Just a quick note in not much time:

The Hooded Merganser diescovered on the 19th continues in the Meadows, as does the Ruddy Duck in the Lighthouse Pond.

At least three broods of Piping Plovers are easily seen, as far as the crypticly coloured little mites go, on the beach at South Cape May. 8 Lesser Black-backs were also there, including one second year bird, and the very dark-mantled adultish one.

A Gull-billed Tern was present in that neighborhood as well-this has been a very good June for both Gull-billed and Sandwich Terns in the neighbourhood, though I managed none of the latter to-day.

A couple of little bird tell me that Pectoral Sandpipers have been in the Meadows the past two mornings, as well as Semipalmated Plover, though I have not seen them, and a Phoebe was there today.

Otherwise, the Beanery and Higbee’s Beach held pretty much what I would expect today, though a newly fledged Great Horned Owl with an attending swarm of mobbing Icterids, Robins and Kingbirds at the latter site was a nice find. Any day now, there could be more obvious signs of bird movements, though,- other than the first Bank Swallows and Shorebirds which have already begun trickling in. Eg: migrant Yellow Warblers have already turned up in Central Park it seems.

CJV

The most interesting birds I could squeak up around Cape May today were a couple of Gannets off the Point, a continuing Hooded Merg at the Meadows, and a single Gull-biled tern there as well.

Now, Gull-billed Terns are one of my favorite creatures, and though for a time they were unimaginatively lumped and lost, like Hydropogne and Thalasseus, in with most other American terns into “Sterna” the AOU has restored its monogeneric status, and the bird again is known scientifically as Gelochelidon nilotica.

I have always loved this name. In Greek, Gelochelidon quite literally means Laughing Swallow. I can imagine few monikers more charming, or more poetically apt to describe the call and form of these predatory terns.

The nilotica part of course refers to the River Nile, the delta of which is excellent Gull-bill habitat, and from whence the type was collected.

“Laughing Swallow of the Nile”?

The charm of this name is only exceeded by the living animals themselves- dashing, hidden-eyed bandits of beasts possessed of more than their fair share of personality.

Gull-billed Tern is rather boring in comparison, and not at all descriptive really. Stout-billed Tern, or Laughing Tern would defintiely get my vote over “Gull-billed” any day.

CJV

There was again excellent birding to be had in Cape May this fine muggy summer day.

The Ruddy Duck continues in the Lighthouse Pond, but can be difficult to find as he has been foraging in the shallow water around Mallow tussocks, and can be easily overlooked.

Also in the odd-ball summering duck category, the Hooded Merg found a week ago last Thursday in the Cove Pool has now taken up residence in the main pool at the Meadows, and was hauled out today with the moulting mallards on the one artificial isalnd there.

On a breeding bird note, I hear that two nestling Cooper’s Hawks are in the State Park, though I only saw the one. They are rapidly shedding their down, and the branches surrounding the nest and the nest itself are covered with fuzzy white detritus as if festooned with some kind of spider-web facsimile halloween decoration.

The adults can be seen hunting until 8:30 or so in the evenings, such is the appetite of thieir babies. They also consistently range out as far from the nest as West Cape May, the Nature Conservancy’s preserve, and Higbee’s beach, much to the chagrin of the robin and pigeon sized birds in the neighborhood!

Also on the subject of downy-fuzzies, the older brood of Piping Plovers has reached fledging; making short, awkward flights, but are indeed perfectly capable of getting themselves airborne to evade a predator, and so go doen as a successful nesting.

Now there were also 5 newbies on the second Plover Pond, which indicates that more than one brood has hatched and are taking advantage of this habitat. Just how may of which brood hatched late last week are comprising that total is something I could not figure out from the observations I made there this afternoon. Evasive little blighters.

The Short-billed Dowitcher which turned up on Thursday is still around, and seems a bit lame in the leg. However, a Greater Yellowlegs which arrived at the Meadows today is decidedly a southbound migrant and a new arrival, marking the end of two and a half weeks of GreaterLeglessness. This is the first Greaterlegs I have seen there since the 11th of June.

The intentions of other newsworthy birds to be had in the Meadows today were rather more difficult to pin down.

