{"id":12939,"date":"2023-12-17T16:47:01","date_gmt":"2023-12-17T21:47:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/orangebirding.com\/?p=12939"},"modified":"2023-12-17T16:47:01","modified_gmt":"2023-12-17T21:47:01","slug":"sunday-shots-12-17-23","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/orangebirding.com\/?p=12939","title":{"rendered":"Sunday Shots, 12\/17\/23"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

I really enjoyed my birding this weekend. It’s that time of year when the days are just too short to fit any birding in during the week, so when I get out on the weekends it seems just that much better. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

On Saturday I took an eight mile hike out at Black Rock Forest. My target species was Red Crossbill, but unfortunately I didn’t have any luck with them. It was a relatively birdy walk though; I had a total of 23 species with my highlight being a trio of Purple Finches. Afterwards, I went to the Newburgh Waterfront, thinking about gulls and waterfowl. Little did I know that I should have been thinking about warblers! On Watefront Trail, I was pleasantly surprised to find a Palm Warbler and then a little later, a Northern Parula. Bruce Nott later found a Tennessee Warbler! Not bad for December.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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~A crazy looking shot of the Northern Parula at the Newburgh Waterfront, 12\/16\/23.~<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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~Palm Warbler at the Newburgh Waterfront, 123\/16\/23.~<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

On Sunday I stayed closer to home; I hit the black dirt early and then checked a few nearby lakes. In the black dirt, I enjoyed sifting through some large flocks of mixed blackbirds, looking unsuccessfully for a Yellow-headed Blackbird in the mix – a total long shot, but if you don’t look, you’ll never find one. The flocks consisted of nearly all Common Grackles, with a smattering European Starlings, Brown-headed Cowbirds, and Red-winged Blackbirds as well.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Afterwards, I found a single Common Goldeneye loosely associating with a small flock of Buffleheads at the northernmost part of Greenwood Lake. At Wickham Lake, surprisingly the Common Loon that I found there back on December 1st was still present. I watched the bird for a good while – it was pretty far out, so I was just enjoying looking at it in my scope. Then the bird appeared to try to take flight – taking a long runway, flapping like mad, but it never got airborne. It did this 3 times, and I started to figure that this was probably why the bird was still present. I waited it out, because the bird still seemed itchy. On the fourth attempt, the bird got airborne! It took a few laps around the lake, only clearing the treetops a few times, before landing in the lake again. I’m choosing to believe that this was finally a successful test flight. Hopefully the bird will have enough strength and get over whatever is ailing it soon so it can continue its migration.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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~Attempt #3, where this Common Loon did not get airborne. Wickham Lake, 12\/17\/23.~<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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~Northern Mocking bird with a bite to eat; Turtle Bay Road 12\/17\/23.~<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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~Not something you see every day in inland southern OC, dozens of Ring-billed Gulls literally on Bellvale Lakes Road, 12\/17\/23.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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~A more conventional shot of the Northern Parula, Newburgh Waterfront 12\/16\/23.~<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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~NOMO in BDR, 12\/17\/23.~<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I really enjoyed my birding this weekend. It’s that time of year when the days are just too short to fit any birding in during the week, so when I get out on the weekends it seems just that much better. On Saturday I took an eight mile hike out at Black Rock Forest. My … Continue reading “Sunday Shots, 12\/17\/23”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[6,19],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12939","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-orangecounty","category-photos"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p5i3kT-3mH","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/orangebirding.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12939","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/orangebirding.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/orangebirding.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/orangebirding.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/orangebirding.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=12939"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/orangebirding.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12939\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12956,"href":"https:\/\/orangebirding.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12939\/revisions\/12956"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/orangebirding.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=12939"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/orangebirding.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=12939"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/orangebirding.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=12939"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}