Lower Neuse Bird Club

Transcription

1 January 2019 Volume 27 Issue 4 Editor: Michael Cheves, LowerNeuseBirdClub@gmail.com Club Officers President Bob Gould Vice President Volunteer Needed Secretary Mike Brooks Treasurer Christine Stoughton Root A Note From the President By Bob Gould, President Welcome back again to the January restart to our monthly meetings. It s been a hectic several months for many of us, and it will be good to get back to some semblance of a routine. Garber is still supporting disaster relief teams, so we may be playing musical rooms for a while- please bear with us. As usual, I could use some help on monthly programs. Let me know if you have ideas or can help! Best regards, Bob Field Trips Al Gamache Newsletter Editor Michael Cheves Refreshments Captain Sally Rowe Agassiz NWR, MN Photo credit: fws.gov January Program: Birding Minne-snow-ta, by Les Coble Tuesday, January 8, 2019 at 6:30 PM Meetings are held at Garber United Methodist Church, Country Club Road, New Bern, in the Ministry Center across the street from the main church. Parking and entrance are at the rear of the building. Join us for refreshments & conversation for the first half hour; meeting begins at 7 PM. There will be a show & tell period. Anyone with interesting photographs, frozen specimens or other unique discoveries may share their findings with the club during this time. Refreshments for this meeting are being provided by Sally Rowe.

2 Page # 2 Thank you to Mary Deckert and Chris Town for hosting the LNBC Christmas Party. It was wellattended, with plenty of food and festivity for all. Carolina Bird Club Meeting Dates Jan , 2019 Nags Head, NC Outstanding Birds Xpected, by Christine Stoughton Root and Les Coble May 3-5, 2019 Southern Pines, NC More info at carolinabirdclub.org Thanks also to Liz Lathrop for hosting the Pamlico CBC meetup. All the count participants were treated to a great selection of food and refreshments. January Field Trip The January field trip will be on January 5, We will be birding the New Bern area for ducks, and whatever else we can find. We will depart from the parking lot of the Bridge Pointe Hotel at 7 AM sharp. Carpools can be arranged as we meet up. Stay tuned to for information on upcoming field trips! LNBC Membership Dues annual membership dues are $15 per person and cover the program year from September 2018 through May Dues may be paid at a monthly meeting, or you may send them directly to: Christine Stoughton Root, LNBC Treasurer 651 Quail Road Merritt, NC Checks should be made payable to LNBC. Please be sure to notify Christine of any changes to your contact information. Pamlico CBC meetup at Liz s, 12/18/18. Photo by Lynn Hines.

3 Page #3 Volume 27, Issue 4 A New Hotspot for Craven County By Michael Cheves If you have glanced at the Craven County listings on ebird.org recently, you have probably noticed that the Glenburnie Quarry is now the top hotspot in our area. Thanks to Shelley Rutkin, our regional hotspot reviewer, for fixing the GPS marker and setting up this hotspot, and also to everyone who has submitted their checklists so far. Let s keep it going! So far, the total number of species reported to ebird from the Quarry is 169. If you have old checklists on ebird that used personal locations at the Quarry, please consider merging them into the new hotspot location ( My ebird on the desktop site, go to Manage My Locations, click on the appropriate location, and use the merge option when prompted). The Quarry (A.K.A. the future Martin Marietta Park ) is open to the public during daylight hours, beginning at 7:30 AM daily. It is accessible by foot or by bicycle (no motorized vehicles permitted). Some good birding can be found there without the need to go in too far, but be prepared for up to 2 miles if you want to survey the reservoir for waterfowl. A more thorough survey of the Quarry will require up to 5 miles of travel. Clockwise from left: Entrance to the Quarry, the Quarry as usually depicted in the Sun Journal, and a selection of the waterfowl that wintered at the Quarry from All photos by Michael Cheves Welcome to our newest member, Julia Thomson! Julia recently moved to New Bern from Connecticut, and was introduced to LNBC by Olwen Jarvis. Welcome, Julia! jthomson@walkerthomson.net

