We headed out east today to bird the Montauk area. We began the day at dawn at Montauk Pt. where Sue quickly spotted a female King Eider with two Common Eider in front of the restaurant. Birds were scarce at the Point, with many of the eider and scoter well offshore. A dismal Razorbill flight (6 birds) did not dampen our enthusiasm as we were soon rewarded with great looks at a winter adult Little Gull, flashing his dark underwings as he leisurely passed the restaurant (photos on my flickr site) with a few Bonaparte’s Gulls.
After leaving the point we turned our attention to locating the previously reported Black Guillemot at Lake Montauk. We were having no luck looking south from the commercial fishing dock until reinforcements arrived in the person of Ed Becher and Bob Proniewych. Ed quickly found the bird in the channel east of Star Island. We then proceeded down West Lake Drive to the jetties where a snappy looking first winter Iceland Gull was observed. While watching the gull we were suddenly surrounded by two Town of East Hampton police cars. We were informed that Coast Guard personnel had alerted the police that two suspicious characters had been training their cameras (spotting scopes) on the Coast Guard Station. The Coast Guard had obtained our license plate number and the EH police presumably ran our plates - we were caught! Things were quickly straightened out but the police wanted to know about a gray car with two males (Ed and Bob) who were also observed behaving suspiciously. We briefly thought about telling the cops we did not know these men but we thought they were speaking Russian and were headed for Montauk Pt. We thought the better of the idea, and our fellow birders never realized how close they came to being apprehended. The rest of the day we headed back west, stopping at Wainscott Pond - no Sandhill Crane but our FOY Eastern Meadowlarks (4). At Shinnecock Inlet we picked up Harlequin Duck (3), Snowy Owl (1), and Iceland Gull (1). The Dune Road American Bittern briefly showed in the marsh grass before stalking off. Happy birding, Ken & Sue Feustel http://www.flickr.com/photos/kfeustel/ -- NYSbirds-L List Info: http://www.NortheastBirding.com/NYSbirdsWELCOME.htm http://www.NortheastBirding.com/NYSbirdsRULES.htm 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://birding.aba.org/maillist/NY01 Please submit your observations to eBird: http://ebird.org/content/ebird/ --
