Birding

Best Bird of the Weekend (First of January 2017)

January 2, 2017 by Corey 3 Comments

The year 2016 is done and gone and 2017 beckons us onward, bright and new and shiny, hopefully full of birds. As birders we love the turn of the calendar as it allows us to start a new year list and take stock of the previous year’s sightings, twitches, dips, and photos. Here’s hoping everyone has a wonderful 2017, full of amazing birds and experiences.

I had a bunch of birds to choose from this weekend as I spent the afternoon hiking upstate with the family and all morning on Sunday building up my new year list. But of all the species I saw I most appreciated the various ducks and other waterbirds that were “cutting the corner” at Breezy Point in the predawn light, overflying the beach and the jetty as they made their way from the open ocean to the protected waters of New York Harbor. And of all of them making that move I think that the Red-throated Loons were the most entertaining, so I chose one of them as my Best Bird of the Weekend. See one for yourself at the top of this post.

As for Mike, well…at the beginning of a new year, every bird commands attention. Why else would Mike dub European Starling, in all of its obnoxious and glossy splendor, his Best Bird of the Weekend. Eeewww!

How about you? What was your best bird of the weekend? Tell us in the comments section about the rarest, loveliest, or most fascinating bird you observed. If you’ve blogged about your weekend experience, you should include a link in your comment.

Written by Corey
Corey is a New Yorker who lived most of his life in upstate New York but has lived in Queens since 2008. He's only been birding since 2005 but has garnered a respectable life list by birding whenever he wasn't working as a union representative or spending time with his family. He lives in Forest Hills with Daisy and Desmond Shearwater. His bird photographs have appeared on the Today Show, in Birding, Living Bird Magazine, Bird Watcher's Digest, and many other fine publications. He is also the author of the American Birding Association Field Guide to the Birds of New York.