Saturday, November 22, 2014

Jones Beach - 21 Nov

Quite a few good birds were reported over the week from Jones' Beach, so I decided to spend my Saturday morning there.

I started at the coast guard station where the sand bar held a large flock of roosting American Oystercatchers and Dunlin. Hidden in the Oystercatchers was a solitary Marbled Godwit, as well as a few Sanderling and some Grey Plovers.

The sheltered bay had a group of 15 Red-breasted Mergansers, as well as smaller numbers of Bufflehead and a Hooded Merganser. Flying past were several small groups of Surf Scoter. Brants were everywhere, of course!

Next stop was the west end car park. Compared to last week I was very successful, with the first bird seen being the vagrant Common Ground Dove. It was hunched trying to get warm in the early morning sun, and I very nearly drove past it. With that under my belt I headed out to the jetty area where there were more Dunlin on the beach, and lots of movement offshore including more Red-breasted Mergansers, a Common Loon and several flocks of both Black Scoter and Surf Scoter.

The short grass near the car parks had a small flock of passerines, most of which turned out to be Horned Lark, but there were also 2 Snow Buntings, and 3 Lapland Longspurs.

Other birds in the area included singles of Northern Harrier, Peregrine and Merlin.

Common Ground Dove. This Florida native has been hanging around for a couple of weeks, and is only the second record for New York state I think.
A flock of Black Scoter. Thanks to Joe for help with the ID!
Female Red-breasted Merganser

Horned Lark.
Snow Bunting.
Brant  
American Herring Gull. This bird was smashing open shells by dropping them onto the roadway....
... clever bird!

No comments:

Post a Comment