Category: birding

I photographed 2 species at Mt. A today:

Which one was more exciting?

Just made a little update to the Charles page, where there’s now a link to a spreadsheet that breaks the birds down by location.

Also have one for the Western Greenway, will link that to the Paine and Beaver Brook pages eventually. Still need to add Bentley, Forest St fields, and Shady’s Pond. Key to the locations on there:

• Habitat
• McLean: trails on the McLean property (opposite Rock Meadow driveway to start)
• Rock Meadow
• Met State: Beaver Brook North from Rock Meadow to the Avalon apartments (including the area around the McLaughlin building)
• BBDP: Beaver Brook ponds
• BB: Beaver Brook reservation (Trapelo/Waverly Oaks Rd)
• Lot 1: Falzone field and vicinity (including some of the development along Walnut/Woburn St)
• West Meadow: trail west of Avalon, the meadow itself out to Walnut/Woburn St and the edges of the development there
• Concord Ave: along Concord Ave from the Avalon entrance or so down to Rock Meadow, including the transfer station, edge of the golf course, and the big marsh with the radio towers
• Fernald: all the Fernald land
• Cedar Hill: girl scout camp
• Lawrence Meadow: corner of Waverly Oaks Rd and Beaver St (not sure about access)
• Waverly Oaks Marsh: marsh behind the office park next to Beaver Brook
• Lyman Pond: behind Gardencrest
• Lyman Estate
• Paine Estate: Storer conservation land
• UMass: UMass Field station on Beaver St
• Chesterbrook: Waltham High School, Kennedy Middle School, the trail running from the high school to the YMCA, the YMCA, Northeast School, etc.

X is my sighting, O is someone else’s when I don’t have one. Obviously there are a lot of O’s missing. I’ve gone through most emails from the last few years (the sharing is new, not the spreadsheets) and eBird for the hotspots but there’s plenty more out there.

I took a walk around the Waltham St. Fields for snipe yesterday. Or at least I started to, halfway around I bumped into these guys and couldn’t check the rest of the fields:

Two young Greater White-fronted Geese!

Sun was pretty bad there but note pinkish bills.

I ran home to post them and then returned to show my parents. Scoping from the street they looked more orange-billed (not that the bills show here):

Marj soon showed up and we reentered the fields and were able to get fairly close. Bill color looks a bit pinker again but the right one is still quite orange. Also note how little (if any) white there is on that one, seems rather late to be so limited.

I finally got around to checking the Watertown side of the Charles on Saturday. Nothing unexpected but there was a good lesson in there.

At the bridge over the river, I had one Ring-neck, a couple Hoodies, and at least 15 black ducks mixed in with the Mallards. Crossing the bridge, I decided it was probably a good idea to put on the yaktrax-type things (first time I’ve done so and they’re well worth it). Down at the first overlook there was a small flock of Common Mergansers. On a later scan, one of the females looked a bit smaller and thinner-billed and had a dusky chest. Red-breasted! A quick snap or two and off I went.

Further down was a flock of Ring-necks and a young male goldeneye.

Reaching Bridge St, I moved to the other side of the river and headed back. A Cooper’s was feasting (bad light so no photo right now). Back at the Ring-necks, I noticed a second young goldeneye.

The merganser was here as well (at least it wasn’t back with the others so I assume it was the same).

With the Watertown section completed, I decided I might as well check the Waltham side too. A couple Fish Crows were calling in the parking lot and most of the Mallards and geese were on land. Down at the Newton St overlook were the two coots and a few Ring-necks.

Crossing over, there were about 30 more Ring-necks here (no scaup though) and a couple more goldeneye including an adult male.

I decided to continue walking to Moody and Prospect St. That part’s still totally frozen and there were no interesting gulls on the ice. At the little opening by Prospect St, I found one Common Merganser in with the Mallards and after extended scanning, finally picked up the American Wigeon. On the way back, two Fish Crows were chasing a Red-tail around. At the fruiting trees I heard a waxwing and eventually found a flock of about 16 nearby. Hopefully they’ll take a few days to get through all the food.

Back at Elm St, the yellow-billed goldeneye was back and looked slightly more like a Barrow’s today (comments please).

Pretty quiet from here back to the car. However, at the bridge there was a close merganser that I presumed was again the same.

Back at the car, I spent a few minutes going through the gulls (a Russo’s truck was dumping baked goods and created quite a frenzy). Nothing unusual and I couldn’t refind the tagged one but Fish Crows were up to 5. From here it was back home.

Back at home, I quickly downloaded photos and sent out a quick message. A few hours later I went to enter the day into Avisys and pulled up the photos again. Suddenly the bill on the merganser didn’t look quite so long and thin and the first shot was showing a really strong contrast between the head and neck. Outside of the chest and white loral stripe, it looked pretty normal for a Common. Guessing a bit of retained juvenal plumage (and the small size means it was a late hatch?). Another reminder to go over every feature.

Near Elm St Sunday

Presumably new bird and appears to be a yellowish-billed Common. A few more photos in the flickr set.

Also took a couple shots of the Lesser Scaup:

Naptime.

Still haven’t looked at my pictures, but here’s WCAC’s news report:

And some additional footage: