[texbirds] GCBO Smith Point HW, 23 Oct
- From: Tony Leukering <greatgrayowl@xxxxxxx>
- To: texbirds@xxxxxxxxxxxxx, Sk8inginfo@xxxxxxx, coturnicops@xxxxxxxxx, sam.galick@xxxxxxxxx, tsweet@xxxxxxxxxxx, mpeterson33@xxxxxxxxx, bmaynard99@xxxxxxxxx, ellendunnking@xxxxxxxxx
- Date: Tue, 23 Oct 2012 20:39:27 -0400 (EDT)
Hi all:
The day started with Franklin's Gulls, yet again. This time, they didn't even
wait for me to get to the tower. Instead, I saw the first flock, of 7
(http://www.flickr.com/photos/tony_leukering/8117554520/in/photostream), over
the town on my way to work. The next flock went by the tower shortly before 9
am (a flock of 11 --
http://www.flickr.com/photos/tony_leukering/8117554762/in/photostream/).
American White Pelicans, after a slow start, put on a good show, with 574 in 14
flocks, with three of those each numbering >100. The stream of westbound
Northern Rough-winged Swallows, while lessened in magnitude from previous
weeks, continued today unabated. With a couple of sample counts, I figure that
another 1200 or so went by. In contrast, I noted only five Barn Swallows, 10
Tree Swallows, and a couple of late Cliff Swallows. Two immature Magnificent
Frigatebirds continue, being distantly visible from the tower twice today, to
the happiness of my second visitor of the day late in the afternoon.
Bird of the Day: About 9.:35, I noticed a yellow-bellied kingbird popping over
the NW motte and perching with a small handful of Euro Starlings. I got the
scope on it and, yowzer, a Cassin's! I thought that it might be a reasonably
"good" bird here, so snapped a few very distant pix of it. I then checked the
eBird database for the county and noted no records in that extensive database,
so I really hoped that it would come a lot closer. I figured that I had gotten
at least identifiable pix of it
(http://www.flickr.com/photos/tony_leukering/8117541938/in/photostream/), but I
wanted better; a lot better, and I told the bird so. Fortunately, about that
time, a foraging Northern Harrier kicked all the birds off the top of that tree
(http://www.flickr.com/photos/tony_leukering/8117529755/in/photostream/) and
the kingbird headed straight for the platform
(http://www.flickr.com/photos/tony_leukering/8117529349/in/photostream/). It
kept coming, so I kept shooting it
(http://www.flickr.com/photos/tony_leukering/8117541510/in/photostream/) until
it was nearly point-blank (it's looking right at me here --
http://www.flickr.com/photos/tony_leukering/8117542262/in/photostream/).
Unfortunately, it came close enough to upset my camera's estimation of
lighting, so overexposed the closest picture, thus allowing wing motion with
the slower shutter speed
(http://www.flickr.com/photos/tony_leukering/8117530177/in/photostream/). Once
by the tower, it joined a couple of Scissor-tailed Flycatchers in the
Rattleboxes and sunflowers near the water's edge. Of course, by that time, a
few raptors had finally decided to get out of bed, so I had to pay attention to
them, and never saw the kingbird again. Depending upon the source, this bird
accounts for something like the 2nd or 7th UTC record of the species. Nice!
Continuing the theme from yesterday's largish Turkey Vulture flight that Tad
Finnell counted on my day off, once they got going, there was almost never a
point at which there were <100 in view. The species is notoriously difficult
to count at peninsulas, and Smith Point is no exception. I tallied 463 today,
which may have been close to accurate or been wildly incorrect on the low side.
A bit after noon, I spotted a largish, buteoish, paddle-winged thing that I
recognized for the second Harris's Hawk of the season. It was around for the
rest of the day, off and on, but it never ventured at all close, so my pix are
nowhere near as good as those of the first one this season. Though I will be
comparing pix of the two occurrences to be sure that they were of different
individuals, this bird had some feather molt apparent in the primaries and
secondaries, and its tail feathers were a bit trashed, features that I think
the first bird lacked. We'll see. I tallied another 28 American Kestrels,
including FIVE between 4:52 and 4:54, just a few minutes before I ended the
count for the day. Thus, if my math is correct or, really, my memory of the
record seasonal count number, I've got 41 to go to tie.
Thanks to Andy, once again, for helping spot and count various waterbirds and
other stuff. He also found the day's only Merlin as he was loading his car to
leave. The bird had flown behind me (I was counting vultures at the time) and
landed on one of the dead trees to the east, staying there for quite some time,
before slipping away unseen; I did not count it.
Raptors counted (count conducted by Gulf Coast Bird Observatory):
Turkey Vulture 463
Osprey 2
Northern Harrier 39 (a new high for the season; 7 ad m, 1 ad f, 25 brown, 6 juv)
Sharp-shinned Hawk 23
Cooper's Hawk 34 (once again, as for most of this season, on days with
Broad-winged flights -- and 40 is a 'flight' this late in the season, the
Sharpie:Cooper's ratio was skewed to Coops)
Harris's Hawk 1
Broad-winged Hawk 40 (all juvs)
Swainson's Hawk 3 (all light juvs, the final one with some mangled outer
primaries on its left wing)
American Kestrel 28
Peregrine Falcon 3 (2j, 1u)
Total 636
Enjoy,
Tony
Tony Leukering
Villas, NJ
http://copyeditinggonebad.blogspot.com/
http://capemaymoths.blogspot.com/
http://cfobirds.blogspot.com/
http://aba.org/photoquiz/
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