Cedar Waxwings

The Cedar Waxwing is one of the most striking birds that I got to see.  While they are much more common that their cousins, the Bohemian Waxwing, Cedar Waxwings are fascinating and social birds to watch.  As I approached the grouping that I photographed below.  They were startled by my presence.  To be fair, I was startled by them as well.  They, unlike me, flew up out the cedars.  Where I had seen 3 or 4, 15 popped out of 3 different cedars.  They zoomed around the cedars looking, presumably for another place to hide from me.

I got lucky.  The street where the cedars were was an over populated, overbuilt street leading to the beach and the waxwings landed back in the first cedars.  Lucky for me.  But I thought about the poor waxwings.  They just wanted to be safe.  What if instead of a birder, I was a car?  A cat?  Another predator?  The Waxwings probably would fly off of course but to what end.  I guess what I am talking about is habitat and birds.  This is something that has preoccupied me lately and something I hope to write about in the future with a more detailed idea.  In the mean time, enjoy pictures of waxwings!

Wind so strong it blew the feathers in the face of the waxwing

Two Pictures of Cedar Waxwings (C) me 

2013 Year List
Brown Headed Cowbird

Barnacle Goose - Found!!

With Saturday free and my dog relaxed and in bed sleeping, I decided to spend the day out chasing rarities and even ventured to New Jersey to chase a couple of very rare birds.  As the readers of this blog will know, the Barnacle Goose has been a bird that I've spent many hours looking for the Barnacle Goose.  I am now happy to say that after days of staring at hordes of Canada Geese, I can now say that I've finally seen my first Barnacle Goose!  I showed up at a dam pond in New Rochelle, NY where there were rumors of one.  By rumors I mean eBird reports.  The Park where I found the Barnacle Goose was full of birds, 2 Pileated Woodpeckers, Red-Bellied WPs, Gulls, Chickadees, and Cardinals.  When I finally got to the pond, I was confronted by a Great Black Backed Gull eating the remains of a Canada Goose, a couple of Hooded Mergansers, and

The other rarity I chased was a Northern Lapwing in New Jersey.  While the Birders were out in force, finding the Lapwings was no easy task.  Before we found them, we found Blue Jays, Sandhill Cranes, and some aggressive Turkey Vultures.  It was the aggressive Turkey Vultures that rustled up the Lapwings.  There were about 3 of them far in the back of the field hanging out with some killdeer.  It was a great day to be out and about and to catch all those rarities was quite a treat!  Anyway, go outside and see some birds!

A Great Black Back Gull eating the leftovers of a Canada Goose (C) Me

A Pileated Woodpecker (C) Me

The Found Barnacle Goose (C) Me

2013 List: 73 (127 to go!)

Notable Additions:

Northern Lapwing (Lifer)

Barnacle Goose (Lifer)

Bonaparte's Gull
Merlin
Sandhill Crane

Life List: 258 (42 to go!)

Red Knots and Redpolls

Too bad you can't call birds over like in the Red Rover game.   Red Rover, Red Rover, Hoary Redpoll, come on over!  It doesn't really work like that.  It doesn't work like that at all.  The search for the Hoary Redpoll began and ended with my feet in the snow.  For a couple of weeks of now, a Hoary Redpoll has been visiting a local feeder.  So, i woke up and headed over.  After an hour and a half of standing in the snow, I had to call it quits.  My feet were cold, my toes were numb and my blood was probably at the early stages of icing.  So without any sign of any more than 2 Common Redpolls at a time, I called it quits and went in search of another bandit.

Beach, wind and shore birds.... lots of shore birds.  What do you do when you are face to face with a single digit wind chill and hundreds of similar looking peeps?  You call it a good day and take out your scope for a good time.  The cold melted away and the wind was stayed with a bounty of chap stick as a looked over Dunlins, Plovers and Turnstones.  The challenge was to judge the legs, beak and coloration all while trying to count the birds!  Sadly, I dipped out the red knot but that doesn't mean I am not going to go out looking for it again... Maybe I'll try the red rover thing with the red knot and redpolls...

The Hoary Redpoll (C) Juho Holmi from Finland

The Red Knot (C) DickDaniels http://carolinabirds.org/

2013 Year List:

62 (138 to go!)

Highlights:

Common Redpoll

Northern Harrier

American Robin

Hooded Merganser

Life List:

256 (44 to go!)

Shorebirding... sorta

Since nabbing the Northern Saw-Whet Owl, I made a return to see some shorebirds and other birds.  There was a good variety of birds and I did spend most of the weekend outside looking for birds.  Which is of course my favorite way to spend a weekend.  I managed to see some old favorites and get some great new birds for the year!  The highlight was watching a Sharp-Shinned Hawk attack and devour a chipmonk.  Pretty cool to see.  The hawk had to navigate some through some bushes and hedges to chase down its prey.

Great weekend of birding and many more to come!

An American Pipit (C) Jonathan Hornung

Life List - 256 (44 to go!)
2013 List - 50 (150 to go!)

Notable Sightings:
American Pipit
Rusty Blackbird (lifer too!)
Lapland Longspur
Snow Goose

A Busy Busy Weekend

So this weekend was filled with 2 great and wonderful birding trips. One River Cruise and one trip to Rhode Island. Both Trips yielded some great finds and even a few life birds. I've attached a few photos of the snowy owl. I was thrilled to see it. In fact, I half expected that what I saw was a gull and not a Snowy. But there she was. and she was hanging out with some Harlequin Ducks. What a great day to be outside and a birder. While I am ready for winter to be over, I am excited that there are still great birds to find out there. This is short but I'll be back. There are a few ducks to still get out there and the outings during the week will be spent trying to get them. Good birding to you all!


Outing #12
Bald Eagle
Great Cormorant

Outing #13
Black Scoter
Canvasback
Harlequin Duck LIFE BIRD!
Lesser Scaup
Snowy Owl LIFE BIRD!
Surf Scoter

2012 Total: 61

Snow buntings...

Today was not a good day to bird.  There were lots of hawks and vultures out but that meant most birds were going to be in hiding. Add that to the high winds and huge number of dogs out and that's a recipe for a bad birding day. The High winds also meant that birds would be hard to find and reluctant to come out. So there wasn't much to see. Even though the weather was difficult to see birds, it was great to be outside. The Beach in winter is a great place to see birds and catch some sun. Although it would be insane to be tanning in the middle of January. In any case, I did manage to get a new bird for 2012. In the parking lot, there are always horned larks. Which are a great bird to see. But Today as I check out the horned larks, i saw a flash of white... hmm... odd as horned larks are most definitely not White. Out come the binoculars. Well there's definitely something there but I can't see it through the binoculars so out comes the scope. 2 Snow Buntings in the flock of larks. So that's a new bird for 2012! Great day all and all. Great day to go and see birds. A second spot showcased some Common Mergansers, Gulls, Black Ducks, Gadwalls and Mute Swans, not new birds for 2012 or my life list, but beautiful birds to see and enjoy!

Outing #10
Snow Bunting

2012 Total: 50!