Kittiwakes and Little Gull off Montauk Point & extremely late Northern Rough-winged Swallow in Deep Hollow - 29 Nov 2009

The largest number of 'small, non-Laughing' gulls that I've seen out here in a while were off Montauk Point (Suffolk Co.) this morning.There were more than 300 Bonaparte's Gulls with at least 45 BLACK-LEGGED KITTIWAKES (max count for single sweep, 50:50 ads:1st winters) and a striking 1st-winter LITTLE GULL. I counted only 15 Laughing Gulls, a very low number for this date. I arrived at slack tide which was probably not ideal as the many of the gulls stopped feeding around 10 am and either settled on the water or flew northward into the center of Gardiners Bay. Many of the Red-throated Loons also took to the air and headed in the same direction. Other than these gulls, I couldn't pull out any other birds of note. Plenty of loons, eiders and scoter but no alcids yet.

At Deep Hollow, the CACKLING GOOSE continues on the south pasture and has been joined by an adult SNOW GOOSE. Whilst looking for through the geese I noted a swallow flying low over the pasture, sometime alighting on the fences. Initially the light was really poor (straight into the sun) but eventually I got good looks confirming that it was a NORTHERN ROUGH-WINGED SWALLOW. Exceptionally late from a coastal standpoint. It soon disappeared but later I relocated it over the ponds on the north side of Rt 27. Needless to say I thought about but quickly ruled out, Brown-chested Martin - a more outlandish but not entirely unreasonable possibility given the recent sighting from MA and the late fall bird from Cape May NJ a few years back. Otherwise, passerines seemed few and far between today despite the glorious weather.

Black-legged Kittiwakes and male King Eider off Main Beach in East Hampton - 28 Nov 2009

The South Fork of Long Island was buffeted by strong WNW winds (22-36 mph) this morning as the front pushed out yesterdays wet weather giving blue skies by late morning. I seawatched for an hour and a half (8:38-10:08 am) from Main Beach in East Hampton and noted a good showing of BLACK-LEGGED KITTIWAKES (28 total) and assortment of waterfowl passing offshore headlined by a full adult male KING EIDER flying east. A 2nd winter LESSER BLACK-BACKED GULL briefly joined the regular species feeding in the surf as the tide dropped. The kittiwakes passed westward in small groups mixed with Bonaparte's and Laughing Gulls. Here's my tally:

Red-throated Loon - 46
Common Loon - 9
loon sp. - 12
Northern Gannet - 595
Brant - 3
Canada Goose - 8
Wood Duck - 2
Mallard - 1
Green-winged Teal - 3
Greater Scaup - 1
Common Eider - 9
KING EIDER - 1 (ad. male flying east)
Long-tailed Duck - 42
White-winged Scoter - 49
Surf Scoter - 55
Black Scoter - 865
dark winged scoter - 380
Hooded Merganser - 12
BLACK-LEGGED KITTIWAKE - 28 (6 ads & 22 juvs)
Bonaparte's Gull - 80
Laughing Gull - 36 (mostly ads)
Lesser Black-backed Gull - 1 (2nd winter)
Herring Gull - 60
Great Black-backed Gull - 45
Ring-billed Gull - 75

Continuing Gannet flight - 27 Nov 2009

The seabird flight this morning was headlined by an unbroken eastward stream of Northern Gannets, along with two flocks of Atlantic Brant totaling 60 birds, my f.o.s. Iceland Gull (an immaculate 1st winter) and Common Goldeneye. A 1 hr count (9:40-10:40 am) logged the following:

Red-throated Loon - 120 (most flying east)
Common Loon - 16
Northern Gannet - 1,452 (all ages, majority adults)
Great Cormorant - 7
cormorant sp. - 14
BLACK-LEGGED KITTIWAKE - 1 (ad.)
Laughing Gull - 1
ICELAND GULL - 1 (1st winter, west along surfline)
Atlantic Brant - (33 & 27 east)
Common Eider - 2
Black Scoter - 70
Surf Scoter - 5
White-winged Scoter - 20
scoter sp. - 75
Common Goldeneye - 2
Long-tailed Duck - 9

With the exception of a PEREGRINE over Hook Poind, there was little of note at Hook, Sagg Mains and Mecox Inlet. No sign of the Cattle Egret reported last week from the farms in Mecox.

