Gone Fishin'

There's a saying - It's called "Fishing", not "Catching" because most of the time you go fishing you don't actually catch anything. Then, there are those rare days when it seems like every time you put your line in, you catch a fish so it really could be called catching. 

That's how it was on Saturday. Harvey and I went out early to see what we could find. Fish were being caught right and left. Fish were being caught so often that it was hard to keep up with who was catching what. It started with this juvenile Black-crowned Nightheron catching an eel in shallow water. 

Junior with an eel

After some time, Mom or Dad got into the action too and caught another eel. That'll show Junior. 

Adult with eel

All told, I watched Junior slurp down 4 eels in a matter of 15 minutes.

Then the Egrets got in on the action. This guy grabbed a fish but got his beak stuck. He struggled with it for quite some time before gulping it down. 

Spearfishing

Somehow, he managed to decapitate the fish in the process. Yuck.

Headless fish

And then, the real show began. A pair of Skimmers began making passes over the shallow pool. The light was great, the water was like glass. The birds dropped their bill into the water and whooshed by.

Mirror Image

Their bill automatically snaps shut when they feel something in the water.  I guess their neck bends so that they don't crash if they hit something solid. 

Skimmer

The birds would come up with a fish about 50% of the time but other times, they would be fooled into snapping up other things from the pond such as a feather. 

Skimmer with feather

When a fish was caught, it had no chance. The Skimmer's bill is like a vice. 

Skimmer

You can see how narrow the bill is when you look head on.  

Skimmer with fish

The bird would fly around with the fish until it was in the right position to be swallowed - while the bird was still flying.  You can see the fish being tossed mid-air in this photo. 

Fish toss

After about 30 minutes, the Skimmers were full and flew off. Harvey and I headed to the State Park to see if we could find the Avocet that had been reported over the past few days. We found the bird and what do you think it was doing. You guessed it, fishing. Here he is with his tiny fish prize. 

American Avocet 

Overall, the birds had a great day of fishing in Cape May. I kind of wished that I was fishing too. 

Heatwave

We are in the midst of a heatwave here in Philly. The temperature has been above 90 degrees for over a week. I finally got out to the Villas beach today to look for banded shorebirds. High tide is best because the birds are close. There were hundreds of birds and hundreds of little black biting flies out today. The flies chased us off the beach quick. Undaunted, I returned with long pants and long sleeved shirt. The effort paid off with 2 banded birds. Good ol' L5V with his buddies:

Here is a map of the places that L5V has been seen. Originally banded at Fortescue beach in May 2013. Reported a few times from Reeds beach and twice at Villas (by me).

A newcomer to the beach - 13H. This bird was banded this past May exactly where I found him today. He was also reported at Fortescue beach in NJ on June 10th. Between June 10th and July 29th, this little bird flew to the arctic, found a mate, raised babies and flew back to Villas.

Sanderling 13H

Hoping for more between now and November.

Annual Mountain Trip

Well, our yearly hike didn't happen but we went to Potter County for July 4th with Connie's family. We had fun and got to visit with some of our favorite birds. Like this Blackburnian Warbler signing in the pine tree just outside the bathroom window. This photo was shot from the roof of the cabin. 

Blackburnian Warbler

And this Chestnut-sided Warbler hopping around the pine trees up the hill.

Chestnut-sided Warbler

And our friend "Maggie", the Magnolia Warbler showing off his necklace up in the slate quarry.

Magnolia Warbler

And of course, the gang of Cedar Waxwings was hanging out. This poor guy has a few ticks hanging off of his black mask. 

Cedar Waxwing

We saw a few Turkeys in the distance at the Elk viewing area - but alas, no Elks were around that day.

Turkeys in the distance

We did see some deer in our field. 2 bucks and a doe.

Bucks and Doe

Of course, this is the time of year for baby birds. I found this one crying and hopping around behind on of the nearby camps. I'm still unsure of what species but I think it is Indigo Bunting. 

Baby Bird

Messing around behind the nearby camps almost got us in trouble when Peanut poked around under a bush at Frank's camp and found a Rattlesnake. Fortunately, the snake rattled and Peanut came away unscathed. We didn't hang around to see the snake. The rattle was enough for us. 

Snakes aren't the only dangerous animals at the camp. Baby birds are also dangerous. Connie found out the hard way when a few baby Ruffed Grouse ran across the logging road in front of our motorcycles. I slowed down. Connie stopped suddenly and got a separated shoulder as a souvenir. OUCH. She's a tough broad though. She rode that motorcycle 10 miles back to camp one-handed. 

