Today being Christmas Bird Count day, I rose before dawn, had a good-sized breakfast, took dog out, and set off for the Rockland Breakwater, where I met fellow counters Kristen, Paul, Ron, Joe, and Paula. The sun rose in a golden line along the southeastern horizon. That golden line turned out to be a remnant clear patch, though, because the rest of the sky had gone overcast. In fact, it just might’ve been the coldest morning of the season—which didn’t surprise me, considering our recent run of frigid, icy CBC weather—but there wasn’t much wind, and the walk out across the harbor seemed almost mild.

Highlights were a fast-moving merlin, four species of gull (I only saw three, having missed the great black-backed), horned and red-necked grebes, surf scoters, and a seal. Oh, and the fact that it began to snow.

And the snow grew heavier and continued for the rest of the morning. We walked the grounds of the Samoset Resort, where our friend Don had seen a lesser scaup in one of the ponds along the golf course. Yep, there it was, in the falling snow. Meanwhile, about a hundred Canada geese played through, which was not exactly a surprise. Then Ron thought he heard a yellow-rumped warbler and crashed off into the woods to look for it. And by-God-found it. (It turned out to be the only warbler seen in our entire section today.)

After that we took a little side-trip to a yard in the neighborhood, where a red-bellied woodpecker had been reported at a backyard feeder, and we found that, too. (Kristen spotted it first.) Also tree sparrows, titmice, chickadees, hairy woodpeckers, starlings, a mourning dove, a song sparrow. It turned out to be a productive little side-trip.

Not much at the Sea View Cemetery, but Clam Cove delivered a Bonaparte’s gull and an eagle. And a stop up at the entrance to the Bear Hill subdivision proved fruitful: three hooded merganser, two females and a male. (The male kept chasing one of the females around, and not in a loving way.) And at Chickawaukie Lake, we counted about six hundred coots.

Then we stopped for lunch and conversation, and I skipped out on the afternoon.

Since Jack had been home alone for about six hours, on my return we took off for Beech Hill. A nice, brisk hike. You could see the huge raft of Chickawaukie coots all the way from up there. And I heard the voice of a crow.

Tonight it’s cold. I do believe the coldest night of the season so far (although not particularly cold for this season). Me? I’m still thinking about all those birds.

(You’ll find a few more photos below.)

Beech Hill List
Beginning at 2:30 p.m., I hiked the open trail.

1. American coot
2. American crow

Elsewhere

3. Black-capped chickadee
4. House sparrow
5. House finch
6. American goldfinch
7. Canada goose
8. Northern mockingbird
9. Herring gull
10. Mallard
11. Horned grebe
12. Black duck
13. Common goldeneye
14. Great cormorant
15. Ring-billed gull
16. Common loon
17. Common eider
18. Red-breasted merganser
19. Bonaparte’s gull
20. Long-tailed duck
21. Red-necked grebe
22. Merlin
23. Surf scoter
24. Black guillemot
25. Northern flicker
26. Bufflehead
27. Lesser scaup
28. Bald eagle
29. Tufted titmouse
30. European starling
31. American tree sparrow
32. Song sparrow
33. Hairy woodpecker
34. White-breasted nuthatch
35. Mourning dove
36. Red-bellied woodpecker
37. Northern cardinal
38. Hooded merganser

Tags: American coot, American crow, American goldfinch, American tree sparrow, bald eagle, black duck, black guillemot, black-capped chickadee, Bonaparte's gull, bufflehead, Canada goose, common eider, common goldeneye, common loon, European starling, great cormorant, hairy woodpecker, herring gull, hooded merganser, horned grebe, house finch, house sparrow, lesser scaup, long-tailed duck, mallard, merlin, mourning dove, northern cardinal, northern flicker, northern mockingbird, red-bellied woodpecker, red-breasted merganser, red-necked grebe, ring-billed gull, surf scoter, tufted titmouse, white-breasted nuthatch

This entry was posted on Saturday, December 17th, 2011 at 11:21 pm and is filed under Lists, Observations. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.