ABA Camp Avocet 2015; Guest Blog #2

Hi birders! It's Tim again, and if you haven't read my first post here, here's the link.

Continuing from my last post, we woke up fairly early at 6 (normal for me) to get breakfast at 6:45 and get on the road at 7:45. Before breakfast, we were allowed to do a little birding around the dorms, so my roommate and I got ready quickly and witnessed the huge flocks of blackbirds, grackles, cowbirds, and starlings dispersing from their roosting sites. The number of starlings even dwarfed the number in Boston! Although considered rare in Delaware, we also witnessed flocks of White Ibis flying from their roosts. Apparently, White Ibis are undergoing a range expansion, which usually starts with a large irruption of birds farther north of their normal range. They were all juveniles, surprisingly.

Breakfast was spectacular, but if you were hoping for real syrup on your waffles, pancakes, or french toast, you're out of luck. We had much conversation, telling each other about cool birding experiences and other random topics.

We started our first full day with a bang by going to Bombay Hook, debatably the best birding hotspot in Delaware, even though it was an hour away from Lewes. We arrived at Bombay around 9, and immediately we stopped the car because someone had heard a bobwhite. We ended up seeing two feeding in someone's driveway with Mourning Doves, and it was a lifer for the majority of the western kids.

The visitor's center at Bombay had many martin boxes, allowing some close views of a species that is very common in Delaware but very local and rare in Massachusetts.

Our first stop was at Raymond Pool, by far the most productive place at Bombay Hook, and it was spectacular. Almost 250 American Avocets dotted the shallow pool, along with a couple Black-necked Stilts, tons of Short-billed Dowitchers, appreciable counts of Stilt Sandpipers, many peeps, huge numbers of Snowy and Great Egrets, 50 Glossy Ibis with a couple White Ibis, 2 Tricolored Herons, Semipalmated Plovers, and probably even more. The humungous numbers allowed for close study of the shorebirds, letting us pick out a Pectoral Sandpiper, some Western Sandpipers, and 12 Long-billed Dowitcher (a lifer for me). Our group split into 3 groups; beginner, intermediate, and advanced shorebird experience, and we learned a lot about shorebirds.

We visited a couple other pools after Raymond, but one of the highlights was hearing and seeing a Grasshopper Sparrow in one of the fields between the pools.

Another very cool stop was Finis Pool, a boggier body of water home to many Little Blue and Green Herons. We ate lunch in the forest around Finis, and were surprised to find an Acadian Flycatcher nest with nestlings and a parent (another lifer). We got brief glimpses of the parent briefly coming to the nest to feed the chicks, along with many calling Eastern Wood-Pewee, a calling Yellow-billed Cuckoo (which I didn't hear) and a calling Barred Owl (which I also didn't hear).

While driving the wildlife loop, our conversations were interrupted by someone screaming "LEAST BITTERN!!" I got a brief glimpse of the bird crossing the road, but some people in our van missed it, and the other van didn't see it at all.

After returning to Raymond Pool and experiencing the cool shorebirds again, we headed out of Bombay and explored some of the local hotspots. Here is our list.

One place we stopped, I believe it was called Stave Landing R., produced some nice marsh birds such as Marsh Wren and the local subspecies of Swamp Sparrow, the Delaware Swamp Sparrow. Delaware Swamp Sparrows have a slightly more musical and slurred song than the nominate race, kind of like a Pine Warbler but slower and more defined. Here is the list for Stave Landing.

While we were in the vans, we went over a bridge famous for it's Cliff Swallows, which have declined on the East Coast recently, and many people got to see them (except for me). We also stopped at Fort DuPont State Park, where we witnessed many herons coming and going from their roosting place on Fort DuPont Island. Strangely, around Delaware City Cattle Egret and Little Blue Heron are much more common than the other species because Fort DuPont Island is a huge breeding colony for those species. Here is the Fort DuPont list.

