May 17, 2003 - Hawkin Rd & Bright View Farms

The only thing missing from our Spring field trip to Hawkin Road and Bright View Farms was spring-like weather as we had lots of birds with us just about everywhere we went. Although it was a very cool, overcast day for mid-May, the group still had 19 species of warblers, the expected grassland birds of Bright View and a few additional surprises.

As we got out of our cars along Hawkin Road we were greeted by singing Wood Thrush, a Louisiana Waterthrush and Ovenbirds along with the first Canada Warbler of the day. All during our visit at Hawkin Road we had Canada Warblers with us. Before we even entered the trails, we had seen Common Yellowthroats, Black and Whites, Redstarts, Magnolias and heard Worm-eating and Kentucky. Two of the real attractions of Hawkin Road are nesting Prothonotary and Hooded Warblers.

Although we had glimpses of Prothonotaries along the creek path going in, it wasn't until we were coming out of the trail that a female Prothonotary was very cooperative and not until the back trail that a male Prothonotary showed off for us. At the bottom of the creek trail, those of us with wellies went a bit deeper into the forest in search of a Hooded Warbler that was singing up a storm. We eventually found him and a Blue-winged Warbler. Working the back trail we ran into two good groups of birds including White-eyed and Red-eyed Vireos, Blue-gray Gnatcatchers, Pewees and Pine, Parula, and Blackpoll warblers. Some of us were also fortunate to get a glimpse of a Worm-eating warbler along the trail.

We then headed to Bright View farm where we had large numbers of Bobolinks in the pastures, a handful of Meadowlarks, Eastern Kingbirds and Eastern Bluebirds. One of the other specialties of the farm is sparrows and perhaps the temperature or the wind kept them under cover but we still managed to find Chipping, Savannah and Grasshopper Sparrows along the pasture fences. A walk along through the woods brought us a fleeting view of a turkey, more Magnolias, a female Black-throated-blue, White-breasted nuthatches, Indigo Buntings, Yellow Warblers, a Yellow-rumped Warbler, several more Blackpolls and a wonderful look at a Wilson's Warbler. Walking along the wet area we finished the day with Song, Swamp and two Lincoln's sparrows before calling it a day.

July 26, 2003 - Bombay Hook

July marks the start of the "fall" migration and that means Delaware for shorebirds. Although the temperatures reached the 90's, there was a nice breeze that kept the bugs at bay and our group was able to get some nice looks at south-bound Yellowlegs, Short-billed Dowitchers, Semi-palmated, Western and Least Sandpipers, Stilt Sandpipers, etc. In all we saw about 16 species of shorebirds including, for those of us who visited the New Castle Airport, at least 4 Upland Sandpipers.

In addition to shorebirds we had at least 4 Bald Eagles, all the usual Herons and Egrets including a surprising Cattle Egret at Bear Swamp and great looks at Gull-billed Tern.

We spent most of the day at Bombay Hook and nearby Woodland Beach WMA before starting north where we searched in vain for Cliff Swallows that have been seen nesting along Rt 9.

Thanks to all the WAS members who joined us in what is always a great trip.

September 20, 2003 - Bombay Hook

It was hard to imagine that Hurricane Isabel had just blown through the area. The day was sunny and mild and the Delaware Bay was as calm as glass.

Our first stop at Fort Dupont started off rather quietly but we stumbled upon a mini-hotspot of activity and managed to find a number of migrants including: Tennessee, No. Parula, Magnolia, Black-throated Blue and Black-throated Green Warblers. Palm, Bay Breasted, Black and White and Redstart rounded out the warbler list.

We got all the usual herons and egrets including Tri-colored plus a nice collection of raptors including Osprey, Bald Eagle, No. Harrier, Sharp-shinned and Red-tail and a great look at a Merlin dive bombing the shorebirds.

Speaking of shorebirds, Raymond Pool held 3 Hudsonian Godwits amongst all the "usual: stuff ... a real treat. Plus, in with all the Forster's Terns, Martin pulled out a Black Tern.

The first real sign of storm damage, not including a downed tree that blocked our road along the Canal, was the "CLOSED" sign at the entrance to Port Mahon Road. And so the day ended.

