Category Archives: Birds

Birds, Snapshots, Travels with the flock, Wanderings

Images: Barnegat Light

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Some more pics that might’ve been included in yesterday’s post…

Beth and her friend Kathy traveled all the way from Pa. and had HAD ENOUGH by the time we met in the parking lot at midday. While the weather was beautiful… usually I think of Barnegat Light as the coldest place on earth… the brisk wind had brought out the apples on sweet Beth’s cheeks.

🙂

This would, I think, make a nice quiz photo for those, like me, who are terror-stricken by shorebirds. At least in wintertime, the possibilities are somewhat limited.

Sleepy dunlin (I think… though I was at first convinced they were purple sandpipers), an orange-legged ruddy turnstone, and a sweet spotty-flanked black-belly plover.

(Take all those ID’s with a grain of salt, of course.)

I love how tame shorebirds can be in winter and am amazed with how they find comfort together on these wind-swept jetties.

Harlequins… what sweet little sea ducks!

They weren’t close in to the lighthouse this time, like they usually are…

Instead they were feeding way out at the end of the jetty, with a happy group of photographers closeby.

(I was a wimp and walked along the sand, instead of on those treacherous rocks.)

Oldsquaw (long-tailed ducks) are a favorite… for their pink-tipped bills and their calls… nothing says winter to me like that sound echoing in the wind.

The day was ended near Manahawkin with hopes for short-eared owls hunting like butterflies over the marsh at dusk.

There were none, but that matters little, really. For all the frigid sunsets I’ve lingered in to spot one with no success… the couple times I have seen them in the low-slanted light of a winter afternoon serve my memory well enough that the hope of them keeps me coming back to wait, just in case.

Birds, Snapshots, Travels with the flock, Wanderings, Whatever

Moments: Barnegat Light

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Once past the terror of the jetty rocks, a rush of wind and an expanse of space… and ducks.

Birders caught in a quandry about the identity of the long-tailed (or are they pin-tailed?) ducks paddling and diving along the inlet at Old Barney’s feet.

(A good enough reason for me to continue calling them oldsquaw… politically incorrect or no…)

The oddly painted costume of the harlequin duck is distinct and well worth the hours long drive to see them.

Random teeterings and dawdlings of dunlin, turnstone and purple sandpiper.

Tears that come at the memory of another visit here, a lifetime ago. I turn around confounded by the wall of wind… heedless of how fast and far I’ve come.

I try to imagine this place in summer, as most would know it… waves glitter a thousand small suns, the long rhythm of the surf, a herring gull’s call like a rusty pulley, the clatter and crunch of periwinkles, scallops and skate egg casings, the sight of a black skimmer slitting the seam between two worlds.

– – – – – – – – – – –

See any good birds yourself this weekend?

😉

Oh… and I ran into Beth out ogling the harlequins! Small world…

Birds, Snapshots, Wanderings, Whatever

How I spent my blog vacation

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trying to stay warm

giggling into pillows

treasuring the magic of snow and ice

buying the world’s most ridiculous bikini

reminiscing with shrinky-dinks and easy-bake ovens

waving back at colorful fish
sliding down snowy roads in my converse sneakers
feeling a little blue
spoiling other people’s dogs

trying out the big bed

witnessing the sun decorate the sky at dawn and dusk
grasping for words

(triple letter and double word scores)

searching for a cell signal in the mountains

counting crows

watching quietly as children opened gifts

puzzling over cryptic sparrows and wishing for a better lens

meeting friends and family

losing myself in diamond dust and the enormity of the night sky

scandalizing a couple sweet little girls

(nothing too serious… don’t worry!)

scoring an awesome set of horseshoes

celebrating the new year twice

(once with sparklers and banging pots and the next with kisses and hugs)

making wishes on a falling star

beating everyone at pool

soaking up the welcome heat of a fire

seeing someone i love look ridiculously happy

Birds, I like to make lists, Travels with the flock, Wanderings

Year in review: birds

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2009 was a good year for birds: I added twelve new species to my life list, give or take one or two that I’m probably making up or remembering wrong.

😉

I don’t believe that increasing one’s life list has anything much to do with skill; in fact, I’ve found that over the years as my skills have improved, I’ve whittled my list down by quite a few birds that were questionable in my memory. Did I really see that Baird’s Sandpiper or was I just part of a group that did? Would I know it when I saw it again?

Most certainly not.

So I don’t count the Goshawk that flew over our van in the Adirondacks years ago or half of the gulls I could. I’ve seen them, yeah, but I recognize now that I still don’t know them. I was probably a little too generous with myself as a beginner and my life list reflected that.