That afternoon, we had dinner at ABA Headquarters in Delaware City where we ordered pizza. We took a tour around the HQ and then just hung out in a large room and told stories about birds. At this point, we had an idea of what everybody's names were, but we still went around the room and told our name, our favorite bird, and where we live. There were kids from all over at this Camp, and a surprising amount were from the west. One of the boys lives in Gunnison, Colorado, and Gunnison Sage-Grouse are common there! I still can't believe it!

After dinner, we headed back to the Virden Center. Curfew was at 9:30 every night, and although some kids chatted for a little after that, we basically stuck to the rules. The early curfew was helpful though, considering how early we had to wake up each morning.

The quote of the day (from Steve Howell) was "If Long-billed Dowitchers were poisonous, and Short-billed Dowitchers were delicious, we would surely know how to tell them apart."

ABA Camp Avocet 2015; Guest Blog #1

Now for something completely different! Last week Tim was in Delaware with ABA's Camp Avocet, and since my blog is so lame, I have begged him to spice it up to bring in more readers.  Take it away!

Hi, I’m Tim, David’s son, and I’d like to share my experience at Camp Avocet, an ABA Young Birder’s camp. These posts will be mainly for people going to Camp Avocet next summer so that they’ll know what to expect. I had an absolutely spectacular time with experienced young birders like me, and would be a great opportunity for any birder between ages 13 and 18 to become part of the young birding community. 
Camp Avocet is based at the Virden Retreat Center in Lewes, Delaware (pronounced Lewis) and we go on many field trips to local and famous hotspots around there. Delaware is a major staging place for migrating shorebirds and a great place to find breeding terns, so the camp is focused on those families. Delaware also is the northern reach of some southeastern songbirds, so we get many opportunities to see these specialties.

Campers arriving at the Philadelphia Airport have to first survive the treacherous 2-3 hour drive to Lewes, still a short drive compared to campers driving from Massachusetts (that’s me!). After a long day of traveling, some campers arriving before dinner are treated to a walk around the Virden Center, producing large numbers of Blue Grosbeak (a lifer for me) and a couple White-eyed Vireos. Oh, did I forget to mention the heat? Delaware might have no forest whatsoever, and incredibly humid days, but I felt none of it because I was having so much fun!

After dinner (the food at the center is excellent), we took the vans to Cape Henlopen State Park for a view of the sunset at “The Point.” We were lucky to find many Royal Terns (another lifer), a Common Loon (rare at this time), Spotted Sandpipers, a Black Scoter on the beach, Ruddy Turnstones, Common Nighthawks “beenz”-ing, and surprising numbers of Orchard Orioles. Here's our eBird list.

Our dorms were arranged into two buildings separate from the Virden Center and you would be paired with one or two other campers that are around your age. My roommate and I happened to both be from Massachusetts, so we shared stories about the birds we had seen before.

I believe I’ll be doing a post for the next 6 days for every day I was at Camp Avocet. So until Day 2, adios!

Carolina Wrens and the Winter of 2015

There is a lot of anecdotal evidence that Carolina Wrens took a big hit this winter in Massachusetts, but I haven't seen anyone offer some hard numbers.  Here is a local perspective drawing on my eBird data from January through May.

On a very local patch level, this winter's effect on Carolina Wrens in my neighborhood was not at all subtle: they were decimated, with none remaining at the end of the storm cycle in March and not a single singing bird through April. Looking through my yard and neighborhood patch records in eBird between January 1 and end of May, I can illustrate what happened with some numbers.

With a sample total of  92 lists recorded between January and the end of May, I can show this break- down by lists per month/lists reporting CAWR/High Counts:

Jan: 15/13/4

Feb: 14/7/3

Mar: 21/4/1

Apr: 17/0/0

May: 24/12/3

Over this period the Concord Birds Project gathered 204 lists which show virtually the same picture town-wide. These are the recorded high counts by month:

Jan: 4

Feb: 3

Mar: 2

Apr: 1

May: 3

June: 3

The weather, of course, introduced a lot of sampling error, but birders essentially did what the birds did, concentrated at feeders!

