Greene County trip planning

Friends of ours have a summer place in Prattsville NY (in Greene County in the Catskills), and they've kindly offered to take us up there for a couple of days soon.

We've been there twice before, once in mid-October and once in early September. It's a great place with a beautiful piece of land, given over to meadows and bordered by woods. The birding was a little sparse, although the first time we were greeted by a Ruffed Grouse as we pulled into the driveway

and there were a number of Bluebirds in the area.

In the September trip, we heard wild Turkeys--disturbed in the night by some predator, they went screaming past the house like the Wild Hunt--and also heard Great Horned Owls.

Since it will be nesting season this time, I'm wondering what else might be around. This is the western part of the county, out near the Delaware County line and fairly near Bearpen Mountain, though I don't think we'll make it over there. I wonder if there might be Pileated Woodpeckers in the area. Maybe some nesting warblers. All the eBird hotspots are in the east part of the county near the Hudson River, so that's no help.

Singers and nesters

My highlight for today was this female Cardinal singing at the Upper Lobe. I had no idea they ever sang.

Sorry for the unsteady (and unedited) video--I don't do video much, and I'm still working it out.

The Ruby-Throated Hummingbird is still on her nest near Oak Bridge. There were singing Robins all over the Ramble.

At Turtle Pond, which last year was a very active nesting area, there seems to be very little activity. The biggest drop-off is the Red-Winged Blackbirds--there were at least six nests last year, belonging to four males. This year, I hear a single RWBB in the area, and I'm not entirely sure he has a mate. I think this is because the Conservancy removed the tall phragmities grasses and replace them with slower-growing grasses; I think the blackbirds did not like the lack of cover at the time they were deciding where to nest.

Other missing nesters are more predictable. Downy Woodpecker--I watched a nesting pair all last June--won't re-use a nest hole, and Turtle Pond doesn't have many suitable trees. The Kingbirds I think are nesting on the other side of Belvedere Castle this year. I am surprised that I don't know where any oriole nests are; they're around somewhere, but probably also in the Ramble.

Grackles are nesting in numbers, of course. Just try to stop 'em.

I heard what I believe is that Common Yellowthroat with the odd pizza pizza song. I think of him as Little Caesar.

No owls for me!

So I'm really bad at spotting owls. I spent several hours in Inwood Hill Park again yesterday, and again failed to see the Eastern Screech Owls being reported there. There's supposed to be five or six of them, sometimes roosting on the same branch. They're pretty small owls, but that shouldn't be so hard to spot.

But not for me. It wasn't a total loss, though. I didn't see any new birds, but when I went down the hill to the shore of Spuyten Duyvil Creek, the tide was out, and a Great Egret was browsing the bleak mudflat.

As I relaxed on a bench listening to the Song Sparrows, a female Red-Winged Blackbird popped up for a minute.

And in one tree I heard first a Warbling Vireo, and then an Orchard Oriole singing a quite jazzily syncopated song.

If I ever figure out how to edit video from my camera, I might post a little clip of this guy. Outstanding singer, well worth the trip.

Late warbler, angry birds

The weekend was a bit slow. We did see a late Black-and-White Warbler on Saturday.

B&W Warbler taking the leisurely approach to life

Nesting season continues. For Robins, nesting season started in April and will continue to about September. You may be familiar with the sight of two apparently peaceful Robins (males, seemingly) suddenly both flying up 8 or 10 feet and coming straight back down in a flurry. It's a bit too fast for my eye to follow, so I've been trying to get photos. I do have a nice shot of the scramble right after landing.

boys will be boys

Quite unfriendly. They don't seem to hurt each other, since they typically go a few rounds and then return to foraging calmly side-by-side.

---

On the rumors-of-birds front, I'm still seeing reports of Screech Owls uptown, so I will try Inwood again soon.

Common Loon

Anders Peltomaa reported a Common Loon in full breeding plumage at the Reservoir Friday morning, a very nice bird for Central Park. I eventually made my way there at 5 PM. The loon was down near the south pumphouse, and I got off a couple of frames before it made one of those patented long loon dives and emerged about halfway to the north side. That left a bunch of Cormorants and a single Great Egret fishing just outside the pumphouse.

I noticed after a while that the Loon was slowly drifting toward the east side, so I hustled up there...I was still 30 yards away when the bird, about 20 feet offshore, dove again and simply disappeared.

