2019 was easily the fullest, most dramatic year of my life for birding. In contrast, 2020 has by necessity been a much more subdued affair. Birding close to home has nevertheless been unexpectedly rewarding, with no shortage of unexpected surprises spotted from my fire escape and at nearby Astoria Park. As the end of the school year drew nearer, the … Read More
Apartment Birding and Fire Escapism
When I first moved into my Astoria apartment in early December, I immediately began keeping a “yard list” of birds seen around my new home. My expectations for the potential of this urbanized neighborhood weren’t particularly high, but I reasoned that watching for birds of note outside my window would be a fun way to pass the time between proper … Read More
October Big Day 2019
Who doesn’t love a Big Day? Any excuse to get out and count birds in the name of science is a worthwhile cause in my book. eBird has been orchestrating Global Big Day events each May since 2015, an international effort to record as many of the world’s species as possible within a 24 hour period. Last fall, the Cornell-based … Read More
Winter Warblers
Originally posted Dec 2013. By December, most warbler species have made it to Central and/or South America where they will spend the rest of the Northern Hemisphere’s winter and then return back North to their breeding grounds. I say most warblers because some species like Yellow-rumped Warblers and Orange-crowned Warblers can survive cold temperatures and actually over-winter successfully in parts … Read More
Ode to Butterbutts – Cape May Autumn Birding Festival
The most abundant landbird species in Cape May during the Autumn Birding Festival was, of course, the Yellow-rumped Warbler. There were thousands. The morning flight counters tallied thousands flying back into Cape May on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday mornings. And that’s in addition to the thousands already in Cape May each day that didn’t pass it off the night before, … Read More
Monday Morning Blues
My friend Mark Mizak found a kayak that he wanted to buy online, but it was in New Jersey. Mark is heading south to Florida for the rest of the winter before heading back to Montana to work as a wildlands fire-fighter. He offered to take Josh Lefever and I along to get his new boat on a day-trip to … Read More
Cape May Pt SP Snowbirds
After wandering around the streets of Cape May Point for awhile but not being able to turn up the White-winged Dove, we decided to head over to the state park to see what was around. It was incredible to see the park covered in snow. Equally amazing was how active the birds were in the snow-covered, freezing landscape. Along the … Read More
Nelson’s Sparrow – Clinton County, PA
This afternoon, I drove out to Bald Eagle SP to do some birding after the storms had moved through the region. A few groups of Ruddy Ducks, 4 Ring-necked Ducks, 6 Double-crested Cormorants, and 2 Common Loons were the only waterfowl I could find on the lake, but many areas I stopped at had lots of Yellow-rumped Warblers and various … Read More
Finally seeing a Fulvous – Stormwater Treatment Area 5
March 2nd, 2013 was the second full day of a Florida birding trip that I took with my friends Josh Lefever and Mark Mizak. Josh and I drove down from PA and planned on meeting up with Mark (who currently works in the Florida Keys) at Stormwater Treatment Area 5 and go in for the tour at 8:00am. Josh and I had stayed … Read More
East Shore Park, CT – Late warblers and other goodies!
If you were following the live feed of my birding trip through New England last week, than you probably know that my friends and I spent our last full day of birding (November 20th) in Connecticut. Some of our main targets for the day were near New Haven at East Shore Park. East Shore Park is a fairly large city park bordering … Read More
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