October 18, 2003 - Cape May The day was sunny and bright and the sky was full of raptors.... a perfect fall Cape May day. We spent most of the morning casually around the State Park, walking the trails, seeing the hawk banding demonstration and scanning the skies as hundred of raptors wheeled overhead. Highlights included Black and Turkey Vultures, Osprey, No. Harriers, Sharpies and the more numerous Cooper's Hawks and several Red-shouldered Hawks. While enjoying a lovely picnic lunch on the beach we were able to scan the seas for passing loons and ducks.... great looks at a male Common Eider . It was hard to get everyone moving after lunch but we did move on to the Cape May Meadows where we picked up a few ducks before moving on to 2 mile landing where we added Greater Yellowlegs and Western Willets.

Question Mark

Then it was on to Stone Harbor Point after a brief stop at the Wetlands Institute for thousands of shorebirds including 5 Marbled Godwits , 200 + Oystercatchers, Black-bellied Plovers, Dunlin, and Dowitchers. In with a flock of gulls on the beach we pulled out 1 Lesser Black-backed Gull amidst the Herring and Black-backed Gulls. We also had Caspian, Royal and Foster's Terns. A highlight was great looks at Merlin and 2 Peregrine Falcons hunting over the marsh.

Our final stop of the day was the Avalon Sea Watch where we had both Common and Red-throated Loons and lots of Black and Surf Scoters. A great finish to a day that produced about 90 species of birds and 8 species of butterfly. (Cabbage White, Orange Sulphur, Monarch, Mourning Cloak, Red Admiral, Common Buckeye, Eastern Comma and Question Mark).

November 8, 2003 - Hawk Mountain

It was a great day for hawk watching! While not every report of a field trip to Hawk Mountain starts or ends that way; our trip on November 8th sure was one of my better trips to this locale. To begin with, a strong cold front was pushing through our region bringing the first really cold weather of the fall. It was a sunny wonderful day to be sitting on the ridge looking at raptors. The sky was blue with scattered clouds, with moderate winds out of the northwest. When we arrived at the visitor’s center at 9:30, the counters had already reported over 150 raptors including 2 Golden Eagles, a Goshawk and over 120 Red-tailed hawks. We immediately, headed up the trail and hoped that the flight continued.

By the time we reached the north lookout, two more Golden Eagles and two Bald Eagles had passed by. We found our perch and began scanning. We stayed at the north lookout for a good 4 hours and had a constant stream of Red-tails flying by. In addition, we had 5 Golden Eagles (although 4 of these were rather distant, one afforded us nice looks), two immature Bald Eagles both of which we watched come up over the far ridge and soar close by the lookout, a handful of Sharp-shinned and Cooper’s Hawks, one male Northern Harrier and quite a few Red-Shouldered Hawks. In fact, it was a Red-shouldered Hawk that got the vote as the field trip bird of the day. This one was an early bird that came in low and then soared overhead giving us wonderfully close top and bottom views.

By the time we came off the mountain, the day’s count was closing in on 500 raptors for the day with lots more day light. The final count for the day was 653 raptors with over 500 Red-tails, 15 Golden Eagles, 10 Bald Eagles, 9 Goshawks, 2 Rough-legged Hawks and 22 Red-shouldered Hawks. When you plan field trips months in advance, you hope they fall into place like this one did and I know we will hope for a repeat next year!

January 17, 2004 - Cape May

It was a beautiful winter's day as Wyncote Audubon went to Cape May for our annual winter field trip. The really cold temperatures from earlier in the week had moderated and the wet weather that was coming for the Eagle's game on Sunday held off until well after we got home. Our first real stop was the Schellenger Tract of the Cape May National Wildlife Refuge. The group of 16 walked all the way to the end of the trail and in the dead trees there found both the adult and immature red-headed woodpeckers that had been reported on the hotlines. With the disappearance of the breeding individuals at the park next to the Cape May Country Zoo this has become a tough bird to find in New Jersey unless you luck into them during migration so the group was happy to find them. This was a lifer for at least two participants.

In one of the hedgerows of multiflora rose we had a handful of sparrows as we got back to the car. This included white-throated, song, swamp, and field sparrows as well as a "fifth" sparrow in a female eastern towhee. We then headed to the concrete ship for a scenic lunch spot and the hope of some birds. The cold weather earlier in the week had left the in-shore area and the concrete ship ice covered. Two intrepid members of our group took a walk along the beach and were rewarded with a peregrine falcon.

