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| An early start put us at Spanish River Park about thirty minutes before sunrise in order to take advantage of some free parking. A pair of foxes greeted us as we got familiar with the park while waiting for enough light to bird. Once that light came we found 12 species of warblers with the highlights being Yellow-breasted Chat, Orange-crowned, and Magnolia. Most of our time was spent talking to Brian Hope and Linda McCandless, but a Ruby-throated Hummingbird decided to drop in on the conversation a few times. Our next stop was Hugh Taylor Birch, where after finding a Blue-headed Vireo and Yellow-rumped Warbler we decided the best part about going to HTB was getting to leave the park. The BK lounge was a much better stop than HTB on our way back to the interstate.   We don't think so The rest of the day was kind of a blur since it was so long ago, but we looked for White-winged Parakeet in Little Hati, checked out a few spots in Key Largo for our Monroe County big day, and wound up at Larry's house late in the afternoon. Phil was pleased with his first lifer of the day when a Shiny came into the feeder, but we also enjoyed watching the Bronzed Cowbird display as well as learning how to identify female cowbirds. The night was spent in Flamingo. | ||
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| I met up with Phil Chaon of Ohio this afternoon, and we went out to get him some life birds. We easily found three of the last Smooth-billed Anis in Florida on Old Griffin Road near the Ft. Lauderdale Airport. After enjoying these birds we hit the beach at John U Lloyd State Park where we watched Northern Gannets and Magnificent Frigatebirds fly out over the ocean before returning home to rest up for our trip. | ||
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| After a cold night up in Tallahassee (I did not realize it would get down into the lower 40s when I decided not to use a blanket to sleep with), Dave Simpson and I hit Alligator Point to chase the second Spotted Towhee in Florida. Arriving before the sun hit the horizon, we looked around for five minutes, decided it was too dark and cold, and went to the beach for a little bit to scan for ducks and loons. After seeing a grand total of 0 loons, we got back into the warmth of the car to go look for the towhee again. There was lots of activity including a Rufous Hummingbird, multiple Parulas, White-throated Sparrows, and a flyover Common Loon, but it was not until about 8:15 that I got a quick glimpse of the Towhee. Dave came running over, but I had already lost the bird. Several hours and multiple short sightings later, the towhee finally came out for all seven chasers to get excellent views. On the way home we made some stops so Dave could add county birds to his county lists. Most stops already had Parulas finding territories, while only a few had Yellow-throated Warbler and Broad-winged Hawk. At lake in Jefferson County had my year Northern Rough-winged Swallow (282). The best bird of our county listing stops was a young Whooping Crane at a place called Koon Lake. | ||
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| Well, I am not the most serious birder in the state. I waited a day so I could go to school before chasing Florida's Loggerhead Kingbird in Key West. I left Alex Harper's house at 3 in the morning so we could get some birding in before getting the Lo' head. A bad accident on US 1 brought our momentum to a stop at 4:30 and after a quick game of soccer, we decided Card Sound road would get us into the keys. So we took the 45 minute detour and didn't reach No Name Key until 7. Great-crested Flycatchers, Prairie Warblers, and Northern Cardinals greeted us unlike a previously reported Brown-crested Flycatcher. We heard a call twice that sounded right, but we are still unsure as to what it was. It wasn't until thirty minutes after the bird was first seen that we arrived at the Kingbird spot. A reported Brown-crested Flycatcher sidetracked us, but like usual we missed that one. The K'bird finally showed up, but most had already seen it. I forgot my scope, so I had to take pictures through my Spacemaster which is always in my car.  Some of the later people and photographers  I also got my year Black-whiskered Vireo in the parking lot, as well as other migrants such as Black and white Warbler, Indigo Bunting, and Peregrine Falcon. The shorebirding throughout the rest of the keys was the best I have ever seen it with numerous Wilson's and Semipalmated Plovers, Short-billed Dowitchers as well as lesser numbers of Red Knots, Semipalmated, Western and Least Sandpipers, and a Piping Plover. Our only Semipalmated Sandpiper was associating with two other peeps that we could not figure out. Throughout the day Turkey Vultures soared overhead in large kettles, various warblers and hummingbirds made their presence known in neighborhoods, and Cormorants kept trying to look like Neotropicals. Nothing spectacular was seen later in the day, but overall four new year birds (Loggerhead Kingbird, Black-whiskered Vireo, Hooded Warbler, and Barn Swallow) took my year list up to 279. | ||
