and this one’s rimmed in red!
😉
That bit of early evening sunlight reflecting off this yellow-headed blackbird is what makes me like this otherwise terrible pic; the quality of light in North Dakota was magical and generous. Even the moonlight seemed to fill the prairie pot holes until they popped out like mirrors of the star-filled sky.
Anyway, I digress…
These were my prairie life birds:
Eared Grebe
Western Grebe
American White Pelican
Sharp-Tailed Grouse
Yellow Rail
American Avocet
Black Tern
Western Kingbird
Bank Swallow
Sedge Wren
Clay-colored Sparrow
Nelson’s Sharp-tailed Sparrow
Yellow-headed blackbird
I’m still holding onto most of my North Dakota stories like precious little pebbles in the pocket of my favorite pair of jeans. Every now and again I pull one out and turn it over in my hand and decide if it’s polished enough for telling yet. Most aren’t, but I’m beginning to remember and still enjoy just sitting with those memories.
Each of the birds on this very modest list has a story of its own; its own sweet memory. I’d forgotten, I think, how nice new life birds can be. A couple of them aren’t technically life birds for me, but I’m a little quirky about claiming life birds and would just as soon wait to check a bird off that list as not be able to really remember seeing it for the first time. These are all firmly set in my memory of a wonderful couple days spent wandering in the middle of nowhere.
#16 in my 38 by 39.
The saying goes that when you really need people, a few seem to turn up. If you have much experience with community groups, you’ll know that it’s the same few people that always turn up… the same few dedicated faces at every board meeting, every event, chairing the empty committee spots, volunteering for yet another project.
My local Audubon chapter has been struggling for volunteers for as long as I can remember. I think someone assigned me a job at the very first program I attended, but I was eager to get involved and to learn about local conservation issues and participate. That doesn’t seem to be the case with a lot of birders. Our chapter has a healthy enough membership, but getting those people who come to the programs and field trips to step up and get involved is just impossible.
A fair number of our membership are excellent and active birders, but their interest ends in the field, it seems. The rest of our membership are people I would never recognize with a pair of binoculars around their necks; in fact I think they come to our monthly programs just for the free snacks afterwards!
I wonder where the young people are, the beginning birders, the people with fresh ideas and energy. Our club needs them. Our volunteers are a dedicated group, with diverse skills and interests, and many have held the same committee chair position for years on end, or served as president multiple times. What happens, though, is that we get tired and frustrated with the lack of support from our membership and then we end up losing those volunteers who care the most about the organization and who do the most work to support it, simply because they’ve burned out.
It happened to me almost; after volunteering to be hospitality chair (to rescue another woman who had been stuck with the job for years) – I found myself doing it and became annoyed after a couple years at being the first to arrive and the last to leave the meetings, cleaning up alone, listening to members complain about the way I made the coffee, etc – pfft! Come early and fix the coffee yourself if you don’t like it! Donate a box of cookies for once! I quit volunteering and became another of those anonymous faces in the crowd at the monthly meetings for a few years. Then my guilt got the better of me and this year I’m the chair for two committees.
Again I’m taking over for two dedicated people who simply got tired of the lack of cooperation from the membership. Funny is that one of my jobs is planning and scheduling the club’s field trips for the year… anyone that knows me at all knows what a poor planner I am. So far, the rest of the board has taken my *fly by the seat of my pants* approach with a good bit of humor; we’ll see how long that will last. My point is that I’m clearly not the best person for the job, but I’m the one willing to do it and if it weren’t me, it would be one of the other people who’s already wearing three different hats, you know?
So… if there’s a local bird or nature club that you care about, please find a way to become involved. Introduce yourself to one of those familiar faces you see at every meeting; maybe the geeky guy who always sets up the slide projector and makes sure the microphone is working, or the lawyer-type lady who brings neat things for the raffle each month, or even the blessed soul who toils away in the kitchen to get the coffee just right for you. Offer to help, maybe. Just once, even. Ask what you can do. We need you.
I drove south to Cape May on Saturday, in the middle of *Hurricane* Hanna, and so missed a lot of the signs of the season I know to look for along the coast. I missed the beach plums ripening close to shore and the wash of russet-gold that comes to the sea meadows that border the parkway in South Jersey. Mostly I concentrated on the raindrops and the taillights of the cars in front of me so as to not run off the road and into a tree. God I hate driving in the pouring rain!
September is always beautiful in Cape May, regardless of the weather. By Saturday evening, Hanna was little more than a gray curtain over the ocean, but there was some hope of good birds brought in by the storm. Unusual birds never materialized beyond a Magnificent Frigatebird that we missed (of course!) I did hear some interesting call notes overhead one night on the beach though. If you ever have reason to be on the beach at night in the late summer under a clear sky – take it!
All the usuals for late summer were there and things are happening just as they should; I guess to most, September belongs to Autumn, but for me it’s still Summer and the best part at that. It’s hardly ever too hot and the nights have a faint chill that hints of what’s to come. The skimmers were barking and dancing over the cove by the jetty while we played in the surf as the sun set down along the bay…
We crossed paths with a box turtle looking for shade from the hot sun at Hidden Valley among the balled up fists of Queen Anne’s Lace going to seed and the ripening greenish-purple berries of Porcelain-berry Vine. We didn’t spot any of the hunting hawks that I know to look for there, but instead found vultures pitching and banking among the few clouds overhead.
I can’t go to Cape May and not remember other times there; other September days with hordes of migrating monarchs and dragonflies, clouds of sanderlings flying in a lane close to the edge of the ocean like distant twinkling lights as they turn and flash their underparts in the sun, wheels of hawks rising together over the Point and then setting their wings and streaming south.