Being thankful for Parasitic Jaeger, Kittiwake and loons: 26 Nov 2009

This morning I seawatched from a number of spots between Amagansett and Montauk Point. Flat calm and overcast conditions made for excellent viewing. The unusual dispersal of COMMON EIDERS is still much in evidence, with birds (sometimes in their hundreds) at every stop. Perhaps as a consequence, there were relatively few eider over the reefs at the Point. Alternatively, the absence of food in the traditional areas explains the western shift in distribution. Loons were also very much in evidence, with a nice flight of Red-throated Loons along the ocean until mid-morning. Squadrons of Northern Gannets pushed east in the direction of Block Island with almost no feeding activity. The CACKLING GOOSE continues on the pasture at Deep Hollow as does the adult LESSER BLACK-BACKED GULL on the shore of Fort Point Bay. No Horned Grebes yet nor Razorbill - perhaps still a little early.

Here is my culmulative tally:

Common Loon - 345
Red-throated Loon - 659
loon sp. - 30
RED-NECKED GREBE - 1 (Fort Pond Bay)
Northern Gannet - 3,200+ (persistent flght, the majority heading east into RI waters or beyond)
Great Cormorant - 6 (Fort Pond Bay & Montauk Inlet jetties)
Double-crested Cormorant - 24
Brant - 33 (headed east)
Common Eider - 1,044 (widespread)
Red-breasted Merganser - 42
Long-tailed Duck - 2
Black Scoter - 1,490
Surf Scoter - 1,400
White-winged Scoter - 74
scoter sp. - 300
PARASITIC JAEGER - 1 subad. (flying east, seen from Atlantic Avenue, Amagansett)
BLACK-LEGGED KITTIWAKE - 8 (6 juv. and 2 ad., flying east, seen from Amagansett & Napeague)
Bonaparte's Gull - 28
Laughing Gull - 22
LESSER BLACK-BACKED GULL - 1 ad. (Fort Pond Bay)

GRAY SEAL - 2 (Hither Hills State Park & Montauk Point)
Harbor Seal - 4 (Fort Pond Bay, Ditch Plains & Montauk)

Recent sightings of Pink-footed Geese on Long Island - New or returning?

Waterfowl can sometimes be tracked by noting differences in the patterning on their bills. This was pioneered by Sir Peter Scott and the Wildfowl Trust in the UK in the study of wintering Bewick's (Tundra) and Whopper Swans. I wondered if this same technique could be applied to gray geese, so began looking at the bill patterns of the recent spate of sightings from Long Island and New England. Click on the image for a slightly bigger version. I think we can say that the Pink-footed Goose at Sunken Meadow State Park, Suffolk, is almost certainly a different individual from the bird that spent several weeks in and around Kissena Park in Flushing, Queens during the winter of 2008/09. Whether it can be distinguished from the bird that wintered around Stony Brook (2007/08 and only a few miles east of Sunken Meadow) is harder to discern but needs more study. Likewise, the Montauk bird (2007/08, more than 40 miles further east and coincident with the Stony Brook bird) is fairly similar. I have been images of that bird but will need to dig them out. My thanks to Paul Gildersleeve and Ed Coyle for use of their images.

Two Western Kingbirds near Bridgehampton - 1 Nov 2006

The WESTERN KINGBIRD was still present this morning in Deep Hollow, Montauk (Suffolk Co.), favoring the trees on the eastern side of the horse pasture. The bird disappears from sight at times, so be patient if you go in search of it.

Twenty miles further west in Bridgehampton, I found 2 WESTERN KINGBIRDS hawking insects in the heavily overgrown field on the south side of Daniel's Lane (40.9188, -72.2618). Initially the birds were close to Peter's Pond Lane, a dirt road running down to the ocean access but they later ranged more widely across the field, sometimes appearing to go over the dune on the beach itself. An American Kestrel, increasingly scarce on the South Fork, was in a field off Gibson Lane.

The ocean between Main Beach in East Hampton and Mecox Bay was fairly active with numerous rafts of scoter, several hundred Atlantic Gannets and small flocks of Laughing Gulls. Most of the bird feeding on small bait fish being pushed to the surface by Striped Bass and I was surprised to see that even the scoter were feeding on these fish, thinking that their diet was limited to bivalves, polychaete worms and small crustaceans. However, they could often be seen surfacing with these slender fish dangling from their bills before being swallowed. No wonder the gulls like to pester them.

Numbers of Common Eider seemed higher than usual this far west of Montauk, and I tallied 103 along this stretch. GREAT CORMORANTS were also in evidence, with 16 flying west along the beach front and an immature roosting with Double-crested Cormorants on the sand flat at Georgica Pond. An adult LESSER BLACK-BACKED GULL was at Sagg Mains. Tom Burke and Gail Benson noted a PARASITIC JAEGER off Main Beach and another off Montauk Point. They also located the female KING EIDER off Ditch Plains before hurrying over to Bridgehampton for their 2nd and 3rd _Tyrannus verticalis_ of the day.