Today we explored Palmyra Cove Nature Park for a little snow birding. Last night we ended up getting a few inches of snow and by mid-morning it already started melting! It seems like Palmyra got a little less snow than where I live, but it was nice to be out in the quiet of winter.
We were greeted by a number of songbirds right in the parking lot: a first-of-year Brown Creeper, White-throated Sparrows, a Northern Cardinal pair, a Tufted Titmouse, Dark-eyed Juncos, and a Downy Woodpecker. A female Bufflehead at the beaver pond was a pleasant surprise as hundreds of gulls flew overhead. We even saw a mink! We ended our walk with 4 Cedar Waxwings near the visitor center. Overall we observed 17 species.
Palmyra Cove Nature Park (17 species, 314 individuals)
9 Canada Geese
2 Mallards
1 Bufflehead
1 Mourning Dove
60 Ring-billed Gulls
150 Herring Gulls
1 Turkey Vulture
3 Downy Woodpeckers
1 Hairy Woodpecker
5 Tufted Titmice
2 White-breasted Nuthatches
1 Brown Creeper
3 Carolina Wrens
4 Cedar Waxwings
16 Dark-eyed Juncos
50 White-throated Sparrows
5 Northern Cardinals
Bufflehead female (Image by Michelle Horowitz)Angry Canada Geese (Image by Michelle Horowitz)
We are halfway through the count weekend and Team BirdNation has observed 36 different bird species and 2,412 individuals. Other fun finds the last two days were a mink, deer, and a backhoe. Let’s see what the second half of the weekend will bring.
Have you participated in the first two days of the bird count? Share some species you saw in the comments below.
Hello friends! I’m here writing you at 8:50 pm on 12/31/19, the end of the year and the decade. I can’t believe 2020 is already upon us. 2019 was a very exciting birding year for us and 2020 is going to be just as, if not more, amazing! My New Year’s Resolution is to get back to blogging frequently again because to be honest, 2019 was a little rough to stay on task. At the end of June Dave and I moved from New Jersey to New Hampshire and its been quite an adventure. Here are BirdNation’s 2019 highlights.
Life List Birds (19 for me, 17 for Dave)
Razorbill: 1/6 at Sandy Hook Beach, NJ (on our 1st wedding anniversary)
Scarlet Tanager: 5/8 at Maria B. Greenwald Park, Cherry Hill, NJ
Eastern Meadowlark: 6/19 at Chincoteague NWR, VA
Eastern Meadowlark (Image by David Horowitz)
Bobolink: 7/28 at Parker River NWR, Newbury, MA
Common Nighthawk: 8/30 at Moores Crossing Railroad Bridge, Manchester, NH
Nashville Warbler: 9/1 at Miller SP-Pack Monadnock, Peterborough, NH
Black Guillemot: 11/10 at Odiorne SP, Rye, NH
American Tree Sparrow: 12/15 at Concord, NH (Dave wasn’t there for this one either, I saw this in the Concord Christmas Bird Count)
Virginia Rail: 12/26 at Edwin B. Forsythe NWR
My current life list total is 227.
Year List 2019
This is the 2nd year I kept a Year List. 2019’s total was 189, 14 more birds than 2018 (175). The Year List will continue into 2020.
Bird Counts
We participated in many bird counts this year:
Great Backyard Bird Count: We counted at Amico Island , Haddon Lake Park, Palmyra Cove, Barnegat Lighthouse SP, Cloverdale Farm, and then Haddon Lake again (lol) to find 52 different species and over 1,500 individual birds
Global Big Day (May 4): 55 species (11 of them warblers) between Rancocas Nature Center and Palmyra Cove
2019 Great American Arctic Birding Challenge (March 15-June 1): It was Team BirdNation’s 2nd year participating and we saw 56 species
October Big Day (October 19): 20 species in Cape Cod, MA
Concord Christmas Bird Count (December 15): I participated in the Concord CBC. Last year I did the Moorestown, NJ count with my friends from Rancocas, but I wanted to start getting involved in the New Hampshire birding community. I had a blast being on the team and we totaled 51 species at the time (not including a count we were waiting on from 1 person and count week birds).
Birding States
We went birding in 2 new states in 2019: New Hampshire (where we moved to) and Maine, bringing our total to 11 birding states. Other states we visited this year were Massachusetts, New Jersey, Maryland, Virginia, and Pennsylvania.
Onward to 2020…
I’m so excited to start our birding adventures in 2020! There are some pretty cool opportunities coming up, so I will keep you posted on all our new expeditions (and I will catch you up on some of the events of the past few months.) Happy New Year! See you in 2020!
