The Birds of 2011

I saw ten life birds in 2011. Three of them were during the Superbowl of Birding in Essex County, Massachusetts. As it turns out, I will not be going there in 2012, but hopefully some other fun events will take its place this year. My best bird was probably the Gray-hooded Gull at Coney Island. The Varied Thrush I saw in Central Park was a species I had long anticipated seeing. The Greater White-fronted Goose at Duke Island Park made up for some frustrating misses on past attempts to see the species. Here are all ten of my life birds from the past year.

Species	Location	Date
Varied Thrush	Central Park	11 Jan 2011
Dovekie	Gloucester Harbor--Jodrey State Fish Pier	29 Jan 2011
Barrow's Goldeneye	Cape Ann--Penzance Beach	29 Jan 2011
Lapland Longspur	Sunshine Dairy Farm	29 Jan 2011
Red Crossbill	Seven Presidents Park	31 Jan 2011
Sora	Charles Rogers Wildlife Refuge	01 May 2011
Curlew Sandpiper	Heislerville WMA	14 May 2011
Gray-hooded Gull	Coney Island Beach	02 Aug 2011
Eurasian Collared-Dove	Cape May Point -- Lincoln & Whilldin	10 Aug 2011
Greater White-fronted Goose	Duke Island Park	01 Dec 2011

2011 turned out to be an excellent year for county birding. I had tremendous luck finding unusual species on my patch, particularly a Grasshopper Sparrow that surprised me one morning. I also had the opportunity to explore some parts of the county that I had not seen before or had not visited in a long time. Each of those visits added new species to my growing county list, which is twenty-eight species higher than it was this time last year. Here are the rest of my new birds for Middlesex County.

Species	Location	Date
American Kestrel	Edison Boat Basin	06 Feb 2011
Common Redpoll	Donaldson Park	15 Feb 2011
Eastern Screech-Owl	Highland Park	20 Feb 2011
Redhead	Duhernal Lake	24 Feb 2011
Rusty Blackbird	Johnson Park	05 Mar 2011
Wilson's Snipe	Johnson Park	26 Mar 2011
Northern Gannet	Morgan Avenue Mudflats	09 Apr 2011
Glossy Ibis	Donaldson Park	12 Apr 2011
Broad-winged Hawk	Donaldson Park	14 Apr 2011
Northern Bobwhite	Morgan Avenue Mudflats	15 Apr 2011
Common Raven	Johnson Park	17 Apr 2011
Grasshopper Sparrow	Donaldson Park	27 Apr 2011
Purple Martin	Donaldson Park	06 May 2011
Chestnut-sided Warbler	Donaldson Park	09 May 2011
Prothonotary Warbler	Donaldson Park	10 May 2011
Worm-eating Warbler	Rutgers Preserve	11 May 2011
Marsh Wren	Cheesequake State Park	21 May 2011
Forster's Tern	Morgan Avenue Mudflats	26 May 2011
Black-bellied Plover	Pirates Cove	26 May 2011
Piping Plover	Pirates Cove	26 May 2011
Ruddy Turnstone	Pirates Cove	26 May 2011
Black Skimmer	Pirates Cove	26 May 2011
Acadian Flycatcher	Pirates Cove	26 May 2011
Little Blue Heron	Morgan Avenue Mudflats	05 Aug 2011
Yellow-crowned Night-Heron	Pirates Cove	05 Aug 2011
Caspian Tern	Morgan Avenue Mudflats	20 Aug 2011
Tennessee Warbler	Rutgers Preserve	16 Sep 2011
Least Flycatcher	Red's Marina	02 Oct 2011

By the numbers:

• Total life birds overall: 351
• Total state birds: 292 (12 of them new in 2011)
• 2011 New Jersey year list: 235
• Total county birds: 198
• 2011 Middlesex County year list: 178
• Total yard birds: 71 (3 of them new in 2011: Snow Goose, Wild Turkey, and Black-throated Green Warbler)

Warm Weather and Half-Hardies

A banded Ring-billed Gull from Spring Lake

As the sun rose on the first day in 2011, I was standing on a beach in Sea Girt looking for seabirds at the start of the Long Branch Christmas Bird Count. Since New Year's is on a Sunday this year, the Long Branch CBC for the 2011-2012 CBC season fell on New Year's Eve. So I ended 2011 the way I started it: counting birds around Spring Lake for the Long Branch CBC. Last year, Patrick, Patrick's friend Mike, and I did that area on our own with two feet of snow on the ground, so that many areas were impenetrable. This year we were assisting Glen Mahler, a birder who has done that section for years and knows the territory very well, including some hidden spots that are not obvious on the maps. Warmer temperatures meant that all water was open so the waterfowl were more spread out. It also kept birds further north than usual, so it was a good year to find half-hardy species and a bad year to find strays from further north.

