[nysbirds-l] Doodletown Road, Bear Mtn State Park - 9.4.16
Date: Sunday, Sept. 4, 2016 Location: Doodletown Rd., Bear Mountain, NY Observers: Amy Simmons, Claire Borrelli and Kym Michaud Knowing that the beach was going to be a bit too windy for our taste, we decided to instead have a walk and picnic at Doodletown Road in Bear Mountain State Park on Sunday. While we didn't see all that many birds, the weather couldn't have been more gorgeous and what we DID see was a real treat: a three-foot long yellow-phase Timber Rattlesnake basking in the sun, and a mother Black Bear with two cubs on the trail! I've seen a number of harmless snakes at Bear Mountain over the years, but this was my first rattlesnake there. We were walking around one of the cemeteries and as we were exiting to go back to the main trail, one of us thought she'd have a seat on a log and rest for a moment. As she was about to sit down, her eye caught a rather large yellow and umber snake, loosely coiled, basking in the sun at the end of the log -- just below where she was about to sit! Needless to say, she (and all of us) slowly backed away. It started to lightly shake its rattle but stopped once we'd backed-up quite a bit. The snake was absolutely gorgeous and while we were all slightly unnerved at how we just hadn't noticed it until it was almost too late, seeing it was a real thrill. Thinking this was probably the highlight of our day, we headed back down the trail to make our way back to the car. On the way, we heard a loud tapping noise and were able to spot a Pileated Woodpecker foraging for bugs high-up in one of the trees. Once again, nature surprised us as Claire suddenly, calmly and quietly stated, "There are three bears coming up the trail in front of us." Sure enough, a large Black Bear and two cubs were ambling up the trail toward us. When we all turned to look, the mother and one of the cubs disappeared into the bushes, but the other cub was quite curious and stood and stared at us for quite a while. We waited and when he didn't seem to be going anywhere, we decided to start clapping and yelling loudly, since he was blocking our way back to the car. This did the trick and he scampered after his mother. Even so, we decided to make a LOT of noise for the next couple of hundred yards. So, even without lots of birds, it was a pretty great day. Below is a list of the birds we did manage to see: 4 Black Vulture 1 Turkey Vulture 1 Red-tailed Hawk 3 Ruby-throated Hummingbird 1 Belted Kingfisher 3 Red-bellied Woodpecker 1 Northern Flicker 3 Pileated Woodpecker 1 Red-eyed Vireo 1 Blue Jay 2 American Crow 4 Tufted Titmouse 1 White-breasted Nuthatch 1 House Wren 1 Hermit Thrush 15 American Robin 4 Gray Catbird 1 Black-and-white Warbler 5 American Redstart 16 Chipping Sparrow 25 Common Grackle 3 American Goldfinch Amy Simmons -- 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/ --
[nysbirds-l] Doodletown Road, Bear Mtn State Park - 9.4.16
Date: Sunday, Sept. 4, 2016 Location: Doodletown Rd., Bear Mountain, NY Observers: Amy Simmons, Claire Borrelli and Kym Michaud Knowing that the beach was going to be a bit too windy for our taste, we decided to instead have a walk and picnic at Doodletown Road in Bear Mountain State Park on Sunday. While we didn't see all that many birds, the weather couldn't have been more gorgeous and what we DID see was a real treat: a three-foot long yellow-phase Timber Rattlesnake basking in the sun, and a mother Black Bear with two cubs on the trail! I've seen a number of harmless snakes at Bear Mountain over the years, but this was my first rattlesnake there. We were walking around one of the cemeteries and as we were exiting to go back to the main trail, one of us thought she'd have a seat on a log and rest for a moment. As she was about to sit down, her eye caught a rather large yellow and umber snake, loosely coiled, basking in the sun at the end of the log -- just below where she was about to sit! Needless to say, she (and all of us) slowly backed away. It started to lightly shake its rattle but stopped once we'd backed-up quite a bit. The snake was absolutely gorgeous and while we were all slightly unnerved at how we just hadn't noticed it until it was almost too late, seeing it was a real thrill. Thinking this was probably the highlight of our day, we headed back down the trail to make our way back to the car. On the way, we heard a loud tapping noise and were able to spot a Pileated Woodpecker foraging for bugs high-up in one of the trees. Once again, nature surprised us as Claire suddenly, calmly and quietly stated, "There are three bears coming up the trail in front of us." Sure enough, a large Black Bear and two cubs were ambling up the trail toward us. When we all turned to look, the mother and one of the cubs disappeared into the bushes, but the other cub was quite curious and stood and stared at us for quite a while. We waited and when he didn't seem to be going anywhere, we decided to start clapping and yelling loudly, since he was blocking our way back to the car. This did the trick and he scampered after his mother. Even so, we decided to make a LOT of noise for the next couple of hundred yards. So, even without lots of birds, it was a pretty great day. Below is a list of the birds we did manage to see: 4 Black Vulture 1 Turkey Vulture 1 Red-tailed Hawk 3 Ruby-throated Hummingbird 1 Belted Kingfisher 3 Red-bellied Woodpecker 1 Northern Flicker 3 Pileated Woodpecker 1 Red-eyed Vireo 1 Blue Jay 2 American Crow 4 Tufted Titmouse 1 White-breasted Nuthatch 1 House Wren 1 Hermit Thrush 15 American Robin 4 Gray Catbird 1 Black-and-white Warbler 5 American Redstart 16 Chipping Sparrow 25 Common Grackle 3 American Goldfinch Amy Simmons -- 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/ --