Hi everyone! I took a little break from blogging since the move to New Hampshire. The transition has been a little rough, but it’ll get easier over time. Since I last wrote we went back to Chincoteague, VA, added Maine to our birding map, and added a few lifers to our list. I’ll catch you up on all of that soon, but this past weekend we visited family back in New Jersey and of course made some time for birding. I was able to visit some of my old stomping grounds: Palmyra Cove Nature Park and Haddon Lake Park.
Palmyra Cove Nature Park, Palmyra, NJ
I really missed Palmyra. Even in the heat of the day, we still observed 34 species. Highlights included a Yellow-billed Cuckoo, American Redstarts, Chimney Swifts, 2 Ospreys, and Wild Turkeys. We also saw a nice variety of butterflies and dragonflies, some turtles, and a groundhog.
Haddon lake park, audubon, nj
The ducks at Haddon Lake are now in eclipse plumage. Waterfowl undergo a simultaneous wing molt, meaning they are rendered flightless for about 20-40 days. Therefore, males, who are usually much more colorful than the females, molt their head plumage in order to blend in. I also learned (thanks to a helpful person on Instagram) that there was an American Black Duck amid the Mallards. We also saw a Red-winged Blackbird fledgling being fed by its parent.
Green Heron (Image by BirdNation)Red-winged Blackbird juvenile
May 4th was Global Big Day. Global Big Day is a citizen science event run by the Cornell Lab of Ornithology. Birders from all over the world count as many birds species as they can for a 24 hour period. This year, over 30,000 people participated and counted 6,899 bird species. Team BirdNation had an awesome Big Day with 61 total species for the day.
I started the morning at Rancocas Nature Center where I am a teacher naturalist. I led a spring migration birding walk. We had a nice variety of songbirds and warblers. During this walk I spotted my first of year/season Ruby-throated Hummingbird, Baltimore Oriole, Veery, Red-eyed Vireo, and Great Crested Flycatcher.
In the afternoon, Dave and I went birding at Palmyra Cove Nature Park. We saw 55 species! Here are the highlights:
11 Warbler Species! Ovenbird, Louisiana Waterthrush, Blue-winged, Black-and-white, Common Yellowthroat, Northern Parula, Magnolia, Yellow, Black-throated Blue, Yellow-rumped, and Prairie
Black-and White Warbler (Image by David Horowitz)
Ovenbird (Image by David Horowitz)
Red-breasted Nuthatches
A House Wren trying to set up their nest box
House Wren on its nest box (Image by BirdNation)
2 Great Horned Owls on an old Bald Eagle nest
Many Baltimore Orioles, an Orchard Oriole, and an Eastern Towhee
Chickies!
Gosling (Image by David Horowitz)
Did you go birding on Global Big Day? Tell us about it in the comments.
Day 2 of the Great Backyard Bird Count was twice as nice because we went birding at 2 locations!
It was 45 degrees with a cold breeze; much more seasonal than yesterday’s warm weather. Our first stop was Haddon Lake Park in Audubon, NJ, followed by Palmyra Cove in Palmyra, NJ. We saw 32 species today, adding 8 new species to the total GBBC so far.
At Haddon Lake, Dave spotted some banded Mallards. I was able to get some pictures of the bands and reported them at reportband.gov. This website is run by USGS (United States Geological Survey) and the link leads to Patuxent Wildlife Research Center Bird Banding Laboratory. We were able to learn around where the Mallard was banded, by who, and its age.
USGS Banding Information (Image by BirdNation)
Haddon Lake Park, Audubon, NJ (10 species, 188 individual birds)
To me, birding is not a hobby, it’s a lifestyle. I pretty much try to go birding as much as possible. How often we go birding depends on the week and season. During spring migration, it’s not unusual for Dave and I to go birding 4-5 times per week (after work and at least once/sometimes twice on the weekend). Today I wanted to share some spring birding pics from some of our smaller excursions.
