This odd weekend began with the end of March, which didn’t exactly go out like a lamb, and ended with the beginning of April. Only January commences with more fanfare and merriment than April. Did you enjoy any particularly amusing April Fools jokes? We’re especially interested in ones involving birds and nature.
My best birds of this weekend were ones I’ve already admired in recent weeks. The gang of Common Grackles plundering my feeder deserve a nod for their brassy, cacophonous splendor. Also of note were the Long-tailed Ducks on Lake Ontario, holding on when the other cold-waterfowl seem to have fled. Corey’s Best Bird of the Weekend was his first Louisiana Waterthrush of the year. Wood-warblers are back (at least in some parts of New York!)
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.
Black Woodpigeon!! I still can’t stop grinning.
I was happy to spend a rainy hour or so on a trail in Sapsucker Woods with my son. We saw one of the movie-star Great Blue Herons chowing down on minnows, seemingly oblivious to our clicking cameras a few feet away. Then we went inside the visitor center at the Lab and saw, up close and personal via the web cam, these two herons making some baby herons–those poor herons have no privacy! I didn’t really feel like a peeping tom except when the volunteer docent (I hope she wasn’t a professional!) gave a rather obnoxious personified play by-play-of the event! Yikes! But I digress. The best birds my son and I saw while there were a pair of Common Mergansers and two male Hooded Mergansers trying to impress a nearby female. Tomorrow I go back to Texas. This week went by too fast.
A Golden Eagle soaring overhead while I rode my bike through the drizzle.
We had lousy weather all weekend which produced a nice fallout of waterfowl. I’d say the three Red-throated Loons were the best of a pretty impressive bunch.
A pair of Greater White-Fronted Geese at the local duck pond.
Watching Gull-billed Terns forage in the surf at close range. Stoked.
Best bird was a horned lark which was the only bird seen on a two mile stretch of the
Bear River MBR. Strong winds kept most birds grounded.
During a Big Day in Costa Rica, best birds were Ornate Hawk Eagle, Peg-billed Finch, and Barred Parakeet. 18 hummingbird species and 4 motmot species were also good. April Fools jokes came in the form of getting rained out on Poas Volcano and missing “given” species like Inca Dove, and Great Tinamou.
We had a wonderful waterfowl fallout on th Hudson river. Of the many great birds: rednecked grebe. I did blog about this (and other Hudson related info) here: http://www.susanfoxrogers.com/journal/2012/4/2/flow-on.html