November rarities

In November the rare birds come. Hatch-year birds who've never migrated before, birds blown by storms, birds whose sense of direction has gone off--all sorts of birds can show up anywhere.

There was a Corn Crake on Long Island. I missed that--no transport--and the poor bird got hit by a car a couple of days after its discovery. That's a ridiculously rare vagrant from Europe, only a few North American records in the last century. Excellent young birder Ryan Zucker wrote a very nice blog post about the Crake twitch.

Closer to home, we had a different skulky bird of the reeds up in the Loch section of Central Park, a Virginia Rail . This wasn't off-course so much, but unusually easy to see, foraging in the leaves just off a popular path.

I got to see an interesting bit of behavior--a Blue Jay who had been hanging around suddenly flew up to the top of a small tree and started alarming, and the rail ran for cover, closing the 15 feet or so to a large log in about a second and crouching underneath until the danger had passed, or at least until the Jay quieted down.

in this and the next picture, look at the feet.

seriously, aren't they amazing?

The Rail might have been released in the park by the Wild Bird Find after a rehab stint.

This is just a ridiculously close look at a Rail. That never happens.

Down in the Ramble, an apparent Hammond's Flycatcher has been around for almost two weeks now. Hammond's is a western Empidonax flycatcher, and empids are notoriously hard to identify, but this bird's small bill, teardrop eyering, long tail, and long "primary projection" (which makes the wings look sword-shaped) are pretty strong evidence, and people have heard it call (which is usually the best way to identify Empidonaxes), so everyone seems happy with the ID.

I had an unsatisfactory look at it when it first showed up, and then for some days the bird was seen before and after I left the park, but then first I had a decent look late one afternoon, and then a couple of days later I came upon a couple of people looking at it at perched over a small stream the Gill)...

..and then it flew right in and showed off on a fence six feet from me. I've never had such a good look at any empid before.

As of today (Friday 12/8), the bird is apparently still present. It goes all over the Ramble, so it might take some searching unless you see a crowd of people staring into the trees.

That same day I saw two other nice birds. While entering the park I stopped to watch a biggish flock of Common Grackles on Cedar Hill, maybe 150 or 200 birds. They weren't two nervous and I was able to walk pretty close as the foraged and fussed, and then I spotted a slightly larger and browner bird in with them.

A Boat-Tailed Grackle! Very unusual for Manhattan, though there's a breeding colony at Jamaica Bay in the summer. I think this is the same bird that was spotted by Anders Peltomaa a week or so before. It's been seen almost daily since; opinions are divided as to whether it's a female or a hatch-year male.

hey there, long legs

It was interesting to watch this bird interact with the Common Grackles. Aside from being a bit bigger, it had much longer legs, and when it felt crowded, it would rise up on them and kind of lean on the neighbors a little until they backed off.

After seeing the Grackle and then the nice view of the Hammond's, I wandered around the Ramble for a while, and came upon a Pine Siskin in a holly tree.

Pine Siskin (OK, next to the Holly)

Pine Siskins are a decently unusual bird here, although some winters we see a number of them as they wander the region looking for good crops of pine cones to eat. This was the first I'd seen this year.

Lunchtime twitching in Central Park

One of the nice things about living and working in New York City is that when the rare birds show up, they're usually not far away. This month, I had a couple of opportunities to see excellent birds on my lunch hour.

cooperative Connecticut

September 6, there was a report in the morning of a Connecticut Warbler in Central Park, near the Pilgrim statue on 72nd Street. So I decided that it was a good opportunity for a quick "twitch" (originally British slang; a trip made specifically to follow a report of a rare bird). I took the Madison Avenue bus up and walked along the 72nd Street Transverse until I spotted people peering into low shrubs on a the little hill below the statue.

not actually going to perch in the tree, mind you

Here is a thing I've learned: if you're looking for a skulky ground-hugging bird on a hill, try to get below it. It will be easier to spot looking uphill than down (where all the vegetation will screen the bird from you).

It worked this time. It wasn't long before I spotted the Connecticut walking around in the shrubbery. This was a very cooperative bird (for a Connecticut), and he spent some time in the open. All in all, twenty minutes on the bus, a half-hour looking at the bird, twenty back downtown--I was back at my desk practically before anyone noticed I was missing.

spot the birdie

A few days later, a report of a Virginal Rail drew me out again. Usually, when that species is spotted in Central park, it's because one ran into trouble and was treated by the Wild Bird Fund, and after rehab,released in the park. Under The Official Rules, you're not supposed to count such a released bird. So there were apparently frantic calls to the rehabbers--who reported that they had not released a Virginia Rail, and there was much rejoicing.

Even better, this normally reclusive bird was right out in the open in a spot (the bridge where the Gill empties into the Lake, which will only mean anything to Central Park regulars) offering great close views.

oh, there you are!

Anyway, I had some adventures getting to the spot this time--wound up walking from 68th and Park to about 77th in the middle of the park--and the bird was gone by the time I got there. Woe and despair! I searched for a half-hour, and decided I needed ti get back to work. As I was deciding what the best way of getting back might be, I looked at Twitter and found that the excellent birder Steve Chang had re-found the rail nearby, at a little pond (more of a big puddle) in the area called called the Swampy Pin Oak.

I hustled over there, and in the shadows of the sheltered pond, was able to spot the rail. I got a life bird on my lunch hour, a very successful twitch. I wasn't even that late getting back to work.

Off the Rails

So Thursday evening, I saw reports of a Virginia Rail in the Loch and Ravine area (part of northern Central Park). That's a very good bird for Manhattan. There were two last year--one at the Loch and one downtown near the Federal reserve (!). Before that, eBird has a report of one on the east side in 2008, and two in the Ramble--one in 2007 and one in 1991. And that's all.

So off I went this morning, under a gloomy sky; and up and down the Loch I walked for the next three and a half hours (with a short excursion around the rest of the north end). No Rail. There were other rewards--a Louisiana Waterthrush sashayed into (and back out of) sight a couple of times, and a Merlin soared over the Great Hill when I took a little walkabout there--those were both first of the year for me. A Golden-Crowned Kinglet popped up in front of my--a male, close enough to see the red streak in the middle of the gold crown stripe. I'd never really seen that before.



Still, no Rail. Nobody else had seen it, either. A post on the NYSBirds mailing list suggested that the Rail, if still present, would likely be more active near dusk. So I went home intending to try again later.

It was starting to sprinkle rain when I got back to the park. A few Buffleheads and a single Great Egret were at the Pool. In the Loch, still no Rail.

In the gathering gloom, birds began to sing: Cardinals, Robins, White-Throated Sparrows. Flickers called. Suddenly, from across the stream, a long, high song above the rest.

a cascade of trills
cuts through the rainy gloaming
--a Winter Wren sings


The wren (also a first of year bird for me) never appeared. Neither did the Virginia Rail. The rain got harder as darkness fell. I went home. There were still Buffleheads diving in the Pool as I passed on my way out.