In case anyone was missing all that tern talk - never fear, I got you covered!
Breezy was very busy yesterday in the late afternoon. There were hundreds of gulls (mostly Herring and Great Black-backed), and hundreds of terns (mostly Common, and Least). But highlights included one ROSEATE TERN and one LESSER BLACK-BACKED GULL. The LBBG seems to be the same one that has been there since late June, and in my experience, has always been in the same place - directly in front of you, or just to the left as the 4 x 4 path opens out onto the beach. The terns were mostly feeding on the ocean, making sorting through them difficult. There was one group that was usually around 30 birds or so loafing around the point. This group did not seem to have much turn around, as I kept finding the same first summer bird and second summer type in it. There was a second group loafing near the base of the jetty, on the bay side, which seemed to rotate more. Below are my ebird report, and pictures on Flickr. I tried to include the variation in age and appearance of the birds that were there. There were at least 6 first summer COTEs, and about as many second summer types. That said, I didn't discover the bay side loafers until about an hour before I was going to leave, and I feel fairly confident that with more scrutiny, that group could have produced even more interesting birds. The numbers were certainly high enough that I would expect some more surprises could have been there with more examination. Ebird: https://ebird.org/view/checklist/S47101870 Photos: https://www.flickr.com/photos/129132563@N05/with/42601039154/ As always, happy terning, Tripper -- 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/ --