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| Here is a text message Alex sent me about ditching friends to chase the Loggerhead Kingbird on Saturday. I also ditched friends to chase this bird: The hell with her. Sleep over at my house and lets get a kingbird. I just love what vagrants can do to people! | ||
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| At a tennis match yesterday in Titusville I heard a House Finch singing. I am not sure if this species has bred in the county yet as it is only the second one I have ever had in Brevard. I also heard several Tufted Titmice that I do not get the chance to see very often this far south. | ||
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Other than getting a Cassin's Kingbird in Zellwood, my only other biridng weekend of birding was down in South Florida with Alex Harper. My first two chases were successful, ticking Ani and White-winged Parakeet off the list. The parakeet was while driving, and I did not want to turn aroud so it was heard only.  Later in the day we drove down to Key Largo and birded around for a while turning up Yell0w-throated Vireo, White-crowned Pigeon, Northern Parula, and Ruby-throated Hummingibrd. We hit Lucky Hammock and Reserach Road after dark and finallly ticked Lesser N'hawk after three whips and two chucks. I was glad to get this out of the way. The next day we messed around even more finding Cape May Warbler, Summer Tanager, Magnolia Warbler, Lincoln's Sparrow, Short-tailed and Swainson's Hawks, and a bunch of other stuff. Bell's Vireo remained the bitch bird of the year by failing to appear when I arrived to an area where it had been seen fifteen minutes earlier.  Alex looking for hawks Me on top of a hill looking for shorebirds Alex on top of the hillAfter this we went to Larry's to look for the Shiny Cowbirds that we could not see on previous trips. The fence posed a big challenge, but a tree in the front yard gave us a good view at the feeders where there were at least 4 Shiny Cowbirds. Year bird 275.  Peeking at a Shiny Cowbird Happy about my 14th Icterid of the year | ||
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The first weekend of the year I found myself very tired and hungry, but ticking off good year birds. Western Meadowlark and Brewer's Blackbird were added to the list in the western part of the Western Panhandle. I also saw Winter Wren, Golden-crowned Kinglet, and Dark-eyed Junco later in the day and did not stop for food until eight which was a very bad idea. The next day I was in St. Augustine before sunrise looking at a Common Eider that was seen the previous day.  Photo by Diane Reed I left that bird before the sun even hit the horizon and sped down to Hal Scott Preserve to look for Florida's second Hammond's Flycatcher. A mile and a half jog and thirty minutes of waiting were enough to see the little guy who failed to appear the day before. After five minutes the bird left, but I was satisfied and just wanted to get home. | ||
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| I chased the Western Spindalis today, and after a few hours I thought I
saw something look good fly by, but I could not get a good look at it
while it was perched. We lost the bird after that. Luckily,
later in the day the bird was found and I got good looks at it in the
north end of the cemetery. A stop for Ani produced no Anis (0 for 2 this year) The Eared Grebe was fairly easy to see at Green Cay. Year list is at 246, and 250 well within reach by the end of the month. | ||
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| I went up to Volusia County to add Glaucous Gull and Purple Sandpiper to my year list. The Glaucous came in to the county landfill around 7:40, but stayed for less than ten minutes. There were many other gulls in the area, but no more white-winged types. Since I was doing very well on time (I had planned to spend most of the morning looking for this bird), I headed over to Ponce Inlet where I met up with Michael Brothers to look for Purple Sandpiper. The tide was very high, and waves were crashing over the jetty, but after about 15 minutes of talking and scanning the ocean a fat shorebird flew out of the rocks and into the sun. Luckily it turned back so I could make sure it was one of the Purples that has been hanging out here for a while. A scan of the beach revealed a few gulls, but more importantly I got a phone call saying the Spindalis is still being seen in Broward County. I will be there tomorrow. | ||