Inaugural Philadelphia Breeding Bird Census

A few of the members of the DVOC are real ornithologists (the "O" in DVOC) while the rest of us are just birders. A few of the O's think they are smarter than the rest of us because they are PhDs or studying to be PhDs but they can't fool me. They think that they can get us to do their research work by making it a fun and noble thing to do. Take the Philadelphia Breeding Bird Census for example. Matt and Tony are promoting this as something that is good for the club and good for Philadelphia but I know better. What they are really doing is getting the club members to do all of the leg work for one of their college term papers. We all signed up, so I guess they are smarter than us :-)

What is a Breeding Bird Census? It is basically a way to see how many birds use your area for breeding purposes. Each area is split into a areas. Birders are assigned to an area and asked to thoroughly record all birds seen or heard on any one day in June. June is selected because migration is over so the birds in an area are presumed to be breeding there. I was assigned Lemon Hill which you have read about here many times.

Barbara and Sammy joined me and Peanut at 6:30 AM. Barbara took the notes and helped count the birds. I mainly listened and looked and counted. We did a big loop around Lemon Hill and then covered the area of the dog field and woods along the railroad tracks. I dropped a pin to show Di and Barbara's house (in the tan area).

We did better than I expected with 34 species including a few surprises like this Ovenbird that we heard singing "teacher, teacher, teacher". I tracked it down and snapped this terrible photo for proof that it was there. I've never heard of an Ovenbird breeding in Philadelphia.

Ovenbird

The other fun birds were Cedar Waxwings and one Indigo Bunting singing along Kelly Drive. The Baltimore Orioles love this area. We saw 8 birds and found one nest. They make a hanging basket.

Baltimore Oriole nest

I'll bet there are other birds around but we only had 2 hours to cover the area and do the scut work for the budding Ornithologists.  Just goes to show you that they are pretty smart.

Back on Land Sort Of

We went to Alligator River NWR near our hotel in North Carolina before the long drive home. Much to our surprise, the place was lousy with Prothonotary Warblers. And other critters too. Like this huge butterfly.

Giant Swallowtail

The whole park is a giant swampy, wet mess with roads running through it which is the reason that the Prothonotaries love the place. Turtles love it too. I don't know what species this is but he crossed the road pretty fast for a turtle.

Turtle

This is Spotted Turtle - for obvious reasons. 

Spotted Turtle

This poor gal just wanted to lay her eggs next to the road but she couldn't get any privacy. Snapping Turtles are scary but she put up with the paparazzi with style.

Snapping Turtle

Speaking of scary, Marty and I saw this snake on the side of the road. Marty noticed that it had vertical pupils. 

Water Moccasin

We met up with the other guys in our group and showed them the photo. Um, that's a Water Moccasin. Um, venomous. Um, glad I didn't know that when I was laying on the ground to take this shot. 

Water Moccasin

Marty and I came upon this bear. I drove closer while Marty hung out the car window to take a photo because we thought the bear would disappear into the swamp but this bear wouldn't leave the road even when we drove closer. But when he was ready to leave, man did he move fast! Not sure my Fiat could have out run him if he came our way. 

Black Bear

More Offshore Antics

In the last post, you read about and watched video about Offshore Bottlenose Dolphins. In this post, you will read about and watch video of a different kind of "dolphin". Until recently, North Carolina fisherman have been catching dolphin for many years but not the kind that you read about in the last post. To them, the fish is called dolphin but we know it as Mahi Mahi. The name changed so that people would know that the fisherman weren't killing the real Dolphins.

Guess who else was catching Mahi Mahi? Yup. The birders. Here we are with our catch. The captain and mate put out some lines each day. After filming the true dolphins, I headed to the back of the boat to let others get a view from the bow. All of a sudden, the rod bent and I yelled the classic "FISH ON!"  Paul grabbed the rod and reeled in the first fish.

Then another rod bent. The mate handed it to me and I reeled one in. I think the mate was impressed that I knew what I was doing.

Me and Paul caught nice sized fish - 15-20 pounders but Mike and Mary caught whoppers. Here is video of the mate "gaffing" the biggest Mahi which Mary reeled in.

The mate filleted and bagged up the fish for us. We grilled some at the hotel for everyone and still had some to bring home. Its in the freezer now.

After the excitement, we were back to birding. The last day was really rough. The weather was less than cooperative. Tropical storm Bonnie was building off the coast. Wind and waves made the ride very rough every day. Many participants got seasick. Even the birds were trying to ride out the storm. This Bridled Tern tried to hang on to a paint can in the middle of the ocean.