In an average winter my neighborhood has 4-5 singing birds, and this January was not different, with nearly all surveys recording numerous birds. This changed markedly in February, with only the surveys through mid-month turning up the usual birds. The beginning of the snow cycle concentrated the birds at feeders, notably ours and one other that usually sustains a couple birds. Going into the storm cycle we had our usual two birds which over-winter and breed in our yard. Then one disappeared, then one was found in our garage (that -12F morning) in visible distress, then a frozen bird turned up at our basement door (gifted to MCZ).

Now at the MCZ, Harvard

It was all over by about the third week of March. April was cruelly silent.

Our Carolinas were eating suet regularly and munching on a large nut block (which also sustained a Pine Warbler through the winter), but apparently Carolina's also seek shelter and supplies of arthropods under porches, in crawl-spaces, in garages, and in brush piles.  The deep snow effectively sealed off virtually all of those food supplies. I realized too late that our brush pile had become completely covered.  Carolina Wrens not so much froze as simply starved, I believe, as did a great many other birds, such as Canada Geese, whose food sources were buried or frozen.

May saw a very slow appearance of a few birds, but in unusual areas. I typically hear only two birds in the neighborhood these days. Only one singing bird is, I believe, a survivor, very likely one of the two birds which a local couple (with a huge feeding station) reported had pulled through, so my numbers might be an over-sampling of my very local experience.  House Wrens, on the other hand, have been plentiful.  While this might be because I am paying more attention to wrens, but it could be that they have been able to use good habitats formerly taken by "yard bosses."

Drawing on a wider data set for the eastern counties of Massachusetts, eBird generates this line chart for the frequency with which lists over this period reported Caroline Wren.  Essentially, the species fell off a statistical cliff.

Your comments welcome.

A Year in Numbers: 2014

"How'd you do?"

You know the question.  It's both sincerely curious and not-so-subtly competitive.  I haven't been birding many years (barely seven, I think, and I entered my first eBird list fall of 2009, for what it's worth), but I have a pretty good idea now of what is a "normal" year for me in numbers:  about 220-30 birds in Massachusetts, but about 180 of them in my town alone.  I am a local birder.  In 2012 I chased a bit and saw 249 in my state, but full time work and a family just don't go together with state-wide listing.  Local is where it is at.

Which is why 2014 was so different.  We traveled.  The kids are old enough to appreciate longer trips, and I had a sabbatical from teaching, so it was a great year for seeing new places and finding new birds.

Early July:  my son and I took a "boreal" trip to northern New Hampshire and Vermont.  Yes, it was a bit late for good activity, but we had a great time exploring bogs and spruce forests.  Perhaps the highlights were Cannon Mountain, where we heard both Bicknell's and Swainson's Thrushes; Pondicherry NWR, where we had goshawk, Philadelphia Vireo, nesting Sharp-shinned Hawks, Bay-breasted and Canada Warblers, and Lincoln's Sparrow; and Moose Bog near Island Lake, VT, where we had Ring-necked ducks and Pied-billed Grebes on territory.  The bugs were ferocious and rain drove us home a day soon, but what a great trip.

Late July/Early August:  Yellowstone NP and Grand Teton NP, plus Bozeman, MT and the Gallatin Valley.  The kids adored Yellowstone, particularly Hayden Valley, where we saw many bison, wolves, grizzlies, white pelicans, delightful Japanese tourists, and open skies.  Yellowstone netted me 14 lifers Overall, we were less enamored with Grand Teton, but the birding was good, too, with 5 more lifers.  Back in Bozeman, where we were staying on either end of our trip, we lucked into a local guide who showed us some local hotspots in the Missouri Headwaters Area, and we picked up a few more new birds.

Texas:  my marvelous wife sent me to Texas for the Rio Grande Valley Birding Festival in November.  It is a cliche that first-timers really load up on lifers in Texas, but the cliche is true.  It got 49 lifers in 5 days of birding, and saw 167 birds, more than we saw in Montana and Wyoming combined.  Man, it was fun!