Destroyed boardwalk in Spring Lake

We started out by doing a tour of the ponds in our area to count waterfowl and any other birds that might be around. When Patrick and I arrived, Glen had already found a Brown Pelican, a very rare bird for this count circle. Wreck Pond held a Great Egret, an unusual bird for the Long Branch CBC, along with Hooded Mergansers, Red-breasted Mergansers, and Black Ducks. Stops at other ponds turned up Gadwall, Brant, American Coots, Ruddy Ducks, and Ring-necked Ducks. It was not until late in the morning that we finally found our first American Wigeons and Green-winged Teal. Black-crowned Night-Herons were in their usual spot on Silver Lake. Once we had accounted for the waterfowl, we turned to land birding. Our most productive spot was along the southern shore of Wreck Pond, where Patrick and I saw two Gray Catbirds, a Yellow-breasted Chat, and a Blue-gray Gnatcatcher in quick succession. The Yellow-breasted Chat was a special find for me since it was my first ever in the state and the first I had seen since about 2007. Subsequent stops for land birds were not quite as productive, though we did add quite many species, including a House Wren along the creek behind a sewage treatment plant.  

Sunset over the outflow from Wreck Pond

In the end, we tallied 70 species for our section, which ties Glen's previous record for that part of the count circle. The Long Branch CBC as a whole tallied at least 116 bird species on count day, along with a few other count week species.

Lesser Black-backed Gull

Yesterday afternoon, I found an adult Lesser Black-backed Gull along the edge of the artificial pond at Donaldson Park. At first it stood in the shallow water, and then it moved up onto the bank and stood there for a while. The mantle was clearly slate-gray, and its legs were obviously yellow in the afternoon sunlight. Light streaking on its crown and nape also indicates its identity. Oddly enough, there were no Great Black-backed Gulls present, or at least none that I saw. However, there were Herring Gulls and Ring-billed Gulls. This was a nice sighting to close out my county birding year.

Loose Feathers #323

Tundra Swans / Photo by D. Montgomery (USFWS)

News about birds and birding

• California may list the Black-backed Woodpecker as a threatened species. While the species is not endangered on a continental level, it is rare in that state, and its habitat is subject to intensive logging.
• Biologists are studying the Red Knots that winter along the Gulf Coast to assess whether that population is stable.
• Here is a map of this winter's Snowy Owl irruption, via eBird and BirdsEye.
• Scientists are studying hybridization patterns between Gambel's and Elegant Quail.
• The Bureau of Land Management is proposing to create wind development zones to reduce impacts of wind energy on birds and bats.

Nature blogging

• 10,000 Birds: Rufous Hummingbirds – The Accidental Tourists
• bootstrap analysis: updated: plotting a christmas bird count circle
• Bug Girl's Blog: Roaches and Woodpecker Conservation
• A Blog Around the Clock: The wonderful quail…and what Sen.Coburn should learn about it.
• The Scicurious Brain: Cocaine and the sexual habits of quail, or, why does NIH fund what it does?
• Flickr Blog: Thomas Shahan’s Spiders in National Geographic 
• PetaPixel: Magical Photos of Insects Shot Using Ordinary Household Objects

News about the environment and biodiversity

• When a gray wolf wandered from Oregon into California this week, it became the first wolf recorded in California since 1924. The wolf's movements are being tracked with a radio collar.
• Since gray wolves were reintroduced to Yellowstone National Park in the 1990s, elk and coyote populations have declined, while aspen, willow, and cottonwood trees have bounced back. The beaver population has also increased.
• The Delta of the Sacramento and San Joaquin rivers has been healthier this year thanks to above-average rainfall.
• A new study argues that beavers shaped much of North America's landscape.
• Newly-released satellite imagery shows the development of tar sands mining in Alberta, Canada.
• Like adult butterflies, caterpillars also engage in mimicry to appear similar to species with chemical defenses.
• A federal judge has blocked California's low-carbon fuel law, which was intended to help the state meet its goals for greenhouse gas reductions.
• Madrid has created a new six-mile-long park to rejuvenate a stretch of the Manzanares River and reconnect city neighborhoods that had been cut off from each other by a freeway. The project included digging tunnels to bury the freeway.
• Bunker fuel spilled into San Francisco Bay during the Cosco Busan accident in 2007 was particularly toxic to the bay's herring population, which is important for seabirds and other marine predators.

Resident Birds

Two of the ubiquitous species in my area during the winter months (well, year-round, really) are the House Finch (above) and House Sparrow (below). Oddly, neither of these species is native to this area. The House Finch is a western species. Its eastern population grew from birds that escaped from the pet trade. The House Sparrow population grew from a series of deliberate releases in the 19th century.