Sue and I spent a nice low humidity/bugless morning at the west end of Dune Road, starting at Pike's Beach. Pike's Beach had the usual shorebirds in fair numbers with the only bird of note a single White-rumped Sandpiper. At Cupsogue Co. Park we waded across the marsh drain to take a look at the terns that always seem to gather as far away from a stable viewing platform as possible. We quickly picked up four Roseate Terns as well two first summer Common Terns. Scattered among the group of terns that we estimated at 170 birds were two immature Forster's Terns. We came upon an interesting looking tern among the Commons, and preliminarily identified it as an Arctic Tern (it was sleeping with head tucked in). We were joined on the flat by Ken Thompson and we continued to study this individual, an adult except for some salt and pepper plumage on the forehead. The bird finally woke up and we were able to see it both in direct comparison to a nearby Common Tern as well as in flight and stretching its wings. A few photos can be seen at:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/kfeustel/ We proceeded to the Calverton Grasslands (aka Old Grumman Property and/or Enterprise Park at Calverton) where there was a good amount of activity despite the afternoon hour. We recorded American Kestrel, Horned Lark, Grasshopper Sparrow and Eastern Meadowlark as well as a cool looking Red-tailed Hawk (at flickr site). Ken & Sue Feustel -- NYSbirds-L List Info: http://www.NortheastBirding.com/NYSbirdsWELCOME http://www.NortheastBirding.com/NYSbirdsRULES http://www.NortheastBirding.com/NYSbirdsSubscribeConfigurationLeave.htm ARCHIVES: 1) http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]/maillist.html 2) http://www.surfbirds.com/birdingmail/Group/NYSBirds-L 3) http://birdingonthe.net/mailinglists/NYSB.html Please submit your observations to eBird: http://ebird.org/content/ebird/ --