As it stands, the number hovers a few over 300, which is respectable, I think, considering that I hadn’t traveled much to see birds until this past year. Adding new life birds at this point is about money and travel and getting up the courage to do a pelagic trip. Considering how close I am to the ocean, it’s almost shameful that I don’t know shorebirds well or have many seabirds. Gulls are still beyond me and that’s still a point of pride that I’m not prepared to surrender, yet.

😉

My first life bird of 2009 was close to home; a sweet Orange-Crowned Warbler that I saw with a sweet friend at Sandy Hook in January.

April’s trip with The Flock to the New River Birding and Nature Festival netted me three warblers: Swainson’s, Cerulean and Yellow-Throated. I most wanted Cerulean on that trip and was glad to get it, though the light was horrible and rainy and I still hope to see one whose color matches the sky like they say it does.

Late June found me, on a whim, in Michigan for Kirtland’s Warbler. Most would consider this a once-in-a-lifetime bird and I was lucky enough to stand among a small group of them singing and feeding young on a summer day.

Wow.

October at the Colonial Coast Birding Festival brought many wonders and six new birds.

I spent a couple days with crazy dream birds, like this Roseate Spoonbill, flying over my head while I wondered how anyone could possibly concentrate on anything else!

Huge pink birds with ridiculously-shaped bills… just crazy.

Mind you, there was a Spoonbill here in NJ at about the same time, but nothing could’ve compared to the sight of groups of them, mixed with Wood Storks and White Ibis floating over in the unbearable heat.

The Brown Pelicans on that trip nearly drove me to distraction, too. And fits of uncontrollable laughter.

😉

There was also a less-than-satisfying look at a Loggerhead Shrike and what I remember to be a Common Moorhen.

Probably I’m making that last one up, though I do somehow remember a purplish bird that reminded me of a chicken.

Probably I shouldn’t count that one yet, right?

The last life bird of the year was sort of a nemesis bird for me: a Golden Eagle. There’d been a couple speck sightings of them through the years, mostly at the hawkwatch at Cape May, but nothing I ever felt really comfortable counting. This one, flying over the road in late October I’ll count for now, until I spot one out west somewhere, perched close enough that I can see the wash of gold across its shoulders.

So… what birds did you add to your life list last year? Which are you hoping to add in 2010?

Birds, Wanderings

Eagles at Conowingo

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I DID NOT TAKE THIS PHOTO!
(pretend to be surprised)
A couple times MevetS walked away
left me to *guard* his camera
let me click the shutter

maybe feel like *one of them*
the people with proper camera equipment
gathered there like paparazzi
(this is only a portion of their number)
I like crooked horizons, btw
so there!
Distorted like the sight of tens of eagles
(closer to hundreds, almost)
soaring over abandoned car parts
and bits of garbage washed ashore
at the foot of a dam
fishing among fishermen
and stray cats
scavenging for prey
looking for life to take
and unequivocally overlooking us
to their honor

– – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – –

I mean to make some point, but don’t have the patience with myself tonight to actually get there.

😉

I’m pretty convinced the Conowingo Dam in Maryland is THE place to go on the East Coast to see bald eagles in winter.

It’s spectacular!  Go there!

(bring your long lens, though)

I’ve never seen so many eagles at one time, in so many plumages… juvenile eagles are gorgeous!

The setting doesn’t befit them, but still it manages to be memorable and goosebump-making.

I’ll remember the people there with me and the sound of their cameras (hundreds of shutters clicking at once like the sound I imagine on the red carpet at a movie premiere) and feeling very, very lucky to have the chance to witness such a thing.

Go!

Birds, Crazy things i do to amuse myself, Snapshots, Wanderings

2/100

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This is Otis… he’s a photographer from Virginia. We met today at the Conowingo Dam in Maryland where we were both photographing the bald eagles that congregate there in the winter.

Truth be told, with my little lens, I was mostly photographing the other people that were photographing the eagles…

Talk about camera envy!

I hesitate to call anyone I met today a stranger… there’s a certain camaraderie that exists naturally among birders and others who enjoy the outdoors. I do know, however, that many of us prefer to remain behind the lens. Otis was an exception to that and I was glad for his smile (and to know that much of his set-up, intimidating as it looks, is homemade and affordable.)

More about the eagles in another post.

This photo is #2 in my 100 strangers project. Find out more about the project and see pictures taken by other photographers at Flickr 100 Strangers or www.100Strangers.com