From here some of us made a quick stop at Lily Lake where we had a few ruddy ducks, greater scaup and a ring-necked duck. The group met up again at the Lighthouse and while scanning the jetty from the picnic pavilion, had the best birds of the day. Someone spotted three large white birds flying in a line out over the ocean and announced that they thought they had three gannets. This made a great deal of sense but as we all got on these birds, we realized that yes these were large white birds and yes, they did have black wing-tips but no they weren't gannets. These three birds were three American white pelicans! We watched these birds for at least 10 minutes, got them in our telescopes and have no doubt that they were pelicans but given where we were and the time of year, these certainly were an out of place surprise.

A look at bunker pond found gadwall, American Wigeon, ruddy duck, ring-necked duck, American coot and scaup. A walk along the trails, yielded a nice group of 3-4 hermit thrushes, a brown thrasher and a gray catbird. We also had several yellow-rumped warblers in the park. We then went to the jetty at St. Mary's where a male common goldeneye was found earlier in the day. Just as promised, the goldeneye was there as were a few red-throated loons, a female surf scoter and nice close-up sanderlings, purple sandpipers and ruddy turnstones.

It was then starting to get late and we headed to Champlain Lake in the Villas for see what ducks and gulls could be found there. The black-headed gull that has been seen there on and off during the week was not to be found but, several pairs of wood duck, hooded merganser, northern pintail and a pair of common mergansers were there.

We made a quick stop at CMBO before heading to Jake's Landing Road for the days last stop. As we were getting out of out cars we had our first short-eared owl up hunting in the meadow just across the creek. We continued to see 2-3 of these owls throughout our stay and since we got there a bit before 4 o'clock, we had plenty of daylight to see them. We then started scanning the treetops and found numerous red-tailed hawks, several adult bald eagles and one dark-phase rough-legged hawk. We also had several northern harriers out hunting. One of the last owls we had was a "shortie" perched out in the open for a few minutes until a harrier chased it away. All in all it was another great trip to Cape May when the locals claimed "there weren't really many birds around".

February 21, 2004 - Sandy Hook to Manasquan, NJ

Persistence finally paid off as we finally had a good weather day at Sandy Hook. Over the years we had been met by some rather blustery and down right wet days when we’ve headed out to Sandy Hook. In that regard, this year was vastly different than trips in years past. We had an un-seasonably warm winter’s day with plenty of sunshine.

Unlike most Wyncote trips where we birds an area and figure covering multiple-habitats will yield good birds, this trip we did a little chasing of some of the rarities reports along the north shore with varying degrees of success. Although we gave it the old college try we were unsuccessful in finding the Bohemian Waxwing(s) that had been reported at Sandy Hook for the better part of the previous week. Two or 3 field trip participants had glimpses of them in flight but a long study of a large flock of Cedar Waxwings feeding and coming to a roadside puddle for a drink didn’t uncover any Bohemians although we did have marvelous looks at their smaller, more familiar cousins.

This isn’t to say that we didn’t have any birds at the Hook because we did! While waiting for everyone we were able to get good looks at Great Cormorants on the sandbar opposite the visitors center. In Horseshoe Cove we had a tremendous flock of Common Goldeneyes and about a half dozen of us were able to pick out the female Barrow’s Goldeneye that was in this flock. Unfortunately, it was just choppy enough and the birds were actively feeding that it was very difficult to get people on this bird and impossible to have someone jump in and use a scope was someone actually found it. However, the goldeneyes were a treat as were the Red-breasted Mergansers, Long-tailed Duck and Horned Grebes that also frequented the cove.

Lunch was at Lake Takanassee just north of Asbury Park and we were able to enjoy Ring-necked and Ruddy Ducks, Hooded Mergansers, American Wigeon, American Coot and Green-winged Teal on the back section of the lake. A quick scan of the gulls on the ice on the front section of the lake, revealed the big three (Herring, Ring-billed and Great Black-backed). From here we went to the end of Pullman Road to scan the ocean. A Harlequin Duck had been reported infrequently from this overlook and this too proved elusive to us. However, there was a nice group of Surf Scoter with one or two pairs of Black Scoter mixed in.

Scanning the distant horizon, yielded Northern Gannets but the western winds kept them far off shore. A trip to Marconi Road produced some pintails, lots of mute Swans, a few Great Blue Herons the expected puddle ducks. A stop at the Shark River Yacht Club allowed us to find the Pied-billed Grebe that had been spending most of the winter here but no Eurasian Wigeon.

