The 59th Captree Christmas Bird Count, in southwestern Suffolk County, was conducted on Sunday, December 19th, 2021. The count had an impressive showing of participants who were thankfully able to dutifully cover their areas, all while continuing to take strict COVID-19 precautions. The day started off with less-than ideal weather; with scattered early-morning showers which eventually dried out, but the weather ended up turning windier than desirable.
After a small cold snap earlier in the fall, sustained higher-than-average regional temperatures (including those north of us) provided a similar pattern to other Long Island CBC's: numbers of seabirds were very low (9 Surf Scoter, 31 White-winged Scoter, 79 Black Scoter, 12 Common Eider, 0 Razorbill) and numbers of half-hardy birds were well represented. Continuing to echo other CBC's, we broke our previous high count of White-throated Sparrows with 1,097 and completely missed Bonaparte's Gull- a species which, while declining on Long Island CBC's generally, was so numerous last year as to set a new high total. Fish Crow and Brown-headed Cowbird numbers were also remarkably low, with only 19 and 2 observed, respectively. In addition, and unsurprisingly, all "winter finches" except Purple Finch were missed. The greatest disappointment was certainly the fact that the previous day's Northern Lapwing (found at Santapogue Creek, in the Gardiner Territory, by Mike Vedder) had vanished overnight and was not seen on the count day. Amazingly, that was one of three new Captree CBC additions to the checklist alongside Short-billed Dowitcher (Gardiner) and Clay-colored Sparrow (Seatuck)- though these latter two species were seen on the count day. A putative Great black-backed by Herring Gull hybrid would be an additional "form" for this checklist, too. On count day, 36,391 individual birds of an impressive 128 species were counted. This species total is equal to last year (tying our ten-year max), but well above the 59-year average of 116 species and ten-year average of 121. A sampling of our more unusual birds (ordered somewhat taxonomically) are listed below: Cackling Goose - East Canvasback - Gardiner Red Knot - Fire Harlequin Duck - East Red-necked Grebe - Fire Virginia Rail - Seatuck & East American Oystercatcher - Jones Long-billed Dowitcher - Gardiner Short-billed Dowitcher - Gardiner American Woodcock - Seatuck Wilson's Snipe - Seatuck Great Black-backed x Herring Gull - Belmont American Bittern - East Great Egret - Belmont & Heckscher Black-crowned Night Heron - Gardiner & East Red-shouldered Hawk - Belmont Northern Saw-whet Owl - Seatuck & East Eastern Bluebird - Connetquot Marsh Wren - Gardiner, Seatuck, & East Purple Finch - North Palm Warbler - Fire & Jones Pine Warbler - Connetquot & Seatuck Orange-crowned Warbler - Belmont, Seatuck, & Heckscher Clay-colored Sparrow - Seatuck "Ipswich" Sparrow - Gardiner Rusty Blackbird - Belmont Eastern Meadowlark - Gardiner, North, Heckscher, & East In addition to what was observed on count day, observers had three excellent count-week birds: the aforementioned Northern Lapwing (Gardiner), Eastern Phoebe (Gardiner), and a very late Blue-headed Vireo (Gardiner). Unfortunately a Lapland Longspur found yesterday by Joan Q at Robert Moses was just outside the count week! As mentioned above, White-throated Sparrow represented a new high count. Additional new maxima included Canada Goose (9,322), Greater Yellowlegs (14), Great Horned Owl (7), Northern Saw-whet Owl (5), Common Raven (18- prev. 4), Chipping Sparrow (11), & Pine Warbler (5), among others. Thankfully we didn't come close to touching 1971's high count of European Starling which was 150,000. While some numbers were low, we luckily managed to avoid too many unbelievable misses (though certainly more than we would have liked!). Some species which are scarce and tough to pin down like Wild Turkey and Great Cormorant were missed. So too were species which can sometimes be reliable but have been hard to find this winter such as Bonaparte's Gull, American Pipit, Razorbill, and Common Grackle. Snowy Owl was also a miss, despite it apparently being a good winter for them in our region. Once again, concerns for the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic precluded the ability to have an in-person compilation, which is always one of the real highlights of the day. Instead a compilation was held over Zoom on December 22. Earlier in the fall, when the COVID-numbers were looking more optimistic, an in-person compilation was tentatively scheduled at the Seatuck Environmental Association's Scully Estate. As such, we would like to extend our gratitude for originally agreeing to host us. We hope to have an in-person compilation next year, provided it is safe to do so. We would also like to extend our gratitude to the New York State Parks Department, US Fish and Wildlife Service, and the Town of Babylon. We are grateful that these agencies permit our count participants to access various parks, wildlife refuges, etc. which may be typically restricted to the public. The results of this count will be shared with the Audubon Society, USFWS, Great South Bay Audubon, and anyone else who requests a summary. Thank you very much to our area leaders and all participants, both long-time veterans and newcomers, who joined the count. Please do not hesitate to reach out if you're interested in joining this Christmas Bird Count for next year- tentatively scheduled for December 18, 2022! Best wishes for the holiday season, Co-compilers Brent Bomkamp and Taylor Sturm -- 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/nysbirds-l@cornell.edu/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/ --