Red-winged Blackbird, Taylor’s Wildlife Preserve (Image by BirdNation)
Yellow Warbler, Taylor’s Wildlife Preserve (Image by BirdNation)
Mourning Dove, Barnegat Lighthouse State Park (Image by BirdNation)
Cedar Waxwing, Palmyra Cove Nature Park (Image by BirdNation)
Magnolia Warbler, Amico Island Park (Image by BirdNation)
Magnolia Warbler, Amico Island Park (Image by BirdNation)
Over the past 2 weeks, Dave and I have gone birding 7 times. We’ve had an interesting variety of early spring weather conditions, including chilly 40s and rain in the 70s. Here are some of my favorite moments from the last two weeks. (I don’t have pictures from all 7 trips)
Palmyra Cove Nature Park (3/23/18):Â first of season Killdeer and Osprey. Also saw a Muskrat
Killdeer (Image by BirdNation)
Muskrat (Image by BirdNation)
Osprey with Goldfish (Image by BirdNation)
Barnegat Lighthouse State Park (3/25/18)
Common Loon (Image by BirdNation)
Purple Sandpiper (Image by BirdNation)
Palmyra Cove Nature Park (4/4/18):Â It started raining when we arrived, so we ended up walking in the middle of a short rainstorm. It was a really cool experience. There were still a lot of birds out, and by the time we finished walking the rain had stopped (29 species in total, including a first of season Palm Warbler and many Eastern Phoebes). We also had a chance to watch the Tacony-Palmyra Bridge open, found a goose egg, saw interesting fungi, and discovered a bunch of forest snails.
Tacony-Palmyra Bridge opening (Image by BirdNation)
Cove in low tide (Image by BirdNation)
Goose Egg (Image by BirdNation)
Canada Goose (Image by BirdNation)
Interesting Fungi (Image by BirdNation)
Snail (Image by BirdNation)
Island Beach State Park (4/6/18):Â Saw about 200 Northern Gannets and many Osprey. First of season Snowy Egrets and Laughing Gull
On Saturday, September 30, Dave and I went to the 3rd Annual American Birding Expo at the Greater Philadelphia Expo Center in Oak, Pennsylvania.
The American Birding Expo was founded by Bill Thompson III, the editor and publisher of Bird Watcher’s Digest. The event’s slogan is “the world of birding in one place!”. I originally heard about the Expo while listening to the podcast This Birding Life, which is hosted by Bill Thompson III (if you haven’t listened to This Birding Life you should check it out!). Dave and I live less than an hour from the expo center, so we thought it would be a great event to check out.
This 3-day event features field trips, guest speakers, travel companies, merchandise, and much more. The first section of the hall was filled with travel companies from all over the world. According to the Expo website, in 2016, over 41 countries and 42 states were represented. Some of the countries present this year were Panama, Taiwan, Chile, Ecuador, Australia, Uganda, Portugal, Mexico, and New Zealand. There were also booths for optics companies, such as Zeiss, Swarovski, Celestron, and Opticron. Organizations such as the Cape May Bird Observatory, Bird Life International, and Bird Watcher’s Digest could also be found in the first hall. We also had the chance to meet Conrad, a blue jay who lives at the John James Audubon Center at Mill Grove.
The second hall featured artists, publishers, and shops. Julie Zickefoose, bird artist and author had a booth. She was also the Friday night featured presenter. Dave and I are a fan of bird-related art, and we ended up buying some watercolors from Ohio-based artist Jim Turanchik. Turanchik’s goal in his art is to capture the essence of birds, which I feel he does very well. The birds in his watercolors seem like they are moving. He does this by portraying them at different angles. He also has a “Birds in Flight” collection, which feature larger birds such as Anhingas, Great Blue Herons, Wood Storks, and Glossy Ibis to name a few. We purchased two watercolors, a Magnolia Warbler and a Blackburnian Warbler. You can check out his website at jturanchik.com.
(We hung the watercolors up in our dining area, which is near a small chandelier. I took this pictures on an angle because no matter what lighting I try to use you can see reflections, so sorry for the bad angles).
Magnolia Warbler watercolor by Jim Turanchik
Blackburnian Warbler watercolor by Jim Turanchik
At the Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing booth, author Stephen Shunk was signing copies of the his book, Peterson Reference Guide to Woodpeckers of North America. As longtime blog readers know, I already own this book (and happily used it to write last fall’s Woodpecker Wednesday feature), so I got my copy signed! I found out that Stephen Shunk’s favorite woodpecker is the Lewis’s Woodpecker and we talked about Pileateds and Red-headed Woodpeckers. It was really cool to meet an author and get my book signed. He wished me “Happy Woodpecker Watching!”, which I will definitely do.
Signed by Stephen Shunk
One event that I wanted to see but didn’t was Scott Weidensaul’s presentation on Project SNOWstorm. I’m a fan of Weidensaul’s nature books, but the presentation was from 6-8, which was a little late for us since we were there in the morning. There were also morning bird hikes each day of the expo from 7-10 am. There were 5 birding locations around Philadelphia were birders could meet to take guided tours. We didn’t end up going to any of them, but we did explore one of the locations on our own after the expo.
