Avoidance tactics

here's looking at you, kid

So I guess I'll just go on blogging about birds as if nothing's happened.

Speaking of avoidance mechanisms, I made my usual trek up to Randall's Island on the day of the NY Marathon. I live east of First Avenue, so if I don't get out of the area before 8:30am on Marathon Sunday, I'm pretty much stuck there until late afternoon unless I walk a couple of miles each way to get in and out of the area.

Song Sparrow watches out

The north end of the island was pretty quiet. The first few Brants have arrived for the winter, and there were a lot of Song Sparrows and Savannah Sparrows. The Song Sparrows were pretty cooperatve.

landscape with Savannah Sparrow

I followed a group of Savannah Sparrows north along the eastern shore. They were a bit less approachable than the Songs.

inclined to fly

I did get a couple of decent photos of them anyway. The usual gulls were around. Mostly Ring-Billeds and mostly distant, but there was a Herring Gull on the rocks on the shore.

curious Herring Gull

There were a few Laughing Gulls in their winter plumage. I don't recall seeing many in the county so late in the year before, though eBird didn't blink at them. I didn't succeed in turning any of them into more unusual species.

who's laughing now?

The little freshwater wetlands across Central Road from Icahn Stadium was also quiet. There were a couple of late migrants: a Black-Throated Blue Warbler skulking around the underbrush, and a Monarch Butterfly in the flower garden just south of the marsh.

Monarch of all et cetera

It looks like they're putting in another water feature in the wetlands area, and also they seem to have completed a bike/pedestrian path just east of the marsh, right outside the wastewater treatment plant. I look forward to seeing what's up back there on a later visit.

Not much was doing at the Little Hell Gate saltmarsh: a few Mallards and one Black Duck, a few sparrows, and along the southern path, several Golden-Crowned Kinglets very active in a tree.

ready for takeoff

In the next tree sat a single tired-looking Ruby Crowned Kinglet.

contemplative Kinglet

Along the River's Edge Garden )between Little Hell Gate and the Ward's Island pedestrian bridge) there were a few more Savannah Sparrows, and one Black Capped Chickadee who scolded me vigorously while feeding.

hungry but talkative

The Marathon was still going when I got back to First Avenue. Up in that area, the crowd was much thinner than in my neighborhood, but there were some spectators.

watching the race

Hanging on

Late in migration season, when the first really cold days come, I start noticing birds that are lingering. As every Fall, there's a stray Ovenbird in Bryant Park.

swept up in the romance of the city

Sometimes they make it through the winter. There's quite a lot of Catbirds in Brant Park this year, as well. I saw seven the other day.

it's a living

Technically, Gray Catbirds aren't actually late yet, but really they should be moving on. The same applies to the American Woodcock who was seen as late as last Thursday hiding out in the Bryant Park lawn border near the entrance to the skating rink. I haven't seen that bird, and I'm really hoping it's found it's way out of Manhattan. Woodcocks seem to have an awful time migrating through the city.

contemplating a long journey

Ruby-Crowned Kinglets are one the likeliest of all the small insectivorous migrants to still be here for the Christmas Bird Count. This one was still around Monday morning near Cleopatra's Needle in Central Park.

enjoying the season

Palm Warblers stay pretty late in the year as well. This one was happily hanging out with a small group of Juncos on Randall's Island on Sunday. The Juncos seemed puzzled by the friendly warbler. "Hey, do you know this guy?" they seemed to be asking each other.

Every year, it seems that something really unlikely overwinters in Manhattan.  I wonder what it will be this year?

Welcome to the working week

excitable boy, they all said

It's Kinglet season! Walking through the Ramble, you'll see dozens of them. There are also sparrows coming through, like this juvenile White-crowned Sparrow.

the young and the restless

We're also seeing a lot of Winter Wrens. I saw a half-dozen in a half-hour walk one day. I don't remember seeing such concentrations before.

winter is coming

There are migrants on the streets of the city as well. Last Monday morning as I hurried in to work, this Common Yellowthroat popped out of a tree pit on 40th Street near Park Avenue.

tourist

Raptor migration is in full swing, too; Monday ended with a Peregrine Falcon followed by a Bald Eagle soaring over Grand Central Station heading south-southeast.

Meanwhile life for the city residents continues apace. We can all enjoy the landscaping around the main branch of the New York Public Library on Fifth Avenue:

getting a street snack on Fifth Avenue

By the way, the reports from Randall's Island the last couple of days are amazing--Nelson's, Saltmarsh, Vesper, Eastern Meadowlark. If you have time to go there, it sounds wonderful.

Double-dip

not the bird I was looking for

In birder jargon, a "dip" is when you chase a reported rare bird and fail to see it. I dipped twice today on the same species of bird.

Yesterday, several people saw a Connecticut Warbler in Central Park, between the Riviera and the Rustic Shelter in the Ramble. The Connecticut Warbler is a skulky bird, a little smaller than a House Sparrow, mostly olive, with a full hood, grey (in adult males) brownish otherwise, and a bold eye-ring. They walk on the ground rather than hopping or flitting, usually come through New York only in the Fall migration (in Spring I think they go north inland), and are quite uncommon even then.

Yesterday's reports were from late in the afternoon until a bit after sunset, so it seemed possible that the bird might stay overnight. So I went out in the morning to try to spot it. Nope! It wasn't a total loss--a cool humid morning with several wrens (all Carolinas, I think), various sparrows, and my first Ruby-Crowned Kinglet of the season. (Not the one above--the light was terrible this morning.)

In the afternoon, I saw a report online of another Connecticut, this one in Madison Square Park. I wasn't able to get down there until after sunset. There were a few birders left, but no bird.

In birder jargon, a "nemesis bird" is a rare bird that a birder has tried and failed to see several times. I'm not really a good enough birder to have an actual nemesis bird, but I have never seen a Connecticut Warbler in a dozen or so attempts. Some of those chases were stakeouts lasting many hours, including one where the other five birders there all saw the warbler skulking in the shrubbery at one point.

That one made me swear off chasing Connecticuts, but there I was again today--and I'll see if I can get up early enough to try again tomorrow.