Loons do that. There's a reason they're called the "Great Northern Diver" in Britain. The last Common Loon I saw, in February at Randall's Island, did not come up within a half mile of where I saw it dive.

Around the north side of the Reservoir, a single Merganser--I think a female or immature Hooded--made shallow dives and then slept fitfully, to far off for a good photo. Whatever the species, that bird is quite late for this area.

I was rewarded for completing the circuit when, as I rounded the southwest corner, I spotted the Loon again, between the fountain and the shore. It dove again as I ran to the area, but this time it came up only a dozen yards farther away, and I caught up and got the photo above. That's my best view ever of this very handsome bird.

Start of summer birding

Spring migration is over, and attention turns to unusual nesters and the occasional accidental sighting.

I went up to Inwood Hill Park Tuesday, following a report of Eastern Screech Owls (maybe transients, maybe taking up residence). I didn't find them, but I eventually made my way to Hudson River promenade, where there were quite a number of Mockingbirds and Song Sparrows.

Song Sparrow, singing

In between looking at them, I scanned the water--there was a goose family swimming across the river--and the Jersey cliffs. I caught sight of a tiny bright flash of white, and in my binoculars I saw a bird with a white head and tail, and an all-dark body and very long, all-dark wings. It could be nothing else but a Bald Eagle--as Peterson says, the bird is "all field mark".

I watched the eagle climb a thermal, high and higher, then glide north on flat wings and disappear in the haze. There were a couple of nesting pairs on the Palisades last year, perhaps this was one of them. It would certainly be very late for a migrating eagle.

No photo, alas. I could not get my camera to focus on such a small moving target so far away. I think it would have been about 20 pixels long even if I had snapped it.

---

The next day, I went out to Governor's Island to look at the nesting colony of Common Terns. I really don'r recommend going there on a weekday. Many of the areas listed as being open to the public are in fact blocked by construction, including a lot of the shore. Yankee Pier, where the most accessible nesting colony is, is a ferry terminal on weekends, but during the week it is padlocked lest someone steal it. You can only get a distant view of the terns from the shore.

red-billed agents of the Common Tern

I did get a nice sculptural shot of some nearby cormorants resting.

sculptural seabirds

There were a lot of crows around. Some were silent, some cawed like American Crows, but several gave the distinctive nasal double call of the Fish Crow. (How do you tell a Fish Crow? Ask a crow it's an American Crow, and a Fish Crow will say "Nunh-unh! Nunh-unh!")

---

The Ruby-Throated Hummingbird is still on her nest at the Upper Lobe of Central Park Lake. The nest is now festooned with lichen, just like it says in the books.

hummingbird home decoration

The surrounding area is festooned with birders and photographers.

People are saying this is the first recorded hummingbird nest in Central Park. I don't know how it works with hummingbirds--if she has already laid the eggs, or if she is ready to lay but can hold them until the nest is ready, or if she's actually still in need of a male. In that last case, this may not turn out well--it's kind of late for hummingbirds to come through.

---

I'm finding it as hard to write about identifying Empidonax flycatchers as it is ti identify them in the first place, so that post may be a while. For now, let me just count up: I had Acadian, Yellow-Bellied, and Alder flycatchers (in addition to Least), which got me to 164 species. The Bald Eagle, Common Tern, and Fish Crow make it 167 in the county. Last year, I got my 167th species in November (and was at 145 on this date), so it continues to be a busy year.

Nesting season

The flow of migrants has pretty much dried up, and the resident nesting birds are dominating Central Park. The first broods of Robins fledged a couple of weeks back, and many nests are still active. Starlings, Grackles, and House Sparrows are tending their first crops of fledglings as well. Cardinals are nesting all over, and so are various woodpeckers. A number of Warbling Vireos and at least two Red-Eyed Vireos are singing in and near the Ramble, so presumably are nesting, as are Eastern Kingbirds at the Upper Lobe at least.

And then there's this:

A Ruby-Throated Hummingbird, on a nest near the Upper Lobe. They don't usually nest in Central Park. I'm trying to fid out if that's ever happened before, in fact.

That nest is about the size of an espresso cup. It's made largely of spiderwebs and a bit of plant material. Usually there's some lichen stuck on the outside--I'm not sure this one is finished yet.

The next few weeks will be interesting.