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| I met up with Andy and a group of birders at St. Marks. Only one Rusty Blackbird was seen at the bridges, and after a while we moved to Stoney Bayou. A walk all the way around the back one (2?) gave me my 240th bird of the year. Was it Ross's Goose? I wish. Maybe Black Duck? Ha. 240 was Northern Pintail. Made it worth the 5 mile walk. A quick stop at Mounds 3 revealed a few Gadwalls that really wanted to be Black Ducks. I left to make it to the Brant in time to think about birding Merritt Island before the sun went down. In Jefferson County I picked up another U turn after Andy called to tell me about White-faced Ibis. I rushed back only to find that the ibis were hiding. I waited for the flock of waders to make their way out into the open, as I looked at more Gadwall hoping for a Black Duck. One bird looked good for a while before it flew. The ibis also flew, and I thought I could see red in one of the birds eyes. When one bird (I think there were four in the flock) kept moving out it would be a Glossy. The next one that moved out was another Glossy. That left the two birds I saw fly in to be the White-faced. One came out quickly and looked like it might have had red in the eye. Finally, after what seemed like forever, I got a good look at a red eye on a young White-faced Ibis. I left the refuge after saying bye to Andy with slim hopes of getting 2 more year birds to pull me up to 243. Lots of thoughts came to mind on the drive down to the Brant spot, like how much more exciting it was birding with others, but also how nice it was not to have to stop for food even though my stomach was complaining. Fort Island was packed with people. The Brant was nowhere to be seen in the swimming area, so I went onto a pier to scan the gulf. I found one sandbar with a large group of White Pelicans, but could not make anything out other than Pelicans and a few Cormorants. I did find another sandbar that was a little closer. It was a lot easier to make out the shapes of the birds on this island, and I was able to find the brant resting on the sand bar sticking his long neck and short bill up giving it a different shape than any other bird on the sandbar. I was too cheap to take the Turnpike and Bee Line home, so I took SR 44 and SR 46 to Titusville to eat at Dixie Crossroads before making it home. The year list stood at 242 | ||
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I woke up really early to make it out to Garcon Point in Santa Rosa County. The habitat looks good for Yellow Rail. Le Conte's Sparrow is easy. I did not know it would require a long walk before Le Conte's started popping up with the Swamp Sparrows and Sedge Wrens. I saw a total of 5 Le Contes by walking about 1/2 mile off the trail into the marsh, but did not see too much else of any interest. A quick stop by the spots in Ft. Walton Beach revealed that most of the areas were closed. I decided that I should start heading east. So I did. A few stops on the Choctawhatchee River produced a few new self found birds like Fox Sparrow and Creeper, as well as my year Winter Wren. I also got a year woodpecker in the area. Just a Hairy, not Ivory-billed. Since it was getting a little late, I rushed up towards the Alabama boarder on route 2 to find some good looking fields. My first two fields sucked. One yard on county road 164, or something like that, had a bunch of Chipping Sparrows, and 2 blackbirds in a field. I scoped them out hoping they could possibly be Brewers, but both were Brown-headed Cowbirds (something Alex was very happy to see on my last trip). When I came to a stop sign on CR 164 I decided to turn to an open area. 'Yep, this is the area I wanted to get to' is what I thought when I came to the large dirt field where I found Horned Lark, a big rarity in the state. It did not take long to find a Lark in the field which only contained 2 other species. I quickly called Dave to let him know, and he said he would be there in about 40 minutes. I also called Bob Wallace, who I knew needed the bird to let him know he should be up there the next day. After watching them for a little bit, I decided to get better directions from route 2. Once I got back to the spot with the correct mileage, Dave pulled up and easily located his state bird. I decided to leave to make it to Lake Seminole to pick up my year Canvasback. I looked for a good Pipit field I found on my last trip on River Road, but could not find it. If anyone is up in the area, you might want to drive down to Three Rivers and look for a good field on the east side of River Road a good ways north of Lake Seminole. I was almost to the dam when a group of geese caught my eye. A quick scan revealed a lack of Cackling and Snows and anything that was not Canada. Once on top of the dam it took a while to find a Canvasback, and the only other surprises were a larger number of Buffleheads and Common Loons, as well as four White Pelicans. I could not find an open Dairy Queen, so I settled for a Burger King as my only meal of the day. The year list was at 239 and I was within reach of the 243 that Dave got in January on his big year.  Horned Lark photo by Bob Wallace | ||
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| Tall Timbers seemed like a good spot to be at dawn on my first day, so I found myself up there a little before any sunlight was visible. I waited on top of the hill for the sun listening to the sparrows and other pineland birds wake up. I walked down to the bird house, saw Wood Ducks, heard two species of Nuthatch wake up, got a little bored and started heading back. On my way back I remembered that Andy had told me about Fox Sparrows in this one area. I walked up and down the lines cut out, and saw several sparrows, including my year Henslow's, but no Foxes. The day was getting better when I found a large flock of Chipping Sparrows which was very impressive. Every step I took forced about 10-20 more to fly up. I also ran into a large flock that consisted of Pine Warblers, White-breasted Nuthatches, American Goldfinches, Kinglets, a Yellow-throated Warbler, and a Pine Siskin. I was still missing most of my targets, but Red-breasted Nuthatch was the only one that I would probably not find anywhere else. I easily picked up Brown-creeper at Indian Mounds near Lake Jackson as well as hearing a White-breasted Nuthatch. I failed to find the Canada Goose flock on Buck Lake Road that has a Snow in it, but I was able to pick up my year Fox Sparrow after about an hour of searching at the Greenway, as well as another Henslow's. I called Paul and the Tropical Audubon group to let them know, and said we would keep in touch for rarities found over the weekend. A quick lunch at Burger King held me over for the rest of daylight, and I made my way to Alligator Point afterwards. Once I got to the points I wanted to check out the KOA, since it is the best place to scan from on Alligator Point. There was one area that looked like the KOA, but I kept on driving. After a while I found myself at the end of the road, realizing that I had missed the KOA I made a U turn and ran into Jill Gaetzi, who had also missed the campground which is no longer there. I pulled off the road where I had gotten good looks at Red-throated Loon before, and easily found another one off the rocks a short ways. While birding around in the woods some I ran into a guy somewhat interested in birds who gave me directions on how to get to that point between Alligator and Bald Points. This area looked good, and I was glad I got directions, because when I reached the last waterfront house on Gulf Shores Blvd I found a White-winged Scoter off the point. On my way over, there was a Western Kingbird on the wires on Mardi Gras Way. When I made it to Bald Point State Park the bay seemed fairly empty of ducks that were not Buffleheads, Goldeneyes, or Mergansers. It took a few scans to find a raft of about 15 scoters take flight, and it appeared there were a few surfs mixed in. A little while later I was rewarded with a flyby group of one Black and one Surf Scoter fairly close in. On my way back to the car I ran into Michael Hartley scoping the birds in the bay. We found a raft of about 100 scoters, but could not pick out anything other than Blacks. While scanning a Western Kingbird flew in. I left for Bottoms road to add Virginia Rail to my year list. At the little parking area on the left hand side of the road I saw what appeared to be a group of birders, so I made a stop. Upon scanning the water I found an Oldsquaw (or Long-tailed Duck as some like/or don't like to call it). The group of people were birders from Northern Georgia, but did not have a scope out at the moment, so they had not seen the duck yet. After showing them the duck, they showed me a few Sharp-tailed Sparrows to the west of the parking area. Since the sun was going down we decided to hit the end of the road to try for Virginia Rail. I missed the one the other group heard, but I heard one later when I went back to show Michael the Oldsquaw. I spent the night near Blountstown at Travis MacClendon's place. The year list was at 234 I think, something like that. Since I was running very low on energy, I had probably the best slice of pizza I have ever had. | ||
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| Ticked Black-bellied Whistling-duck on my way up to Talahassee (Year bird 217) | ||
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Today was rather uneventful. The
Brown-crested Flycatcher didn't want to come out for us.
Brown-headed Nuthatch at least called, but would not come out to give
the Ohio crowd their life looks. We ran into a large group of
birders at Lucky, but left to look for Shiny Cowbird. We missed
them at the Winery (although we might have seen some and misIDed them
as Brown-headed) and also at Larry's house. Ruby-throated
Hummingbird and Western Kingbird were interesting sights at Larry's
place. When we got back to Lucky we
were informed that we missed Bell's Vireo, Swainson's Hawk, and
Clay-colored Sparrow as well as the fact that Larry still needed the
kingbird for his yard. Of the birds the group had, only
Clay-colored Sparrow was relocated in the field opposite the hammock.
