After dropping my wife off at LaGuardia Airport, for her flight to Chicago, I headed east to Suffolk's Smith Point County Park, in the hope of it living up to it's long ago given "nickname", referenced above ! Although not recording any special sparrows or allies, a nice variety of species were observed. The most numerous among them were the 43 Gannets (mostly adults, flying east to west, with some fairly close to shore)counted in a 35 minute period. Also seen during this sea-watch were 11 White-winged Scoters flying west to east and 2 Royal Terns,in addition to the many large gulls standing around waiting for a handout from the 15 surfcasters scattered along the beach. What I found interesting was, despite all this evidence of fish being "out there", I didn't see a single Gannet dive, nor did I see a fisherman bring in a fish. In fact, the only action happened when one of the terns dove, once, coming up empty ! Among the land birds seen were: 3 E.Phoebe; 2 Hermit Thrush; many Yellow-rumped Warblers; 1 Palm Warbler; 2 Indigo Buntings and 7 species of sparrows: Field; Chipping; Savannah (Ipswich); White-throated; White-crowned; Song and Swamp. What will the morrow bring ?
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/ --