One Bank Swallow was most definitely a south-bound migrant. But the two pairs of Gull-billed Terns, one of which was going through droop-winged, and neck-extended courtship displays, just prior to actually copulating were a bit more difficult to explain. This is not at all too late for Gull-bills to settle down and nest, and I have a feeling that given the paucity of Commons in Hereford Inlet, and the lack of all that much room on Chmapagne Island these birds may have their eye on Cape Island as a terrtiory.

On a non-courtship note, one of the birds, in it own inimitable deep swooping fashion deftly plucked a huge Giant Waterbug/Toebiter kind of aquatic bug right in front of me, dispatched the nastier parts of the beast as it would a crab’s, and swallowed it all in mid air, before settling back down to persuing the wooing of his intended.

Two Sandwhich Terns, one with a white-forhead, briefly stopped in at the Larid Island on the east path, but after circling the Meadows, headed over Sunset, and north, over West Cape May.

By far the most unexpected and unseasonal bird today though was an adult male Northern Parula singing his guts out at Higbee’s Beach. While I have found the odd, singing male N. Parula here in years past in late June or early July, and this one behaved the same way, a late June Northern Parula on Cape Island is a damned good bird.

He worked his way up the west side of the fields, and around to the nice oaks by the overflow lot, singing at a very spririted rate of once every 20 seconds or so, and never stopped. In other words, he seemed rather desperate. He was a very good-looking Parula too, one with a very dark full breast band.

Once upon a time, before the air became too polluted by the coal furnaces of the Industrial Revolution or the belching exhausts of the Post War ers to support Usnea lichens, Parulas were not unknown as breeders in Cape May. They were abundant breeding birds in what we now call Belleplain State Forest, in fact.

CJV

The drake Ruddy Duck discovered last week in the Lighthouse Pond at the State Park is still present, and rather surprised me when it popped up, cork-like just in front of the blind there.

A striking little bird in full breeding plumage, its bill an intense baby/sky blue. If the overall effect was not so handsome on the living bird, the proportions, pattern, and colours of a Ruddy Duck would be totally absurd. Like something a kid who put the wrong colours on a rubber-ducky in a colouring-books lines might concoct.

While some birds are feeding young, rearing second broods, or have not even settled down to nest yet, the beginnings of fall were already evident at Cape May Point today. A breeding plumaged Short-billed Dowitcher honed in on 4 Killdeer circling the Plover Ponds and eventually put down in one of them. The continuing one-footed Lesser Yellowlegs, and Willets notwithstanding, this is the first South-bound shorebird I’ve seen at the Point.

Likewise, while there have been 8 or so Glossy Ibis hanging around Cape Island, today a skein of 22 circled the island, and headed Seaward. Like Willets, Glossy Ibis don’t waste much time on the breeding grounds, they do however have a strangely protracted migration, which spans from June to November.

Otherwise, 4 young male Surf Scoter Continue off the Point, 8 Lesser Black-backs continue at South Cape May, and both broods of Piping Plovers seen yesterday continue on the beach there as well.

However, one of the Newbies was in the Plover Pond, and the other three were out on the Beach. While one parent was attending the black-sheep for a while, by sunset, both were with the majority of the brood, and I would place more money on the one in the thick grass by the plover pond becoming Rat-snake or Bull-frog Chow than rejoining his nest mates by morning.

It is also worth mentioning that there were two toddler Bottle-nosed Dolphins, each maybe a yard long, doing a sort of spy-hop, baby-play breach as they cruised along just yards off-shore with there mums this evening. If there is one thing more appealing than newborn Piping Plovers, newborn Bottlenosed dolphins trying to get a handle on just what that thinner element above them is all about, has got to be it. They really were ickle, and had the delphinid version of that same, stumbling clumsy look 8 week-old puppies, or terrible two-yearolds have got. Up close and personal Tursiops calves was a fine way to end this beautiful Summer day.

CJV

There was excellent birding and excellent birds to be had in Cape May today, and it also happened to be a spectacularly pleasant one on which to be out and about doing just about anything out-of-doors.

By far the most exciting find were three Sandwich Terns among the 200 Royal Terns and well over a thousand Black Skimmers on Champagne Island. While three Sandwich terns here in late June is not all that surprising, the exciting thing was that two were breeding plumaged adults, apparently going through some kind of courtship manouvres.