We headed home since it was getting late and found Bronzed Cowbirds on
Red Road for my 210th bird of the year. The only birding done
after we dropped Alex off the only birding done was another quick
failed stop for anis and I headed home. I went to Viera the next day to
pick up a few easy year birds, as well as one of three Cinnamon Teals
that have been hanging around.  Trying for Brown-crested Flycatacher  Peeking for Shiny Cowbird before we realized there was a gate   Practicing safe birding | ||
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I
woke up the next morning with the year list at 181 and 200 well within
reach. We missed Lesser Nighthawk on all 6 of our drives out
Research, but did hear a Common Nighthawk flying around out there and
my year Wilson's Snipe. King Rail and Whip-poor-will all made it
on my year list before I heard a Green Heron as year bird 186. On
our way to Lucky Hammock we found a Chuck-wills-widow which was a life
bird for Phil. We saw several more Whips, and Alex felt the need
to yell at every single one of them. The night birds were all
fairly easy and Screech was the only owl we were missing (or so we
thought) and we had three nightjars. I pointed out some good King
Rail habitat near the bridges on the way out of the park and we soon
found a rail on the road. It appeared to have been stunned, so we
had a little fun with it until it began to move around some and it
appeared perfectly healthy.   Alex with King RailLucky Hammock had a lot of birds, most of which I probably forgot. Least Flycatcher, Grasshopper Sparrow, and Yellow-breasted Chat made appearances at the hammock, but the annex held more birds. We birded the annex very heavily and turned up Wilson's Warbler, Lincoln's Sparrow, Black-throated Blue Warbler, Magnolia Warbler, Sandhill Crane, Great Crested Flycatchers as many others. I never got my hands on a Bell's Vireo, which got me a very upset. I quickly pulled out a kinfe and threatened to stab the vireo, and Alex found a stick to beat it with.  Where was the Bell's Vireo?A quick run through Flynn's produced nothing and the White-tailed Kite was still in its area along with Cave Swallows. The good morning at Lucky made me think we could hit the high 120s for the day. Between Anhinga Trail, Gumbo Limbo, Research Road, and Mahogany Hammock I think we had one interesting bird which was a Louisiana Waterthrush on Anhinga Trail. Year Bird 199. We also gave an Anhinga a close look before the rain started, and sent most of the tourists, as well as us, running to the parking lot.  Me getting good looks at AnhingaWhen we arrived at Snake Bight the day list stood at 94. As we walked down the trail we wondered whether I would hit 200 year birds before we hit 100 for the day. I don't know how many times I said 'I want 200 NOW!!!' down the trail, but it sure helped me get over the boredom of the birdless trail. If you have never walked Snake Bight before, it is very boring. Once we got out to the end the day birds piled up, but no year birds were seen. The area has gotten really overgrown and very few birds were visible. The area where I have seen flamingo in the past is only visible by standing on the hand rail of the boardwalk. While up there I could see a large flock of Pelicans, but the only pink birds seen while out there were flyover spoonbills. A calling Clapper Rail was rather unusual, but I got to see one here in June of 2005. The trip back produced 3 sapsuckers and a large cottonmouth, but it was still very boring. We took a few pictures and just acted crazy to pass the time we spent on this 2 mile death march.  This might be the only way to see Flamingo at Snake Bight  Ahh... the boredom of Snake Bight  Ooops Before a stop for food I was still complaining about getting to 200 year birds so we made a quick stop for easy Scissor-tailed Flycatchers. Couldn't find them. The Vermilion Flycatcher in the campground seemed like an easy and cool 200th year bird. Couldn't find it. Frustrated we drove back to the marina to get some food. While the three others sat down to eat their meals, I grabbed a few candy bars and got directions from the ranger on where the flycatchers were and went over there. A Western Kingbird finally broke the 3 or 4 hour yearbirdless streak I was on, and was shortly followed by a Scissor-tailed Flycatcher. When the rest of the lazy crew arrived, they said they needed to eat, two Orchard Orioles and an Indigo Bunting had joined the birdlife of the area. Scissor-tail was a lifer for the Ohio kids, and after the birds went away we made the short drive to the new Eco Pond that I had never seen before. The habitat at Eco Pond was really interesting and had more shorebirds for the day list and Stilt Sandpiper for the year list. A walk around the pond gave us new ducks including the Greater Scaup that has been hanging out in the pond for a while. The day list was growing, but we did not know by how much. Due to our earlier miss, we called Paul Bithorn to get better directions to the Vermilion Flycatcher, and Alex easily spotted it at the northwest corner of the T loop of the campground. We walked the West Lake Trail with our Hatian flag, but did not see any new birds, except a Short-tailed Hawk. Alex was also able to spot a few more Short-tailed Hawks on the road. Without anything really left to do we played soccer until dusk before we could look for Lesser Nighthawk. We later found out that a nearby trail held Dickcissel and White-crowned Sparrow.  For when the birding is slowWhile walking out to the C Loop where I got my first Lessers we were informed that spotlights are not allowed in the park. The ranger then proceeded to turn his golf cart around into a bush which gave us a good laugh. We played a few games as it got almost too dark to see, and we concluded that we couldn't find nighthawks. On the way back to the car a bird flew up out of the marsh and I shouted out owl. At first I thought I had made a mistake because it flew like a harrier. After getting everybody on the bird we determined that it was a female Short-eared Owl. We ended the day with 150 species. The pictures from today, yesterday, and tomorrow were mostly taken by Ethan Kistler | ||
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I
woke up shortly after sunrise and was easily shown a Muscovy while
walking a block to a tree that held my year Spot-breasted Oriole.
