…at Jamaica Bay Wildlife Refuge anyway. The famed East Pond, where so many wonderful shorebirds have shown, had issues with its draining system this summer and was well above the level it needed to be at to expose mud for the birds. Yesterday’s eight plus inches of rain (as measured at JFK Airport)* have probably brought this year’s shorebird season at Jamaica Bay to an unfortunate and early end. Where else can we New Yorkers go for good shorebirds? And when do the wood-warblers start moving in numbers again?
*The most rain ever recorded in a single day there by over an inch-and-a-half.
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.
For New Yorker’s (downstate), there’s Cupsogue County Park, Jones Beach West End, Democrat Point (Fire Island), the Sod Fields in Riverhead, Floyd Bennett Field, and a few other spots. Alas, none compare to Jamaica Bay. The warblers are already on their way. The next cold front with northwest winds should produce many landbird migrants.
New Yorkers can go south…like the shorebirds will be soon….and visit Roebuck Bay, Broome, Western Australia. We can guarantee bar-tailed and black godwits, great and red knots, curlew sandpiper, greater and lesser sandpiper, red-necked stint, black-winged stilt, ruddy turnstone, common greenshank, pied and sooty oystercatchers, grey-tailed tattlers, terek sandpipers and possible asian dowitcher and red-necked avocet. Oh….don’t forget the passerines and birds of prey as well. You will probably get 100 species in a day on a tour with the Broome Bird Observatory! You will be a bit dizzy and overwhelmed at the end…..