nothing much to see in those > conditions, and generally you're right. A smattering of Ring-billed Gulls > and 2 Canada Geese facing the wind and leaning into it (pretty amusing > actually). > > But the coolest phenomenon presented itself. As Mark and Tilden reported > yesterday, there were swallows. Wow, lots of swallows! It was like standing > in the observing window of a wind tunnel as the swallows were more or less > stationary in the steady wind blast. BARN SWALLOWs (adult and immature), > BANK SWALLOWs, and TREE SWALLOWs were all mixing it up. I tried to find > Northern Rough-winged but was not confident that I did. Nor did I > confidently see any Cliff Swallow yellow rumps amongst the other > blue-backs. The point is what they were doing: they were hovering inches > over the 2 foot waves, dipping into the troughs, rising just before the > next crest whacked them, and picking something off the water without ever > getting wet or missing a beat and getting swamped. This was very neat and > the best ever swallow observing I've ever had because they were literally > 30' away and flying in place! You could pick out any individual and study > it at leisure. > > The winds are set to keep blowing this afternoon and tomorrow, so if you > are over that way, check this out. > > Lots of other birds on Salt Pt, nothing new, but still fun to hear/see. > Singing FIELD SPARROWs, fighting BALTIMORE ORIOLES, singing YELLOW > WARBLERs, Flickers, Kingfishers, Ospreys, Common Mergansers, etc. A group > of 4-6 Mergansers flew by and I was pretty sure one was RED-BREASTED but I > did not get a second look at that one. There were obvious female Commons > there but I'm reasonably sure I saw red down the neck, not just on top of > that one flyby. Saw one shorebird briefly flash up from the shoreline and > fly by at 40 mph before disappearing behind the trees I was using as a > shield. I think it was probably a Dunlin from the distinct white wing bar > pattern, but can't say with any more specificity because I have little > experience with most shorebirds. > > ChrisP > > > > -- > > Cayugabirds-L List Info: > http://www.NortheastBirding.com/CayugabirdsWELCOME > http://www.NortheastBirding.com/CayugabirdsRULES > http://www.NortheastBirding.com/CayugabirdsSubscribeConfigurationLeave.htm > > ARCHIVES: > 1) http://www.mail-archive.com/cayugabirds-l@cornell.edu/maillist.html > 2) http://www.surfbirds.com/birdingmail/Group/Cayugabirds > 3) http://birdingonthe.net/mailinglists/CAYU.html > > Please submit your observations to eBird: > http://ebird.org/content/ebird/ > > -- > > -- Cayugabirds-L List Info: http://www.NortheastBirding.com/CayugabirdsWELCOME http://www.NortheastBirding.com/CayugabirdsRULES http://www.NortheastBirding.com/CayugabirdsSubscribeConfigurationLeave.htm ARCHIVES: 1) http://www.mail-archive.com/cayugabirds-l@cornell.edu/maillist.html 2) http://www.surfbirds.com/birdingmail/Group/Cayugabirds 3) http://birdingonthe.net/mailinglists/CAYU.html Please submit your observations to eBird: http://ebird.org/content/ebird/ --