Paint Can bird

She finally gave up and took to the wind.

Bridled Tern

This Pomarine Jaeger was happy to see the suet chunk in the waves but has a hell of a time trying to keep possession. Check out how big that wave is.

Pomarine Jaeger - big wave

 The suet chunk was also pretty big. The bird worked hard to try to swallow it as the waves rolled on.

One of the birds that is a target for pelagic trips is the Skua. These are really big birds. You can see them from a long way because they fly high over the horizon and are dark against the blue sky. When spotted, we yell "SKY BIRD!"

Sky Bird!

They look like giant seagulls. Once they find the suet, they lower the landing gear and gulp every piece that they can get to.

South Polar Skua

But even these big birds are bullied by the Jaegers. Here is a Pom trying to get the Skua to drop the grub.

Pomarine Jaeger chasing South Polar Skua

Everyone was happy to see the birds and even happier to see the dock at the end of the day. Enough rocking and rolling for the weekend.

Outer, Outer, Outer Banks

Once again, I answered the call of the sea and spent the Memorial Day weekend off the coast of North Carolina watching birds - and dolphins and whales. I have been hoping to go offshore in North Carolina for a long time. The reason is that there are different birds seen there including Petrels. Four species can be seen however, we only saw 2 (Black-capped and Herald) but it was worth the trip. 

Some of the sights included flocks of Wilson's Storm Petrels running across the water's surface picking up suet chunks that we use to draw them close to the boat. 

And these Shearwaters. Great Shearwater here. 

Great Shearwater

 It rained off and on. Here is the Great Shearwater paddling around in a sun shower.

Great Shearwater in the rain

We saw 2 Sooty Shearwaters too. They are less common and really pretty birds. This one found a piece of suet to eat.

Sooty Shearwater

 He flew past the boat a few times showing off his handsomeness.

Sooty Shearwater

Cory's Shearwaters were the most numerous. 2 of them seen here with a Wilson's Storm Petrel. 

Cory's Shearwaters

Birds weren't the only highlight. We also had great views of Pilot Whales. You can identify them by the big round head. 

Pilot Whale

You can see how close they were to the boat in this photo.

Marty and Pilot Whales

A special interaction with Offshore Bottlenose Dolphins when a few of them played in front of the boat. Here is a shot of Marty and Mike on the front of the boat. Luckily, the waves were calmer at this point. 

Marty, Mike and Dolphin

Here is a video of them. I hung over the front of the boat and filmed this scene with my iPhone. Notice the bright blue water - this is the Gulf Stream. You can also see a Remora sucker fish hanging on the Dolphin.

 More stories next which also include non avian animals. 

Magee Marsh Residents

The boardwalk at Magee Marsh is not only a stop over for migrants but is also the summer home to quite a few birds too. Most notably, the Prothonotary Warbler. A few pairs of these birds nest along the boardwalk. They nest in cavities and always above water. In some areas, people put nest boxes on posts in swampy areas but at Magee, there are natural nest cavities too. Here is a beautiful male preparing a nest for his mate.

Prothonotary Warbler - male

And here is the mate gathering twigs and grass right on the boardwalk. She literally has no fear of the people walking the boardwalk since she is solely focused on getting that nest built.

Female Prothonotary Warbler

Prothonotary warblers are some of the sought after birds because of their beautiful yellow color but they aren't the only yellow birds that call Magee boardwalk home. Yellow Warblers were building their nests too. In fact, there were at least 6 nests along the boardwalk. This one was the most photographable. I stood on the railing to get up high enough to snap a few shots. Here she is with a beak full of fine silk maybe from a spider web.

Yellow Warbler

The next series shows how she moves around the nest getting it formed just right before going off to find more materials.

Yellow Warbler

It's not just warblers, other birds like this Woodcock also build their nests at the park. In fact, the people who mow the lawn at the parking area have to rope off areas where they find the nests. Here is one of the Woodcocks laying low in the bushes just off of the parking lot. Our friend Steve spotted it. I love that fluffy butt!

Woodcock

And there are now 2 active Bald Eagle nests within a few hundred yards of each other in the parking area. I didn't shoot any photos of the nests, but Connie, Peanut and I watched one of the adults fishing for perch just off the beach. Spoiler alert, he didn't get a fish.

Bald Eagle

The other fun thing about Magee Marsh is that we saw people that we know there. Edie and her friends from DVOC, Chris and Gerry, and Harvey's friend Steve too. Off to another destination this week. Hoping to squeeze in some really good bird stuff in between work meetings in Massachusetts.