They were marching together in circles, quick-step time, side by side, wings slightly drooped, bushy crests raised, and necks arched. They kept this up for some time.

The interesting thing is that Sandwich Terns apparently form pair-bonds well before arriving on breeding turf. However the biirds showed no aggressive interaction, and stayed glued to each other’s side the entire timeI watched, even when not marching around together.

The other Sandwich was a first year, ousted from the middle of one cluster of Royal Tern nests by a garrulous Royal. The young Sandwich just flew a few feet to the edge of the nesters, and stayed within very close proximity to the colony. Last year, Sandwich Terns were landing among the actual nesting Royal Terns too, not just hanging out with the loafers as is typical of misfit terns.

I should not at all be surprised if Sandwich Tern is not among the next, if not the next bird added to NJ’s list of breeding birds.

Otherwise, there were 11 Brown Pelicans in that neighborhood, two roosting on the inlet side of Great Channel, the others all winging north off-shore, six of those being in one flock.

A young Great Cormorant left the flock of 50 roosting Double-cresteds roosting on the sandbars on the west side of the point, and headed to the north over the sea. This is the first I’ve seen or heard of an over-summering Great Corm at Hereford Inlet this year.

There was a decent little flock of shorebirds at the overflow pond at the base of Stone Harbor Point, including, 3 Red Knot, 9 Ruddy Turnstones, 11 Black-bellied Plovers, 13 Semipalmated Plovers, 3 Short-billed Dowitchers, 12 Western Sandpipers, and 5 Semipalmated Sandpipers.

One Tricolored Heron was at Nummy’s Island, but otherwise, the place belonged to the flies.

Cape Island was its effervescent summertime self and very birdy today.

I get the feeling that Yellow-billed Cuckoo eggs must’ve hatched. One because Yellow-billed Cuckoos were incredibly obvious, flying back and forth around the fields at Higbee’s in a way which they weren’t even just yesterday, and carrying food; and two because I found the discarded shell of a hatched Yellow-billed Cuckoo egg just near the Pond there today.

One Roseate Tern-beautiful bird, was hunting off the Point this morning, and the same bachelor flock of 4 Surf Scoters persists. Gannets also seemed to be a bit more in evidence today, I managed about 6, including one second-year type. Later, towards evening, there was a most unexpected, adult Black Tern hunting the rips. Odd time of year for one.

There were 9 Lesser Black-backed Gulls on the South Cape May Beach front this evening, including the dark near-adult and two second summers.

A first-summer Yellow-crowned Night Heron at the Meadows was a bit unexpected as it came in from the north and circled the place two or three times before settling in. A first summer Black-crown was also there and an adult Black-crown was in the park.

The same footless Lesser Yellowlegs was in the Meadows, but the Willets of the last fortnight have apparently departed.

Best of all, there were two broods of four Piping Plovers, one very new- maybe a day or two old, the other a couple of weeks old, and maybe a week away from fledgeling, give or take. With the 8 chicks there were 16 Pipers on the Beach tonight.

Numbers of endangered species aside, the scene at South Cape May was just about idyllic this evening.

In a lowering sun, with a perfect breeze, the adult Lesser Black-backed Gull, flushed by a walker, unwittinlgy settled too close to the newborn Piping Plovers. As they ran behind his bright yellow legs and the parents mobbed his ankles, one of the Dolphins, unaccompanied by newborn calves, decided smacking his flukes was the best idea to come into his delphinic mind, and began pounding the waves with all his might, like a beaver on steroids, to the tune of 30 smacks.

I don’t know which was better, four adorably wide eyed newborn Piping Plovers incongruously behind a well-plumaged European stray, or the echoing cetacean ebullience. Perhaps its best not to try and tease it apart-the whole scene was a gesamtkunstwerk of Maw Nature at her finest.

CJV

A bit of sea-watching off the Point this morning produced 4 Brown Pelicans, and a first summer Northern Gannet, and some decent mixed Tern flocks, but little out of the ordinary.

Perhaps given the very mild day, and cooling breeze, birds seemed to be singing a bit today, and I think Indigo Buntings, judging from the numbers of dueling, song-flying males, and well-mature fledgelings about, are presently engaged in brood number two.

