Yesterday AM I tried for the Rufous Hummingbird, that has graced Rich & Nancy Willot's feeders for ~ 2 weeks. Heading east on a gorgeous day, and buoyed by this particular bird's fidelity, as well as Norm Klein's Ilsa (sp?)experience of a few years past, I felt good about my chances for success. What I didn't expect was the 1/2 hour of "Fire Island Hawk Watch" Rich & I experienced from his back deck ! The 2 local birders, who had to leave after seeing the hummer (but before this exciting event) will go nameless !
The 4 single raptors, in the order of which they passed, were a "probable" Broad-winged Hawk, a Red-tailed Hawk, a Cooper's Hawk and a Red-shouldered Hawk. All of these birds, except for the red-tail, flew over fairly low. In fact, if the broad-winged was a little higher (above the tree-line) we could have been sure on it's ID. It's "Jizz" initially provided us with: small buteo, light under wings & belly, but no look at it's tail, due to trees interspersed between the bird and us. We did get other glimpses as it traveled east to west, but still couldn't come up with any tail info. The above, coupled with the discovery of the location of the fairly new, award winning McCalls Winery/Vineyards in Cutchogue, and then seeing the outstanding new movie Captain Phillips last evening, meant for a most rewarding day ! Cheers, Bob -- NYSbirds-L List Info: http://www.NortheastBirding.com/NYSbirdsWELCOME http://www.NortheastBirding.com/NYSbirdsRULES http://www.NortheastBirding.com/NYSbirdsSubscribeConfigurationLeave.htm ARCHIVES: 1) http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]/maillist.html 2) http://www.surfbirds.com/birdingmail/Group/NYSBirds-L 3) http://birdingonthe.net/mailinglists/NYSB.html Please submit your observations to eBird: http://ebird.org/content/ebird/ --
