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| Many Baltimore Orioles today |
with health problems. I have literally been doing two jobs. This is a financial windfall for me, but physically it is taking its toll. Since you SoB's prefer fresh donuts, I can't go do the donut delivery until night time. So I have been getting home between 12-1 am and going into work at my normal time (what is the sense of making extra money, if you cut back later on). Believe it or not, even with this extra work I have been fishing every evening, so what is being sacrificed is...sleep.
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| Red Winged Blackbird |
What the hell do you care about this for? Today I went to Parker River National Wildlife Refuge. Normally I would try to be there very early, usually leaving my house at 5 am or earlier. However, since I didn't get to sleep until 2:15 last night, it was a miracle that I woke up to leave at 6:15 without an alarm.
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| It was over 90 degrees on the island today. This smart turkey stayed in the shade |
However, this did mean I didn't get there until 8 am, and since I try to beat rush hour traffic in Lowell, I leave around 1 pm. Getting there at 8, meant I burned three hours of prime daylight,
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| Eastern Towhee. Picture not cropped. It was singing four feet from me |
I started my morning at a quick stop at lot #1. I saw the resident purple martins. I should have gone out to the beach with my spotting scope to scan the ocean for birds. I planned on coming back that way before I left and do it. When I got back to the lot in the early afternoon it was full of cars. Beachgoers park there because it is one part of the beach not closed for piping plovers. It doesn't look good for a single guy in his forties to bring binoculars and a spotting scope to a beach with bikinis around. So I just left the beach for the early morning next time.
I kind of made a quick drive to the Hellcat area. There are birds all over the refuge. Some of the other great spots are the Old Blind, S curves, and the Pines. I was going to stop at the S curves but there was an Audubon group just getting out of their caravan, so I moved on. I like walking the trails at Hellcat anyway.
The theme for today was there were a lot of birds but not a lot of species. I only ended up with 44 species. However, I saw a lot of those species. I saw what had to be over one hundred American Redstarts and Magnolia Warblers today. There were Baltimore Orioles everywhere.
Of course there were notable exceptions when you only see 44 species. I was hoping to see Rose Breasted Grosbeak, Great Crested Flycatcher, and a few of the less common warblers such as Bay Breasted. I didn't spend any time at the open marshes which is the main reason I saw few shorebirds and no Great Blue Herons (Great and Snowy Egrets were everywhere though).
My best bird was a Northern Waterthrush. I got to watch one for quite sometime in a swamp. I also
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| Red Eyed Vireo |
All in all, birding today at the refuge was average. I clearly could have seen more birds if I went to lot #1. I also didn't go to Sandy Point where I have seen Piping Plovers and Two species of terns every time I was there. If I were trying to see how many species I could in the day I would have done those things. I wouldn't have spent three hours at Hellcat.
Instead of making it a contest, I just want to enjoy the birds. No other place I go has such a diversity of wood warblers as Plum Island. However the season is short, in a few weeks those birds will be breeding to the north. Instead of rushing to the next bird, I want to enjoy the ones in front of me. Based on that criteria then the mission was accomplished today.
...And, because addiction is real, after a nap I went fishing tonight catching my biggest striper to date for the year.
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