The sanderlings this weekend were doing their thing on scurrying feet, up and back with every shining wave, alone or in twos. The egrets congregated in big groups at Bunker Pond in front of the hawkwatch, entertainment for the lack of hawks, despite a merlin spotted feeding on a swarm of dragonflies. Of course there’s no picture of that; the best memories somehow manage to always escape my camera.
Cat lovers cover your ears.
I used to like cats. Then I decided that I liked birds and other wildlife better.
What really happened is that I had a beautiful fat black cat that got sick and broke my heart when I was a kid.
So I swore off cats for good. I like other people’s cats well enough, but I really don’t like my neighbor’s cats that are allowed free run of the neighborhood.
Some of my favorite people have *mostly* indoor cats that are *let out* each day to do whatever it is that their dear owners think is so necessary to a domestic cat’s nature.
Kill birds and torture small furry innocent woodland creatures and HAVE KITTENS UNDER MY SHED!
Why are these kittens my problem? I don’t own a cat.
Have I mentioned the free catch and release (to the SPCA) program we run here?
😉
This was tonight’s catch. 4 adorable and hissy-scared little killers. We’re trying to catch their mother, but she ran the DH out of the backyard one too many times and he finally said uncle. What a protective mother!
I don’t know the answer. I don’t understand why this behavior is tolerated from cat owners. Jeez… I can’t even walk my dog on a leash in the local park except for under the cover of darkness for fear that I’ll be ticketed by the local police. My town is very serious about protecting our parks from dogs. I once had the police follow me home after walking my dog in the cul-de-sac that leads to the park.
Cats get a free pass. Why is that?
NJ Audubon has collaborated with the American Bird Conservancy in an effort to educate cat lovers to be more responsible cat owners. Cats Indoors has lots of great info, but I’m not so sure that anyone will be so easily convinced as me.
Circumstances beyond my control (a husband with a mind of his own) have necessitated the start of a new list: birds seen by boat. Not just any boat, either… THE boat… our boat, apparently.
(Men and their toys!)
😉
An osprey scared from its nest just when I thought I finally had the perfect photo opportunity – a nest at eye level, just outside of the river channel. I love all the found stuff osprey include in their nests. Also interesting is the rope ladder up to the nest… I guess somebody bands these guys.
I have no idea what this bird is. I’d thought it was a tern, but its back is reddish. Help anyone?
A tree full of great egrets, waiting out the tide, I guess. I know these pictures are awful, but I was too scared of having to swim to shore to bring the good lens. (The boat is something of a fixer-upper.)
Storm clouds full of gulls… who cares what kind; they’re just gulls!
😉
Conversation following inaugural boat tour of the river:
“So… are you happy with it?”
“Um… I didn’t want a boat.”
“Yeah, but… are you happy with it?”
“Um… it’s a boat.”
(I might get to see some good birds though.)
😉
Just thought I’d point out an addition to the blogroll for those of you that might like to follow bird news from Cape May: View from the Cape.
I wish I’d found the site sooner. Perusing the archives I found this recent tribute by Pete Dunne to a birding buddy from CMBO. Just unbelievably sad… George was a great guy and a friend to all.
Guesses anyone?
(Silly me thinking these bad pics won’t come in handy!)
Most of the weekend was spent within view of the ocean, on various benches along the boardwalk. That’s a pretty nice way to watch the world go by, I think.
Anyway… I noticed that some of the Laughing Gulls seem to be pulling back their summertime black hoods in favor of a more undistinguished (or is it indistinguishable?) look. The terns still look the same, though I could imagine this one suddenly remembering an appointment someplace to the south.
There were small flocks of peeps feeding back of the jetty and flying, fragile bits of silver and pale russet, among the beachgoers. Telling one from another is impossible, because even among the normally *easy peeps* like sanderling and semi-palms, no two in a dozen look the same at this time of year. They’re all a scraggly mix of winter gray and spring red. Shorebirds just escape my abilities!
There is always something to savor at Cape May… any day, in any weather, at any season… something is always making its way through the skies overhead.
The time that holds the greatest interest for me is from late August until the middle of November: the fabled fall migration period. The variety of habitats: ocean and bay, salt marsh, freshwater ponds, dark swamps, woodlands and upland fields all attract a diverse array of migrants… hordes of butterflies and dragonflies, hawks and falcons, shorebirds, songbirds, bats, seabirds, owls – you name it!
Conveniently, the New Jersey Audubon Society throws out the welcome mat at one of the best times to experience migration at Cape May for its Autumn Weekend this year on October 24, 25, and 26.
Some of The Flock are getting restless and making preliminary plans to attend. Susan and KatDoc are driving from Ohio (and will hopefully avoid a stop in Camden), Lynne, I think, will cash in the ticket she bought last year and fly all the way from Minnesota (Yay!).
Other Flock members are saving their pennies for New River in April, but maybe they can be convinced otherwise. Mary, Delia, Susan, Nina, Ruthie, Jayne (can that be? Really, you’re gonna come?) – why not join us in Cape May, too? That farmhouse in W. Va. is gonna be pretty crowded and loud I think!
I’m also thinking maybe we should harass Larry into making the trip or Dave (hey – Alaska’s not that far and we could all get to meet Ghost!). Maybe Bobbie could join us for lunch and what about Heather in Pa.? The more the merrier!
😉
I’ll sneak away there at least once before October – for the Monarchs that breeze past the lighthouse or the falcons that scream down along the dunes. I just can’t resist… there’s something in the air.