After lunch, we drove over to the Militia Hill section of Fort Washington State Park, one of the Expo birding hotspots. The Militia Hill section features a Hawk Watch platform and is near the Wissahickon Creek. We spent some time sitting on the platform and them briefly walked around the area. Some birds we saw included an American Redstart, an Osprey, Turkey Vultures, Blue Jays, a Red-bellied Woodpecker, and House Finches. It was a lovely place that I’d like to explore more one day.
View from the Militia Hill Hawk Watch Platform (Image by BirdNation)
Wissahickon Creek (Image by BirdNation)
It was still early in the day and we weren’t done with birds yet! After Militia Hill, we drove back to New Jersey and hiked around Palmyra Cove. Highlights included 2 Bald Eagles, a Green Heron, a Red-bellied Woodpecker cleaning out its hole, Wild Turkeys, and Eastern Phoebes.
September 30th was a fantastic day. We not only had a fun time at the American Birding Expo, but spent the day outside with the birds. I couldn’t have asked for a better birding day.
Sunday tends to be our normal birding day. This week we were having trouble deciding where we wanted to go. The options were: Palmyra Cove or Barnegat Light. Which park did we choose? We actually went to both!
We started our day at Palmyra Cove Nature Park. The weather was lovely. We had a bright blue summer sky punctuated by white puffy clouds. Our main goal for the trip was to explore the Cove Trail. On the way to the cove we listened to the song of an Indigo Bunting, saw a Red-bellied Woodpecker, watched some Carolina Chickadees chase each other, and got a rare glimpse of a Warbling Vireo (I say rare because they are usually always at the top of the tree, so I tend to hear them frequently instead of see them).
Red-bellied Woodpecker (Image by BirdNation)
The Cove Trail runs along the Delaware River. Sometimes you can walk on the beach along the river, but it was around high tide so that wasn’t an option. We did see some Double-crested Cormorants, as well as a flock of at least 70 Canada Geese float by.
There’s a wooden platform that extends out into the marshland of the cove. We were pretty close to it when we almost ran right into a Black Rat Snake! It was having a sun-bathing section right in the middle of the trail.
Black Rat Snake (Image by BirdNation)
There were a lot of birds around once we reached the platform. There were 2 Bald Eagles in a nest, 6 or 7 Great Blue Herons, Mallards, small flocks of Semipalmated Sandpipers, swallows, Eastern Phoebes, Red-winged Blackbirds, a Cedar Waxwing, Orchard Orioles, and juvenile Starlings to name a few. My favorite visitor though was an adorable Spotted Sandpiper. It landed on the platform railing and pumped his little tail. With all their teetering motions, no wonder why people have nicknames these little guys the “teeter-peep” or the “tip-tail”.
Spotted Sandpiper (Image by David Horowitz)
On the Cove Trail (Image by BirdNation)
Great Blue Heron (Image by David Horowitz)
Eastern Phoebe (Image by BirdNation)
After Palmyra we made our way across the state to the Jersey Shore to go back to Long Beach Island. We went to Barnegat Light SP about a month ago, but wanted to spend some time at the ocean. We arrived at the park in the late afternoon. This time we saw 3 Piping Plovers running around the beach. I think one of them was a juvenile, because it lacked the black neck and forehead bands that the breeding adult Piping Plovers exhibit.
Piping Plover (Image by BirdNation)
We also saw American Oystercatcher T2 and its family again. The 2 chicks are still in what is called their prejuvenal (first prebasic) molt. This means that they have some down on the tips of some of their feathers. They are in this stage from June-August and have their full juvenal plumage by week 6. They also still have a larger black tip on their orange bills than the adults do. I was happy to see the T2 family again. The 2 juveniles were banded. We weren’t able to read their bands from the distance we were at, but maybe if they return in the future we’ll get a better glimpse of them. The picture on the left is one of the chicks a month ago in June, and the picture on the right are what they look like now in July. They grow up so fast, don’t they?
T2 family chicks in June 2017 (Image by BirdNation)
T2 family chicks in July 2017 (Image by BirdNation)
Double birding days are certainly a special treat! 🙂
We took advantage of our 3 day weekend by going on 3 birding adventures. One of our trips was to Palmyra Cove Nature Park, but the other days we explored 2 new places: Taylor Wildlife Preserve and Michael Huber Prairie Warbler Preserve.
