Jan 11 2011 - (another) one that got away

A quiet morning at the park.

8 Hooded Merganser were in the receiving pool area, the largest unfrozen water are. 30 Mallard were also there.

On the main pond 53 Canada Geese were standing. I scanned but only noted a slight presumably gender related size difference. Later as 20 or so geese flew over me at the 'magic spot' one of the birds looked securely short necked and slightly smaller. It didn't look small enough for a classic Cackling Goose but I didn't get a great look and must make a note to look through the flock some more.
A little further up the path a Carolina Chickadee reacted very strongly to Carolina song when played, reasonably well to Black-capped Song but (for good measure and in the name of science!) ignored that of Mountain Chickadee.

Jan 09 2011 - Keep off the Ice

  A bitterly cold day kept away the human customers at Riverbend. The River was mostly frozen but the bay on the Maryland side and a few other areas. In the bay there were a couple of hundred Ring-necked Ducks. Mixed in were a few Common Mergansers, a Hooded Merganser and (around) 19 Redheads. A single female Canvasback was also in the flock. As is usual in winter at Riverbend the vast majority of Ring-necked were male, maybe 90% in this group.

Futher up stream, in the next sizeable area of open water a close-knit group of 20 Redheads were found and a big raft of maybe 120 Bufflehead

At the Visitors' Center a block of suet attracted more than the usual customers including Tufted Titmouse and Cardinal. The female Cardinal that had been attacking its reflection the last two visits wasnt seen today.

A Squirrel ate fries from the rubbish bin outside the center :O

Occoquan 11/07/10

A decidedly chilly start to Sunday morning found Chrystal and I at Occoquan NWR for a local Audubon walk led by Rich Reiger and helped by Kurt Gasklil.



While we waited for the group to assemble, we saw the only Waxwings of the day, a flock of 30+ birds over towards the Ringing station. By the time we got around there, they were nowhere to be seen however. Good numbers of bluebirds were around, maybe a flock of 40 to start with and several others around the reserve. Also in good numbers, Kinglets, and unusually Golden-crowed out numbered Ruby-crowns, with maybe15 of the former and 4-5 of the latter seen during the morning



Out in the bay huge flocks of Gadwall and Coot predominated - maybe a 1000 of the duck (including later flyover flocks of a couple of hundred) and 600 Coot. Pied-billed Grebe were plentiful with maybe 30 seen, undoubtedly there were more.

In one of the streams leading down to the bay a fine Rusty Blackbird was feeding less than 30 feet away, a excellent look at a species that is often hard to see this well.







A couple of Palm Warbler were found along the 'shore' but no sign of the Orange-crowned Warbler photographed by another birder coming up from the point.

Brrrrrr....

In the lake seven Hooded Merganser were found in the light mist over the lake at dawn. As the sun came up 2 of the 3 males were displaying frantically to 1 or 2 of the females. No sign or the grebe or Bufflehead of a couple if days ago.



Only a light crow passage from roost this Mir ing despite being early. Most looked like fish crows and the majority that called were. Later I found a party sitting in trees above the riverbed, one looked bigger and there were certainly odd American Crow still.

A few flocks of 20-25 Robin flew over high and smaller parties were in the trees around the picnic area.

A balmy October day....

Average high temp for today 64, pre-Dawn actual 61, can't imagine going for a pre-breakfast walk on Scilly just in a teeshirt despite my record of being there with high pressure in October.
Further field testing of differentiating the crows was pretty successful this morning with again the Fish crow mainly being later than the American Crow. No wing moult noticed today.
From Cardinal Bridge I watched two pairs of Mallard diving apparently for food. Like Scoter they open there wings and flapped to give Initial subversive power and then paddled like crazy to stay under while they reach the stream-bed.
Each dive was usually 3-5 seconds and each bird when they surfaced had drooped wings and, unless they dived again quickly, frantically rearranged they plumage with flapping and preening.
Two Great Egret flew in over Pooh Bridge later, previously these had only been early birds.

Chasing yesterday's bird

I had the choice to go aroun the softball field or back down to the lake where yesterday's sparrow was found. I chose the latter for no particulArly sound reason but making my way back towards the overflow found another group of song sparrows which I spent sone time with. I soon found a juv. White-crowned but that quickly disappeared. While trying to refind, a Lincoln's came out into the open Along the edge of the lakeside vegetation. It looked dusky around the head and I did a double take before checking out the pertinent features, Buffy moustacial, thin break streaking and 'crew cut' look to the head
On the lake the grebe and the merganser remained.
Walking from the dog park to the rusty bridge it was quiet until I chanced across a flock of yellow-rumped warbler (c.10) accompanied by a single golden-crowned kinglet.

Oh I forgot to mention the juv green heron at in inflow pipe entrance