After seeing the Guillemot and getting some fairly close pictures (thanks to the sacrifice made by Mr. A.G.) , Andrew Baksh and I went over to Shinnecock. I didn't see Carl Starace's post until I got home, so the amount of activity there came as quite a surprise. When we pulled up around 1:45, there were Northern Gannets in the inlet (mostly toward the mouth), some plunge diving. There were Bonaparte's Gulls diving as well. I mentioned to Andrew how Shinnecock (along with Jones Inet) used to be a fabuolous place for Bonaparte's and the other hooded gulls, and that I hadn't seen this many Bonies here in years. No sooner had I said to be on the lookout for the other species, did an adult CO. BLACK-HEADED GULL fly right towards us and then into the bay. We later had this experience again, but it very well could have been the same bird flying back in without us having seen it fly out. Inside the bay were hundreds of Common Eiders, mostly due north of inlet around the sandbar. A good number of them were hauled out on the sandbar.
By the time we made our way out toward the mouth, the gannet activity had shifted back into the ocean, mainly to the east of the inlet. A few Common Eider, Black and Surf Scoters were around the tips of the two jetties. More interesting were the large number of diving birds outside the inlet, mostly Red-throated Loons. Andrew announced that he had a Red-necked Grebe and had me look at it in his scope. My reaction was that if it's a grebe, it's not a Red-necked -- and I did think it was a grebe. The bird was far out, therefore the difficulty in assessing what we were seeing. I thought I saw a yellowish bill, a sharp dark cap, and the body sitting higher above the water than I expect in a loon. I got in contact with Tom Burke, who was up at Iron Beach unsuccessfully looking for a Western / Clark's Grebe reported from there. He asked if the body looked squarish. Andrew commented that it looked "box" shaped. It then disappeared, perhaps behind the east jetty, and we couldn't relocate it for further evaluation. So without crying wolf, I'll just say there could be an interesting bird to look for -- in addtion to the Black-headed Gull. Steve Walter Bayside, NY -- NYSbirds-L List Info: http://www.NortheastBirding.com/NYSbirdsWELCOME http://www.NortheastBirding.com/NYSbirdsRULES Archives: 1) http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]/maillist.html 2) http://birdingonthe.net/mailinglists/NYSB.html Please submit your observations to eBird: http://ebird.org/content/ebird/ --