On Saturday night we wanted to go to Amico Island. Every time we go there, we pass a place called Taylor Farm & Wildlife Preserve. People go to Taylor Farm to pick their own fruits and vegetables, but part of the property was turned into a wildlife preserve with a few hiking trails. We’ve been curious about Taylor’s for awhile, so we decided to check it out. We never made it to Amico that night, but had a great time exploring Taylor Wildlife Preserve instead.
Taylor’s Wildlife Preserve is right on the Delaware River and Dredge Harbor. It’s a wooded habitat that features stretches of wetlands. We arrived to the sounds of Gray Catbirds and Red-winged Blackbirds. As we walked towards the foot trails we spotted some Northern Cardinals, Eastern Phoebes, and Baltimore Orioles. Yellow Warblers and Warbling Vireos sang from high in the trees while we explored the winding trails. We found the wetlands area not long after entering the trails. There was a beaver lodge, Eastern Kingbirds, swallows, Common Yellowthroats, and Blue-gray Gnatcatchers.
Taylor Wildlife Preserve (Image by BirdNation)
“Breep! Breep!” A raucous call came from high in the tree over our heads. It was a Great Crested Flycatcher! These large flycatchers have lemon-colored bellies and long tails, although the crest mentioned in their names are not very prominent. For being about 7 inches in length, the Great Crested Flycatcher has a pretty ear-piercing call. These flycatchers are agile fliers, and we watch it for a bit before it disappeared into the treetops. We also ran into a muskrat on the trail. He didn’t notice us right away, and was pretty surprised when he realized he was being watched. It was a fun moment.
Another highlight of our Taylor trip was finding Wright Cove, where there is a platform with an Osprey nest. At the end of April, Dave and I bought a spotting scope and tested it out at the local yacht club where some Osprey nest nearby. We found a second tower with nesting Osprey that night, and wondered if there was a way to see them better from land. It turns out the Wright Cove in Taylor Preserve is exactly where we want to be to see these Osprey really well. We will definitely go back to observe them, as well as explore more the preserve.
We woke up early Sunday morning to spend some time at Palmyra Cove. It was a quiet morning so we were able to see 42 species. Some highlights included Cedar Waxwings eating berries, a Green Heron flying through the woods, a Ruby-throated Hummingbird at the honeysuckles, and an Orchard Oriole pair chasing each other around. We ended up seeing some more Great Crested Flycatchers on this trip too. Ever have the experience where once you learn something is around, you start seeing it everywhere? Well it seems like we’ve been missing Great Crested Flycatchers for awhile, because now that we know them, we’ve been seeing them all weekend! Amazing how learning about a species can open up a brand new world you never knew was there before.
Today we went to Michael Huber Prairie Warbler Preserve in Woodland Township for the first time. The preserve is 1,227 acres of pitch pine/scrub oak woodlands. An interesting feature of the preserve is a spung. A spung is a hydrologically isolated wetland that relies entirely on rainfall/snowfall to maintain its water level and is habitat to rare plants/amphibians.
Our hike started off with some of the usual suspects: Eastern Wood-pewees, Eastern Phoebes, Cedar Waxwings, Eastern Towhees Gray Catbirds, Common Yellowthroats and woodpeckers. But we kept hearing an ascending buzzy sound. It turned out this was the sound of the park’s namesake: the Prairie Warbler. Despite its name, these warblers don’t live on prairies, they prefer scrubby pine forests. This makes Huber Preserve the perfect breeding habitat. We were able to see and hear these beautiful yellow and black warblers throughout the entire walk.
Prairie Warbler (Image by David Horowitz)
At one point on the blue trail Dave heard a low bellowing call. We froze and listened. “Hoo-hoo-hoo-hoo, hoo-hoo-hoo-HOO!” I couldn’t believe it. I could recognize that voice anywhere; it was a Barred Owl! It was in the distance, but we heard it call a few times. I’m so excited that we added our 2nd owl to our lifelist :-).
There are actually 2 spungs at the preserve: one on the green trail and the other on the red trail. I really wanted to go to the red trail spung (which was mentioned on their website), but we would have had to walk at least 3 miles (one way that is). You can bike at the preserve, so we will probably go back and bike to that spung. We did try to find the green trail spung, but its seems like it dried up. So no spungs for us today :-(. We did however see a Pine Warbler, more Great Crested Flycatchers, Ovenbirds, an American Redstart juvenile male, Black-and-White Warblers, and the Prairie Warblers/Barred Owl listed above, so it was a great day despite there being no spung. It was a fun weekend of adventures, and overall May was a great birding month for us.
BirdNation 