Meet Mr. White

Mr. White's first name? Bob. As in Bobwhite. As in quail. Harvey, Barb and I ran into 2 Bobwhites today at The Nature Conservancy's Meadow preserve. These birds are very tame because they are raised from eggs to chicks by various nature agencies and then released into the wild. The idea is that they will be hunted later on (sick, I know). Anyway, these 2 Bobs put on quite a show today. The older guy was calling "bob - WHITE"

Adult Male - Northern Bobwhite

And then the younger guy would call "bob - WHITE"

Young Male - Northern Bobwhite

It ended up as a dual of quail with the old guy calling "anything you can do, I can do better"

Adult Male - Northern Bobwhite

And the young guy responding "I can do everything better than you"

Young Male - Northern Bobwhite

The old guy shouting "No you can't"

Adult Male - Northern Bobwhite

And the young guy shouting "Yes I can"

Young Male - Northern Bobwhite

In the end, the young guy was definitely winning the shouting match and also started chasing the old man around. The old man gave up and found a friend.

Barb's new friend

The young guy posed for more photos. This one with the Cape May lighthouse in the background.

Young Male - Northern Bobwhite

And this one singing while sitting on The Nature Conservancy sign which I sent to my contact at The Nature Conservancy for a laugh.

Young Male - Northern Bobwhite

A fun way to spend the morning before work for sure. After work, I hit the beach in the scorching heat and found a few banded Sanderling.

Varied Week But Not Today

This week:

• Our location was varied - started in Florida, spent the night in Virginia, arrived home in Pennsylvania and spent the day today in New Jersey.
• Our weather was varied - 86 degrees in Florida but only 33 degrees today. 
• Our TV watching was even varied - we watched shows that we never heard of before in Florida like "2 Broke Girls" and "Pitbulls and Perolees" (not kidding), then football and our soap opera at home.

The only thing that wasn't varied was my luck chasing the Varied Thrush that showed up right in the Villas about a month ago and has been seen sporadically ever since. The Varied Thrush is a bird from the north and west. Of course, with everything that is going on at home (Connie's broken ankle etc) I haven't been able to go after the bird until today. And of course, with my luck you know how the chase was going to end up.

I met Harvey at 7:30 AM and headed out to Cox Hall Creek to look for the bird. Harvey has seen the bird a few times and agreed to help me find it today.  The last report of the bird stated that it was in the Holly Woods near a Bluebird box. The report said that the bird was seen hanging out with another rare bird - the Red-headed Woodpecker. We spent 2 hours freezing our hands and feet off looking. We finally found a Red-headed Woodpecker but the Thrush could not be found.

Red-headed Woodpecker

By 9:30 we needed warmth and breakfast. Harvey went home to do chores and I headed back to the park to look again. I started to feel better when I found another Red-headed Woodpecker. Again, no Varied Thrush but to my surprise, I stumbled on 4 Bobwhites scurrying up the path in front of me. I managed to snap a few shots before they scattered into the grass. They are so small and so cute. I noticed that some of the quail have white faces and some have tan/beige faces. Turns out that the birds with white faces are male and the beige faces are females. 2 of each in this covey.

Bobwhites

I re-found one of the male birds huddled under a bush just off the path.

Bobwhite

Still no Thrush so I went to Wawa for a Diet Coke and much needed bathroom break. Back to the park for third try. The wind was really howling all day. So much so that even this Merlin was sitting in the woods instead of on top of a snag like he usually does. Merlins are falcons and should be used to the wind, but today was too much for this guy. He really liked watching Peanut running around below him. Good thing Merlins eat birds and not mammals.

Merlin

I'll cut to the chase - no Thrush. A few other birders were looking for the bird throughout the day without luck either. One guy dipped for the 7th time today. Another missed the bird for the 5th time. I don't feel that bad about not seeing this elusive bird. I hope it hangs around so that I can try to vary my luck.

Working Hard at Tuckerton

This week, I have been working with Tuckerton Seaport Museum to set up a new cash register system for their gift shop. Tuckerton Seaport is a cute place in Tuckerton - north of Atlantic City on Route 9 - that shows visitors the back bay lifestyle from years past and today.  They have displays in the museum and also a village set up of old houses and storefronts which is pretty cool.  Out back, they have a dock and various boats that baymen use for clamming and duck hunting (yes, duck hunting).   They also have a chicken coup and 2 goats in a pen to show how people would have kept their own livestock for eggs, milk and meat. The gift shop is terrific too with lots of duck decoys and other nautical items to purchase.

This year, the Seaport was asking to help raise Bobwhites to repopulate some areas of NJ with the bird.  They had over 100 eggs which hatched and now they have the Bobwhites in a "flight cage" out back.  Here is a photo of some of the birds:

Bobwhite fledglings

The guy that I am working with to set up the cash registers had to go feed the Bobwhite on Friday and of course, I said that I would help.  We both went into the pen.  While I was snapping photos with my iPhone, Nick went to refill the water dishes.  I was just happy to keep shooting photo and video like this:

Bobwhite in the shelter

Little did I realize that the back door was open while I was filming - look again - and the little birds were escaping one by one in single file like school kids during recess!  Aahhhh!  I yelled for Nick but I couldn't get close to the door without scaring the rest of the birds out, so I just stood there watching them go outside one by one until Nick ran over and closed the door.

Next thing I know, the 2 of us are trying to herd the Bobwhites back into the pen where they obviously didn't want to be.  Picture me waiving 2 pirate shirts - yes pirate shirts - at these little birds while Nick used a fishing net to catch them one by one.  Hysterical!  Meanwhile, other visitors are staring at us and other staff are trying to explain the situation by saying "this never happened before"  and stuff like that.  I think we got them all back into the pen.  If not, keep your ears open for the sound of  "Bob - white" next time you are near Atlantic City.