Today was one of those days you dream about

After working the last six days I couldn't wait to get outside today. Even though the temperature took a massive nose dive over the last 36 hours, I was going birding. The cold be damned! I still wanted to get a bunch of "yearbirds". I put together an itinerary of all the places I wanted to hit on the East side of Narragansett Bay. The problem was, I made this plan on Tuesday, so I had a long wait before I could carry it out.

I was in Tiverton, RI before 6:15 am in the hopes of hearing owls, specifically Great Horned and Screech. No luck. Then I went to Pardon Grey where I also struck out with Meadowlarks and Killdeer. I wasn't thrilled to be 0-4 before 7 am!

From there my luck changed. I saw a bunch of birds. I got my nemesis bird at Rueker, Yellow Bellied Sapsucker. I went back to Pardon Grey and had a Coopers Hawk put on a photo shoot.

From Tiverton, I went to Boyd Marsh in Portsmouth and saw a Eurasian Widgeon. I was happy to get it, because they are fairly rare. I was surprised to find out that it was the first one reported in 2019. However, it was there all of December, so I can't believe no one else had seen it.

I left Boyd's Marsh for Easton's Pond where I saw a mess of ducks including Ring Necked, Canvasback, Common Mergansers, and Ruddy Ducks. Also in the water were American Coots, which were a target bird.

I left Easton's Pond for Third Beach. I picked up all three Scoters there. I was hoping to see Surf Scoters and White Winged. When I saw them I actually did a fist pump.

Knowing I wanted to leave my long hike for the afternoon I went to Brenton Point next before walking hiking trails. At Brenton Point I saw some Snow Buntings and a Winter Wren. I wanted to look for birds on the ocean (specifically Red Necked Grebe) but the wind was so cold I managed to look for less than two minutes.

I stopped at Fort Adams. There wasn't anything unusual but the common ducks were close to shore so I got a couple pictures of Bufflehead and Common Eider.

I went for my hike during the warmest part of the day (it was still frigging cold). I had two species I wanted to find: Purple Sandpiper and Snowy Owl. I dipped on the Sandpiper but as you can see I found a Snowy Owl. It was standing on a piece of driftwood on a rocky shoreline. I was above it on the trails. When I saw it, I got close enough for pictures but not to scare it. The photos are cropped. I have made a conscious choice not to scare owls for the sake of a photo. I am not posting any of the photos on Facebook or any bird reports.

As if that weren't enough, on my way home I stopped at some woods and heard a Great Horned Owl just before dark. Talk about getting lucky.

I ended up seeing 13 new year birds. I was hoping for around 15-20. The early morning strike outs kept my number low. That said, I'm sure as hell not complaining. I got a 2 owls, and many birds that gave me trouble in 2018, especially the Sapsucker. Today was fantastic.

To pour more fuel on a great fire, I took about 150 pictures today. All but 10 came out crisp and clear. Normally, I just hope for one good photo of each species I take pics of. Before today, I had exactly ZERO pictures of a Snowy Owl that weren't blurry, now I have 75. I wish every day were like today! Here's hoping for tomorrow!!!

Multiple pictures below (no not all 150, don't worry)

Coopers Hawk

Adult male Bufflehead

Bufflehead

Common Eider, Ft. Adams 

 The photos below are of the Snowy Owl