We then decided to head to the Manasquan Inlet in hopes of the Razorbills and Nelson’s Gul that had been reported there. The Nelson’s gull was a first or second year bird and is a hybrid between Glaucous and Herring gull. A walk out on the jetty didn’t produce the Razorbills but did produce lots of Common Loons and just as we were starting to walk back in, a small flock of Purple Sandpipers. From the end of the jetty we could see a large group of gulls in the area where the Nelson’s had been reported so we eagerly headed there. Unfortunately, when we first arrived, a handful of small children had been play right where we waited to be and the flock of gulls we had seen from the end of the jetty had dispersed. We walked around to the Shrimp Box restaurant to see if the Red-necked Grebe was still in the channel behind the restaurant, no luck here.

This trip was beginning to prove why sometimes you win and sometimes you loose when you chase birds. As we got back near the cars, I noticed that the gulls had returned to the seawall and there was this HUGE, immature gull in with the Ring-billed and Herring Gulls. This immature had a two-tone bill like a 1st/2nd year Glaucous Gull and was buffy but it had very, very dark primary tips. It also dwarfed the Ring-billed Gulls next to it and was much larger than the Herring Gulls too. Darn it if we didn’t find the Nelson’s! While this may only be a hybrid and not everyone gets excited by gulls (myself included) this was a remarkable bird to see and a highlight of the day.

Nelson's Gull Herring/Glaucous Gull hyrbid Manasquan Inlet, NJ photographed by Naomi Murphy

From here we made quick stops at Sunset Lake and Old Sam’s Pond. We had a nice Red-throated Loon and 5 Canvasbacks on Sunset Lake and a few Northern Shovelers at Old Sam’s pond. We then called it a day. Although we missed almost as much as we saw, it still was a good day.

Martin Selzer

May 1st and 2nd - Ft. Washington and Belleplain, NJ

Wyncote Audubon ran two field trips in hopes of catching some the spring migration of songbirds. On May 1st we visited Fort Washington State Park. The park can be a wonderful place to witness migration and, while we got a taste of it, it was a somewhat quiet day.

The group met at the Hawk Watch platform and, as we assembled, we were treated to several Baltimore Orioles in the nearby trees. Our walk up Ridge Road was quiet and it wasn’t until we crossed Joshua Road that we found a few migrants. Here we stumbled across a small flock of Yellow-rumped Warblers, maybe 5-6 birds, along with a Black-and-White Warbler. While working this flock, we heard a Veery and at least two Scarlet Tanagers. With some persistence, we were able to see these neo-tropical migrants and, as always, the tanager was a big hit. Besides, singing right over our heads, we heard it give its “Chick-burr” call several times.

Crossing back across Joshua Road and walking the loop road, we had wonderful looks at multiple Blue-gray Gnatcatchers, many of whom were paired off and busy building nests, a few Chipping Sparrows, an Eastern Bluebird, more orioles, a singing Yellow Warbler and a Common Yellowthoat. When we returned to the Hawk Watch platform a Ruby-throated Hummingbird was seen at the feeder.

While the 1st was a beautiful spring day, the morning of May 2nd started off overcast and drizzly. That didn’t stop four intrepid club members from joining me for our walk at Belleplain State Forest. Although we were looking for migrants at Belleplain too, the real target birds here were the nesting warblers. We certainly heard all of the expected nesters and saw many of them.

Driving in along the road off of Route 347, we quickly heard Overbirds and Blue-winged warblers signing. At our first stop we had dueling Overbird and Prothonotary Warblers singing and we able to see both of them close to the road. We also had the first of numerous Worm-eating Warblers calling. Although we heard them at each and every stop, we never could get on this bugger. We also had lots of White-eyed vireos. We quickly picked up Black-and-White and another Blue-Winged Warbler before heading to the bridge on Sunset Road. At the bridge, there were calling Hooded, Prothonotary and Worm-eating warblers, just as you would expect to have there.

A walk down the road yielded Scarlet Tanager and Great-crested Flycatcher, Praire Warblers building a nest, Blue-gray gnatcatchers, Yellow-throated Warbler, Ruby-throated Hummingbird and singing Louisiana Waterthrush. While it would have been great to have seen everything we heard, we did manage to see some of the Belleplain specialities.