I’ve often said that people who are more actively observant of the natural world around them are more acutely aware of the seasonal cycle. When you spend most of your free time watching the comings and goings of animals, you can’t help but notice the gradual, steady changes each day brings on our yearly journey around the Sun. This is … Read More
Coastal waterbird notes from southern Belize, Fall 2014
We are spoiled in the United States with many concentrated birding efforts taking place throughout fall and spring migration such as hawkwatches, seawatches, Big Sits, and other surveys which all help to pull in loads of data on bird numbers and distribution, but there are very few endeavors taking place in countries like Belize. Thanks to the Belize Raptor Research Institute, there … Read More
NC PSO Hatteras Pelagic Trip – Part 1
On August 9-13 the Pennsylvania Society for Ornithology had an out-of-state field trip to the Outer Banks in North Carolina. A total of 35 participants ventured down to NC for several days of land birding followed by two days of pelagic trips out of Hatteras, NC. This series of posts will show some of the highlights of this epic trip! … Read More
Conejohela Flats – Black Terns and Stilt Sandpiper
This morning Ian Gardner and I took the short drive down to Conejohela Flats from Hershey. We arrived at 8:20am and kayaked around for 2.5 hours. The weather started off very windy with rough water on the river, and heavy cloud cover. Later in the morning, the wind died down and the sun came out. The water level in the area … Read More
Another awesome day of spring birding!
As day after day and night after night of north winds blew through the Northeast, birds were being held back – unable to smoothly migrate to our area. Needless to say, I am sure many birders in PA were just as excited as I was to hear that starting late this past Friday night, winds would shift to the south … Read More
BESP 8/25/11 – Forster’s Terns, Common Loon, etc
I made a quick run over to Bald Eagle State Park this morning and was rewarded with a few interesting species; two Forster’s Terns (a juvenile and an adult at the swimming beach), a very early Common Loon, two juvenile Semipalmated Sandpipers, and a Least Sandpiper. The Common Loon, which was a 1st summer bird, this is the third record … Read More
More Desert Shorebirding!
This morning, Anna and I went to one of our cuckoo sites near Blythe that hadn’t been visited in a few weeks to see if there was any cuckoo activity there. We arrived at 5:00am and stayed for an hour and forty-five minutes, without hearing anything, so we left to go to Cibola NWR. Here Anna and I were planning … Read More
Toftrees Forster’s Tern
This afternoon I stopped at Toftrees Pond around 5 PM to see if all the rain had brought in anything interesting. As soon as I got there I noticed white birds in the distance which got my hope up as Caspian Terns had been reported yesterday. Looking through my scope I saw that there was a few Bonaparte’s Gulls sitting … Read More