On Saturday I was mostly out of commission as I had a wedding to attend in Westchester County. I say mostly because between the church and the reception we had some time to kill, so Tricia and I made a stop at Five Islands Park in New Rochelle. I was hoping for Monk Parakeets, but alas we didn’t have any luck with them. It was the third time I’ve been to that park and still I haven’t seen the Monk Parakeets.
On Sunday I got up early and checked my emails. An Iceland Gull had been reported in Westchester County, not far from Croton Point Park. I figured I could make the morning of it by heading over to try for the gull and then bird the park afterwards. I didn’t have any luck with the gull, but I got lucky in another way. I ran into another birder, the original locator of the Iceland Gull. He is a long time birder/naturalist from New York City. We checked for the gull near the Boathouse Restaurant and the neighboring park and then he showed where he had originally located the bird at the Croton Point Park train station. I had never birded that spot, even though I knew of it, so it was good to get the lay of the land. He shared stories of his birding over the years; he had seen some really amazing local birds and he also had gone on some amazing birding trips. He showed me a photograph that he took of a Spoon-billed Sandpiper in full breeding plumage back in 1995 on a film camera; it was unbelievable and made me want to cry. What a bird. Anyways, my takeaway from it was that there is an awful lot of birding out there, be it locally or even more so if you are willing to travel. It made me look forward to when I can look back on 30++ years of my own birding adventures…
Great post. I have not been out in the field too much the last 2 months. Am just getting over a bad cough that I have had for a few weeks. There are 2 jib red headed woodpeckers in my local patch about a mile away. We were down to North Carolina for a short time last week and was able to get several loggerhead shrikes in addition to a number of eastern meadow larks. Stopped off at Bombay Hook on the the way back. There were at least 100 avocets there. Got some good shots of mature bald eaglesAlso had a very cooperative fox
A month or so back I did have a Wilson’s phalarope at the meadowlands.
Your spoonbill sandpiper story was good to hear. A few months ago I ran into a Chinese student who was a student at Princeton. He had had an intern job at the spoonbill wintering grounds and had also visited the breeding territory further north
Bruce
Good to hear from you Bruce and glad you are getting over your cough. You did well on your trip to NC; it’s always good to see a shrike (by the way I saw my first “local” report of N. Shrike in Pennsylvania yesterday, hopefully that’s a sign of things to come this winter). I’d love to see the big numbers of avocets too. Take care of yourself and maybe see you out there sometime. Matt