After spending some time packing up the car we hit the Ft. Lauderdale
Airport in hopes of anis. The park off Griffin held no anis in a
very good search. We tried the cell phone waiting area, where I
parked and waited as Ethan and Phil searched without success.
They could have easily been perched on the fence line east of the train
tracks, but a train kept us from scanning that. After we
concluded that the anis were not going to cooperate we headed towards
Alex Harper's house. After picking up Alex we went to Kendall to
pick up my 4th straight exotic year bird. It only took 10 minutes
to find 2 Bulbuls on the northern most road in the eastern section of
the neighborhood across from the hospital. Alex
fell asleep, or at least his mind did as he guided me to wrong turn
after wrong turn to the Kendall Tamiami Airport. Eastern
Meadowlark was an easy year tick, but Burrowing Owls eluded us here
just like they would later in the day at the Homestead Airport.
Cutler Wetlands was a little more familiar to Alex, so we easily made
it there to find a few dowitchers, yellowlegs, and teal.
 Birding Cutler WetlandsOn the way there Alex did pick out a Short-tailed Hawk flying over the road. Impressive at first, but after the first 10 or so finding Short-tails was just getting too easy. We checked a few small flocks of gulls for Franklin's without success. The only other spot left to check for this tough year bird was Black Point Park. The half mile hike got a little boring, until we ran into some gulls at the end. The first five or so scans revealed nothing other than the usual three and one Lesser Black-backed way out in the water. Several more scans and a few jokes with a Laughing Gull skull later I was able to pick out a little Franklin's Gull in the flock. I was happy with this year bird, and we found a few warblers on the trip back to the car.  The Laughing Gull head that gave us about 10 minutes of entertainmentI think we hit Denny's after this where we picked a table where we could watch the mynas and watch another Short-tailed Hawk fly over. Homestead didn't hold much, except for some white bird with black shoulders kiting in a field near 312th Street and 217th Ave. We concluded that it was a White-tailed Kite, and my thoughts of swallows were proven wrong when a flock of about 20 Cave Swallows flew over. The rest of the day was spent setting up the tent and playing frisbee. While setting the tent up, I found out that I had forgotten the poles at home. Instead of sleeping outside with the bugs we decided to use our tripods to hold the tent up, and hung a Hatian flag, which Alex had for no reason, around the tent for good luck.  Who needs poles for a tent? At night we found Barn, Burrowing and Screech Owls on Research Road, Least Bittern in Taylor Slough, and Barred Owl near Pay-hay-okee. We also saw a few snakes including a cottonmouth.  Cottonmouth in the Everglades Phil and Alex getting Cottonmouth off the road Alex and me clapping for King Rail in the Everglades | ||
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| Even though I will be back up soon, I wanted to knock a few easy year
birds out of the way. My first was Rusy Blackbird. I needed
to be at the bridges at St. Marks NWR at 7:30. Since I had some
free time, I started down by the lighthouse where I saw plenty of
Buffleheads, Common Goldeneyes, Greater Scaup, Common Loons, Horned
Grebes etc. Marsh birds like Seaside, Saltmarsh Sharp-tailed, and
Song Sparrow, Marsh Wren, and Clapper Rail woke up before it was time
to hit the blackbirds. Unlike my previous trips, the robin
numbers were not as high, but I was still able to find a small flock of
5 or 6 Rusty Blackbirds before heading back out to do some more
birding. American Avocet, Gadwall, and several other easy ticks
were found before I headed back up into town for feeder birds. On my way up a quick stop by Springhill produced American Pipit, Bonaparte's Gull, Bufflehead, both Yellowlegs, Long-billed Dowitcher, Least Sandpiper, and a few other species. I made a quick stop by the Calliope Hummingbird feeder to get my state bird. It stayed at the feeder for a while before flying off. I never saw it again in the 20 minutes I was there. The yard also held Baltimore Oriole, House Finch, and Ruby-throated Hummingbird. My last stop in the Tallahasee area was for Western Tanager. When I first pulled up to the yard a Rufous Hummingbird made its presence well known. In the hour or so I waited for the Western to come in I added Black-chinned Hummingbird, White-breasted Nuthatch, Bullock's Oriole, and Brown Thrasher to my year list. My long wait finally payed off when the Tanager came near the feeder with a group of four orioles. Even though it never came to the feeder, I was satisfied with the looks of this bird which I have seen numerous times out west. I left Tallahassee around 1 in the afternoon, and eight hours later I was down in Ft. Lauderdale ready to bird with several kids my own age for the next few days. My year list stood at 164 with lots of easy holes that would be filled in the next three days. | ||
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| The West Pasco CBC was rather boring. I sat on Green Key all
morning. The birding was slow. I saw over 50 Common Loons,
35 Horned Grebes, and about 200 Red-breasted Mergansers. There
were lots of herons and egrets around, but very few shorebirds.