Florida:  Finally, a family trip at Christmas to the Orlando area netted my son and I some good birding time.  We missed most of the birds we had targeted, such as red-cockaded woodpecker and Bachman's sparrow, but saw around 90 birds on sporadic trips near where my parent's live.

Overall, I picked up 95 lifers and saw 362 birds in 2014 to get me to a grand total of 419 (300 of which are in Mass.).

Next post will be a year in record shots (some resembling actual photography!).

Back from the (sub) Tropics

My family and I had an enjoyable trip to central Florida, and my son and I got out quite a bit locally around the Kissimmee area, seeing around 110 species over the week.  During winter the retention ponds around my parent's condo complex host Lesser Scaup and Ring-necked Ducks, along with many locals: White Ibis, Anhinga, Blue, Tri-colored, and Great Blue Herons, Snowy, Cattle, and Great Egrets, and the ubiquitous feral Muscovy Ducks.  Florida Sandhill Cranes walk the lawns, flocks of Fish Crow fly over, and the trees are full of Palm, Yellow-rumped, and Orange Crowned Warblers.  Sub-tropical birding at its easiest!

Anhinga

However, we had a few goals, one being to try and see Red-cockaded Woodpecker, Bachman's Sparrow, and Brown-headed Nuthatch at the Hal Scott Preserve.  We succeeded only in hearing several of the nuthatches; Bachman's were unresponsive to all means of persuasion, and we lacked time to get deep into the best older growth Long-leaf Pine sections of Hal Scott.  Our consolation was good looks at White-eyed Vireo and four Yellow-throated Warblers (both lifers for Tim).  Hal Scott is really lovely, but it is big, so allow half a day of walking (or take a bike).

Other highlights included a Snail Kite at Riverside Park in St. Cloud (very reliable there), numerous Loggerhead Shrikes (lifer for Tim), Sedge Wren at Twin Oaks Conservation Area in Kissimmee (an excellent new area with great potential), and locally rare wintering ducks, Canvasback and Redhead, also at Twin Oaks.  Finally, after another visiting birder put up an erroneous eBird report for a locals-only communal roosting area (for 240 Fulvous Whistling Ducks, no less!), we visited to find 49 Black-bellied (another lifer for Tim).

Alas, we never got to the Lake Apopka North Shore Restoration Area, where some Groove-billed Ani continued through the holidays.  Nor were we able to get down to Joe Overstreet Rd. to look for Whooping Cranes (introduced locally and now countable).  But all in all, a lovely, warm, and productive trip.

Back to the (sub) Tropics

The holidays bring an opportunity to go south again, this time to the Orlando area to visit family.  I won't be posting long blogs, but perhaps a few pictures.  Here is one for today, a Loggerhead Shrike in a stiff breeze.

Happy Holidays!

A Red-tailed Conundrum

Today while doing some early scouting for CBC in Concord I spotted a brilliant white raptor perched above a field with some pretty active edges.  My first hope, of course, was a Snowy, but instead it proved to be a buteo, and a very pale one.  I am no raptor expert, but I am aware that Red Tails have a Western pale morph, the nearly white high plains Krider's, and an uncommon light morph in the Eastern population.  I don't think this is a western or plains bird, but in my experience it was so unusual—and pretty—I thought I would post my highly-cropped record shots for some comment.

It was 17F, overcast, with snow flakes and a light north breeze, so this bird was really puffed up, with feathers down over its legs.  You can just make out a hint of a "belly band" and some buffiness in the un-banded tail, but overall this is a very pale bird from the throat (typical of eastern birds) through the undertail.  I did not see it fly, so I can't offer dorsal details, but the shoulder suggests light brown wings.  Not a leucistic bird but maybe a light morph Eastern bird.  Comments and corrections welcome.

I have gotten a few comments suggesting that, while pale, this bird is within range for a normal male juvenal bird.  I did not know males tended to be paler. Also, because of the cold, the bird is very puffed up, likely blurring the belly band; additionally, the flat lighting suggested the bird is whiter than it actually is,

Another instance of the great variety and variation in birds.