4 Page # 4 First Saturday: 01 December, Pamlico County By Al Gamache A tiny white goose with black wingtips, the Ross s Goose is like a miniature version of the more abundant Snow Goose. It breeds in the central Arctic and winters primarily in central California, but it is becoming more frequent farther east Photo by Michael Cheves Text from Allaboutbirds.org The did its annual December Pamlico County Bird Walk. We had twelve birders, the walk was very productive, giving us a total of 64 species, and the bird of the day, the Ross s Goose. On the way driving back to New Bern, I read down on the checklist to Bob, Michael, and Ronnie and got sixty-four species. We all thought that number was a bit high. So we counted down again, this time more carefully, and still came up with sixty-four. 64, it was! The itinerary started out at the City of Oriental W.T.P., then the Water Front at Oriental, the River Dunes W.T.P., and finally the Bayboro W.T.P. three settling ponds. Of particular interest to me was the strange state of affairs with respect to gulls. Back in early September when Hurricane Florence was brewing up, all of a sudden there was a mandatory evacuation, we left and ended up in Vermont. Eleven days later, we returned to New Bern. Our house had not flooded, this was most fortunate, but we had massive tree damage. And for the next several weeks, I would take time to take little breaks and go birding, and I was mostly puzzled by the total absence of gulls. Not a gull to be seen anywhere. It was really quite eerie. In fact, it wasn t until October 30th, that s like thirty-seven days later, that I was able to find a gull, four of them at the Quarry. Although during the month of November, gulls slowly began to return to our area. However, this time, they were all of one species, Ring-billed Gulls, everywhere, but not a single Laughing. So you can imagine my surprise and my delight on this Bird Walk when suddenly, there were gulls all over the place. And not only lots of gulls, but six different species of gulls. Super! Bonaparte s Gulls Ring-billed Gulls Laughing Gulls Great Black-backed Gulls Herring Gulls even a Lesser Black-backed Gull Other standouts were the eleven species of ducks: No. Shoveler R.N. Duck Gadwall L. Scaup Am. Wigeon Surf Scoter Mallard Black Scoter Bufflehead Hooded Merganser Ruddy Duck A Northern Harrier and an American Kestrel while driving along agricultural fields. American Pipts spotted by Christine Root, and a bit later a Field Sparrow spotted by sharp-eyed Michael Cheves who chocks it up to his ability to stare at a bush for a long time. One Lesser Yellowlegs and eight Greater Yellowlegs at the River Dunes W.T.P. piping out a multiple ringing chorus of Tu, Tu, Tu s. And of the warblers, we ll give it to the Palm Warbler. But it was when we got to the Bayboro W.T.P., and we walked out to the high pond on the far end, the four of us stood, staring into our scopes, focusing on this most beautiful pure white goose with the cutest little bill that you ever did see, looking as though he had been poking around in some lichen with this gray green stuff stuck to the base of its bill. The Ross s Goose, with its small human shape of a nose bill, black dot of an eye, white brightness of body, sharp black primary at the back: Everything so pleasingly and perfectly placed Simply a delight to one s eye. Al Gamache

5 Page #5 Volume 27, Issue 4 Pamlico County Birds for 01 December 2018 Ross s Goose Canada Goose Northern Shoveler Gadwall American Wigeon Mallard Ring-necked Duck Lesser Scaup Surf Scoter Black Scoter Bufflehead Hooded Merganser Ruddy Duck Mourning Dove Killdeer Greater Yellowlegs Lesser Yellowlegs Bonaparte s Gull Laughing Gull Ring-billed Gull Herring Gull Lesser Black-backed Gull Great Black-backed Gull Royal Tern Common Loon Double-crested Cormorant Great Blue Heron Turkey Vulture Northern Harrier Red-shouldered Hawk Belted Kingfisher Yellow-bellied Sapsucker Red-bellied Woodpecker Downy Woodpecker Northern Flicker American Kestrel Eastern Phoebe Blue Jay American Crow Tree Swallow Carolina Chickadee Tufted Titmouse Brown-headed Nuthatch House Wren Carolina Wren Golden-crowned Kinglet Ruby-crowned Kinglet Eastern Bluebird American Robin Brown Thrasher Northern Mockingbird European Starling American Pipit American Goldfinch Field Sparrow Dark-eyed Junco White-throated Sparrow Song Sparrow Swamp Sparrow Red-winged Blackbird Common Grackle Palm Warbler Yellow-rumped Warbler Northern Cardinal Ross s with Canada Goose, Bayboro W.T.P. 12/1/18