Birthday Birding

I took the day off from work today so I could just go birding. I decided that since we went to Mt. Auburn Cemetery on both Saturday and Sunday last weekend (and that I'll be doing bird-a-thon this weekend, more on that later) I would take the day to go to Plum Island and see what I could add to my 2008 Plum Island competition list. I arrived at 6am and birded until 3:30 in the afternoon and managed to see 90 species.

I started the day by "rescuing" a Grey Catbird. The bird was in the road and didn't fly away as I passed it. Knowing that something wasn't right, I pulled over and walked back to the bird, not sure if it was even alive. It seemed almost like it was asleep on the pavement. I gently picked it up, and it seemed to wake a bit, and I brought it far enough off the road to keep it out of harms way. Feeling good about hopefully doing some good, I continued on to the island.

The island was pretty active the entire time I was there. One of the highlights of the morning was a Black-billed Cuckoo alongside the road. The photo above is actually from a few years ago, but the bird was in almost the same place as where I digi-scoped this one.

Then there were all the warblers...

Northern Parulas and Magnolia Warblers were among the more common ones...

Wilson's Warbler's were relatively easy to see, although harder to photograph. There were also a few Canada Warblers around. I was lucky to get a few shots off of this guy...

Other warblers seen: Black-throated Blue, Black-throated Green, Black-and-white, Nashville, Yellow, Yellow-rumped, Chestnut-sided, Common Yellowthroat, American Redstarts, Ovenbirds, Northern Waterthrush. 15 total, not too bad. Unfortunately, there were no Cape May, Blackburnian, Bay-breasted or Tenenesse Warblers today on the island.

I also had a lot of sparrows on the island - White-crowned Sparrows got people's attention at a few locations...


And, of course, Towhees were singing everywhere, so I couldn't resist snapping a few pics.

Also, I kept finding Lincoln's Sparrows - this normally shy and retiring sparrow was pretty bold yesterday, at one point coming within 2' of a few people I was chatting with. (they had their backs to the sparrow and it popped out right in front of me)

Seemed like migration was in evidence everywhere, from Rose-breasted Grosbeaks and Scarlet Tanagers singing, to new warblers and sparrows , extending even to shorebirds as the Semi-palmated Plovers, Semi-palmated and Least Sandpipers.

Also, the Woodcock that I saw on the nest a few weeks ago apparently hatched her eggs on Wednesday. I happened to find her with three chicks about 5' from the boardwalk at one point. Unable to get any photos since the underbrush was so thick, but the chick were absolutely adorable. The beaks are not full grown yet obviously, but they did seem a little too big for their little black and yellow fuzzy bodies.

I was going to add more info here about Bird-a-thon, but instead I'm going to do a new and separate post...