Yesterday (10/21), a warm and sunny midday tour of small portions of Riis Park and Fort Tilden in Queens with Sean Sime and Corey Finger turned out to be highly productive.
The overriding theme was Sparrows, far and away dominated by Savannah Sparrows. At the SW corner of Riis we had one each of GRASSHOPPER SPARROW, NELSON'S SPARROW, a late BOBOLINK, and White-crowned Sparrow. Fort Tilden was quieter, but produced an Eastern Meadowlark, and 2 Pine Warblers in the area around the baseball fields. At Floyd Bennett Field in Brooklyn, Sean and I ran across the highest number of Savannah Sparrows either of us could remember ever seeing there, as well as a single Lincoln's Sparrow near the Community Garden. Today (10/22) Shane Blodgett and I ran across a VESPER SPARROW at Canarsie Beach Park in Brooklyn, though numbers of passerines didn't come near what was observed at some coastal spots from yesterday. A bit later at Floyd Bennett Field we had a dull Solitary Vireo, but got frustratingly brief/poor views of it before it disappeared. It was likely a HY Blue-headed Vireo, but certainly warranted a more thorough examination. I stopped off at Prospect Park on the way home and saw the continuing SORA along the shore at the base of the Peninsula, and had a flyover American Pipit (fairly rare for the location), and 2 Eastern Bluebirds there as well. Good Birding, -Doug Gochfeld. Brooklyn, NY. -- 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/ --