There were no fewer than 9 Lesser Black-backed Gulls on the beach at South Cape May, including two second summers, and the very blackish-mantled just about adult. He seems to prefer the area just to the east of the bunker, and has reliably been found foraging in the surf here for some time now.

By far the most unexpected bird though was a White-rumped Sandpiper in the second Plover Pond at the State Park, foraging on the mud just near the resident Killdeer and Piping Plovers. I don’t have much faith in this bird’s reproductive success this year!

CJV

The most noteworthy birds I could come up with this fine muggy day were 4 Surf Scoters off the Point, and 4 Lesser Black-backed Gulls-including a fine looking third summer at the Meadows. 22 Royal Terns were also out roosting on the beach there.

Otherwise, some of the breeders are getting noticeably quieter-like Orchard Orioles and Pine Warblers, for instance.

2 Mallard X Black Ducks were also kind of interesting- they are not as common around here as elsewhere further north in the Bight.

Couldn’t find any more Bank Swallows, for the life of me though, and am still rather impressed by those of the other day.

Luckily, there is always tomorrow…

CJV

I can’t help but think that the so-called closure of this bird-colony was little more than lip-service.

The “closure” lasted all of what, just a matter of weeks, really? None of those weeks coinciding with the peak of Skimmer and Tern nesting activity, and the opening to boaters, “partial” as it may be, coinciding with the peaks of boating and beach activity.

The opening of parts of this bird colony to human activity are perfectly timed to allow for the least inconvenience of tourists, and peak human activity by the sorts which threaten it. The opening, not coincidentally coinciding with the majority of school closures-which brings the majority or beach tourists to the Jersey Shore, and the Fourth of July weekend, just so happens to mirror dates which are dear to the hearts of Cape May beach-town Chambers of Commerce, municipal governments, and others who crave tourist dollars far more than the well being of nesting birds.

I think at worst, a fast one and a minor publicity stunt were pulled off on the part of the DEP, and at best, this is a barometer for just how weak New Jersey’s environemntal lobby truly is.

While I wish I could think of a more articulate way of expressing the sentiment, at the moment, the blunt seems perfectly apt. I think even a so called partial opening of this little gem and the inevitable disturbance to the nesting birds it will cause, just plain sucks.

CJV

A short note on midsummer eve Birds in Cape May

There were 9 Lesser Black-back at south Cape May, including the second summer, and the funky dark-backed near adult, today.

One Brown Pelican heading South was worth mentioning, a Royal Tern or two were roosting on the beach as well, and a Least Bittern has taken up clucking near the heavily brushy spot where the old platform used to be, the last couple of times I walked it.

Ring-billed Gulls are also far more in evidence on the beach this June than is typical.

Otherwise, the odd eastern Willet is already heading south over the sea at Cape May Point. Willets arrive in April, do their business, and get out as early as is decent. Fall is nigh upon us, while the pendulum of the solstice has yet to even turn towards the downswing.

Neat.

CJV

Providing a very odd late June record, an immature male Hooded Merganser was admirably found by Keith Seager this morning in the Cove Pool at the Meadows, reached from the dead-end Mt. Vernon Avenue.

The bird was most convincingly imitating a clod of marsh while it slept among the little islands there.

While odd late-summer records of non-breeding Hooded Mergs are not entirely unheard of (like the one who was in the State Park last summer), breeding-season records are more unusual. While clearly a non-breeder, the 19th of June is a downright odd time of year for one to be on Cape Island.

Otherwise, a bit of seawatching from the Point revealed a most cooperative hunting Roseate Tern. While Forster’s are very long-tailed, the stream-linedness of this bird made it stand out immediately. While Forsters seem to show a bit of rough edge on the vent, the lines of a Roseate are all aerodynamic. If the elegance of the jizz, and the black bill were not enough, the concolorous whitish of the beast, with no contrasting rump, made it more than a bit obvious as it flew by.

Wonderful bird.

Three male Surf Scoters were around Second Avenue, and I think there are a few more Gadwall around Cape Island than I had thought. There were five in the Cove Pool today, and there were five in the Lighthouse Pond the last time I looked. When added to the duos and trios in the Meadows and the Plover Ponds, it seems like there are more like just shy of 20 hanging out at Land’s End.

CJV

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Recently Written

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