For those who track avian migration, each new week may bring a fresh arrival or herald a new departure. Of course, birds only represent a sliver of the near-infinite flora and fauna that, collectively, grows, blooms, dies back, and lapses into dormancy over the course of a year. I’m only musing on seasonal changes because one of my many environmental allergies flared up today. The coming of autumn is bittersweet indeed.
I did, however, incur this allergic reaction in the line of duty this weekend, as I checked out a new wetland trail in my area. My first pass, sans binoculars, revealed many migratory songbirds popping around. When I returned Sunday morning with appropriate optics, warblers were nowhere to be seen, but a veritable profusion of sparrow species along with a mess of Marsh Wrens made up for their absence. Corey’s Best Bird of the Weekend was his favorite species, a Green Heron, at the Great Vly in his hometown of Saugerties, New York. Though he has no complaints about seeing his favorite bird he would have liked to have seen more species this weekend.
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.
Best for me was by far the flock of 64 Buff-breasted Sandpipers seen at Chomes, Costa Rica on Saturday. Not only was this was a major country and year tick, but it was also the largest group of this scarce migrant ever recorded in Costa Rica. After paying far too many visits to the airport and sod farms in CR to look for this species, scoping dozens of them was simply surreal. Diego Quesada and I were both just as happy to not have to navigate the pot holes on the road next to the airport any more!
Excellent capture of this Green Heron great work .
My favorite sighting of the weekend was a group of three Merlins perched in close proximity to each other at Sandy Hook.
In the last few days, I have seen a very large number of Royal and Elegant Terns showing up on the Baja. Sunday morning there was a single Least Tern in mix. There is a breeding area south of us, near the East cape, but we rarely see then here on the Sea of Cortez side of the Baja.
Lots of fancy highlights from a quick trip west, but the most eye-catching was probably an osprey high over Nebraska’s Toadstool Park: if that bird was looking for fish, it was some millions of years late.
I wasn’t birding, but on Sunday morning I happened to see a kettle of Red-tailed Hawks hanging out near the Cheltenham Mall on Philadelphia’s northern border. (I wasn’t shopping either … but maybe the hawks were birds-eyeing some bargains?)
@Mike: I feel for you. My hay fever came out of nowhere this week like a tornado and just as quickly subsided.
A kettle, huh? Bet they were waiting to get into Williams-Sonoma.
😉