This evening, while biking around Meadow Lake in Flushing Meadow - Corona Park
in Queens County, I went to a large, shallow wet area which had held a high
number of shorebirds last Friday evening. ("Large" number meaning 30-40, which
is the highest count I have seen in this park in over 15 years of biking and
birding there.) While enjoying taking close-up looks at each and every
shorebird, mostly juvenile Least and Semipalmated Sandpipers, I was rewarded
with the sighting of a Wilson's Phalarope, also a juvenile as it turns out
after looking at the guides back home.
The best way to get to this spot is to exit the southbound Van Wyck Expressway
at Harry Van Arsdale/Jewel Ave. and enter the park almost immediately as you
exit. (If you reach the avenue you've gone too far.) Parking should be
available nearby. Walk towards the lake in front of you - this is the western
shore. There is a 2.5 mile perimeter path that goes around the lake used by
strollers, joggers, and bicyclists. When you reach this road, look for the spot
on the shore where the phragmites start. In this area you'll see the large wet
area just east of the perimeter path. The phalarope was favoring the
easternmost part of the wet area.
All three phalaropes have now been reported from this park. I saw a Red-necked
in 2000, and a great sighting of a Red Phalarope was reported, I believe, in
May 2011.
Karlo Mirth
Forest Park, NY
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