The landbirding didn't completely suck for winter. I saw a
Prairie Warbler and two Orange-crowns. After lunch a group of us
took a boat trip that added new species to the count list, and a few to
my year list like Black Scoter and Bufflehead. After leaving the count I made a quick stop for Budgie and Yellow-headed Blackbird. I easily found the exotic species, but could not find the vagrant that would have been nice for the year list. My year list was at 126 when I made it to Tallahassee to spend the night. | ||
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| I started the year off in my grandmothers neighborhood
with Great-horned Owl and Killdeer as the first birds of the year. As I approached De Soto I ticked some more year birds like Wood Stork, Wilson's Plover, Semiplamated Plover, Dunlin, Short-billed Dowitcher and other shorebirds, along with three Spoonbills. I think this started me off with 12 species for the competition, but all the night birds would be seen later. As the sun was rising, I walked out to the Boreal Chickadee spot (named while sleep deprived on a previous big day) the rain began. Once I got out to the end I saw only a few shorebirds and thought to myself what the lowest total the event ever had was. Despite the rain I was able to find most of the shorebirds like Snowy, Piping and Wilson's Plover, and Red Knot as well as a Common Loon which can be difficult at De Soto. The list was not impressive, but I trudged on in the rain. I went around the northern end of the park for most of the morning looking for songbirds, especially Blue-headed Vireo. The rain kept fogging up the binoculars, but no birds I looked at appeared to be this key species. While trying to find one these little guys both kinglets, Hermit Thrush, Black-and-White Warbler all appeared, and I finally got my eyes on a Blue-headed near North Beach. The beach itself had very low numbers of birds, with my day Reddish Egret, one Oystercatcher, and a surprise Harrier I took what I could get and packed the car up to head out of the park. I decided to skip the Mulberry area and make a quick stop at East Beach Turnaround before heading out of the park for more birds. The turnaround held the usual Horned Grebe as well as a Lesser Black-backed Gull. A five minute stop at the duck pond outside the park gave me all the species I needed, Redhead, Ring-necked, Ruddy, Wigeon, and Green-winged Teal, and a drive around town gave me many new species as well as many more loons. The most unusual bird outside the park was a Chipping Sparrow that I found on the 31st and saw again on the day of the competition. Time was running out as I went back into the park. A quick stop for a scouted out Sapsucker at North Beach failed. A late decision turn to the Gulf Pier gave me a Gannet after about 10 minutes of looking. While out on the jetty I thought to myself that this was the only pier I could stand on in Florida and have Loons outnumber Gannets. Since I had about 50 minutes left I figured I could spend a few minutes at the Mulberry area since I did not hit it hard in scouting and something new could show up. As I was just leaving the parking lot a group of Palm Warblers flew up with one bird with white outer tail feathers. Year Bird, but what? A pipit? Vesper Sparrow? Junco never hit my mind, but that's what it was and I got all the birders in the area over to see it. After a lengthy stay at the lunch at East Beach Woods I worked my way up to Hudson and picked up my year Frigatebird and Black Vulture before meeting up with Dave Simpson before the West Pasco Count the next morning. Unlike most birding adventures, we got to sleep before 9, and my year list stood at 110. | ||
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