Yellow-billed Goldeneyes

Today, after doing some scouting for the Concord CBC (which is now on hold after finding my territory all ice and deep water), I headed over to the Charles for a few minutes. It was on the quiet side (no mergansers, only 1 ring-neck) but the first goldeneye of the winter had arrived. Interestingly, the female had an entirely pale bill. With a bunch of Barrow’s reported lately (including one at Fresh Pond), I got excited for a couple seconds, but it was shaped more like a Common.

Note that the head is slicked down a bit in the first photo.

Yellow-billed Common Goldeneye

Yellow-billed Common Goldeneye

Update: John Crookes found this bird independently and has a much better photo of it (with the male). Anyone want to go over the ID again?

Another update: I’ve posted 3 more photos, with a second bird for comparison.

Interestingly, I had a very similar bird here a couple years ago (January 2005). Two photos of that one are below.

Previous Goldeneye

Previous Goldeneye

The previous one seems a bit more intermediate in shape, although I’m not sure whether that means anything. If you have any feedback on these birds, I’d like to hear it.

More photos:

Place 12 – Gore Estate

The Gore Estate is another place in Waltham that’s worth a stop for the birds and history. The majority of the estate is open fields, but there’s a wooded section with a small stream that attracts a good number of birds.

As the home of an early 19th century governor, the estate is kept very nicely. That makes it a nice spot for special events, so beware in the warmer months, there may be a wedding or high school graduation going on. Most of the time, however, you’ll have the grounds to yourself. I’ve yet to make it into the house, but they offer tours, so make the time to check it out.

My typical walk is to follow the road up to the house and then towards the farm.There’s often something of interest in the trees along the edge, but things pick up as you pass the farm. Continue straight out to the small wooded section. The first of many bluebird houses are here (although I’ve yet to see a bluebird). Check among the sheep, goats, and llama in the fenced area of the farm for birds and then work around the trees. In spring, there can be lots of migrants, and winter brings good numbers of juncos and sparrows.

Circle to the other side of the trees and check the field. I’ve had Bobolink in the past and there’s often sparrows working along the edge. Finches really like to hang out in the bushes towards the middle and there’s often a large flock of geese to check through. It does get muddy here (and occasionally icy), so have good footwear. Walk down to the end and then head back. About halfway is a path that runs along the stream through the trees. Carolina Wrens and woodpeckers really like it in there and there’s often something else different.

At times, you can hop across the stream and come out right near the farm fence, but that can be a bit tough, so continue to the end of the trees. There are two choices here: go to the back of the estate behind the house or work along the edge and back to the car. If you go along the edge, there’s some fruit trees along the way that occasionally have interesting things The tall trees along the wall seem to attract raptors (that goes for the ones all the way in the back as well). If you instead want to go to the back of the house, retrace your steps along the farm and then go left and behind. There’s more trees and bluebird boxes to check and the geese often congregate here as well.

Depending on the activity, it can take half an hour to an hour or more to cover the estate. Although there’s often not much, there’s almost always something of interest and it’s right near the Charles, which is an ideal combination.

I haven’t spent much time investigating the insect life, but I expect that there’s a few good things in the field.

Starling Roost

A belated couple of photos from the Menotomy trip to the Alewife Reservation robin and starling roost.

I estimated 1200 in the tree, but was probably way off.

Starling Roost

Starling Roost

You’re on your own counting those.

The robins were coming in in small groups, so no impressive photos of them. And the Cooper’s Hawk(s) didn’t cooperate for a photo either. I do wish I got a shot of the hawk chasing the robin that decided the next branch over was a good perch (one on the other side of the tree only got glanced at and then ignored).

More cool bird photos:

With any luck on the CBC, I’ll have something better for next week.

Top 5 Wanted Bird Meme

The latest meme for the birdblogs seems to be top 5 most wanted. I’m not going to go with lifers, as most of that list would be Texas birds and either I’ll be getting them in a month or jinxing myself now, so here’s top 5 Middlesex county and Massachusetts birds:

Massachusetts

  1. Upland Sandpiper
  2. Clapper Rail
  3. Cattle Egret
  4. Lark Sparrow
  5. Parasitic Jaeger

I really need to bird along the coast more.

Middlesex County

  1. Northern Goshawk
  2. Lapland Longspur
  3. Surf Scoter
  4. Long-billed Dowitcher
  5. Bonaparte’s Gull

I decided not to have any overlap, even though I’ve now chased and missed multiple Lark Sparrows within 15 minutes of home and should have the sandpiper and egret as well in the county.

I took this from Christopher, but there’s a bunch of other people doing it as well.

BPW14

Gray Catbird

Another CBC-related one this week. This guy taunted me a couple years ago, showing up at the same spot along the Charles every time I went from November to February except on count day. One of these years I’ll actually get one on the count.

Weekend Highlights

Saturday started with a walk through Lot 1 with hopes of White-winged Crossbills and other birds that would be new for Waltham (or at least my half-hearted bigby list). That didn’t work out, but I still got some CBC scouting in. Lots of sparrows along the edges and a few woodpeckers were the extent of things.

After an hour at Lot 1, I got in the car and headed over to Met State. Not that exciting either, but a few good pockets of birds. One started with a chickadee and Carolina Wren and then ended up containing 3 Brown Creepers, a Golden-crowned Kinglet, several nuthatches, woodpeckers, goldfinches, and titmice. Checking the pines, the Great Horned was in the usual spot, which is definitely good for the CBC:

Great Horned

I had approached from a slightly different angle and this time I noticed some sticks higher up in the tree. This was the tree that I was told was the nest tree and the pile of sticks looked a lot like this. Think I can mark that as confirmed (UN – used nest) but I’ll probably just check back in a couple months. The rest of the walk was pretty birdless, although a Golden-crowned Kinglet taunted me into attempting so photos that didn’t come out.

Even though the weather today was much worse, the birds were better. Steve Moore and Barbara Volkle reported a lingering Semipalmated Plover at the Arlington Res, so I headed there to sneak it onto my county year list. I got a quick view flying across the water and then was able to watch it running along the mud flats for quite a while. I’m not fully sure, but it’s among the latest inland records for Massachusetts if not the latest. Hopefully it will make it through the sleet and will be a December record.

Late Semi

Other birds around included 3 Killdeer, 4 Shovelers and many Gadwall and Wigeon. I took a few pictures of the ducks but since it was dark and they all happened to have their heads in the water, I’m not going to show any.

After leaving, I hopped on Rt. 2 and then 128 and made a quick circle around the Cambridge Res. Passing on 128, I noticed lots and lots of geese but couldn’t find them from the other side. I settled for about 60 Common Merganser and a few Hooded. A spin through the office parks didn’t have anything interesting, so I continued on to Flint’s Pond.

Driving up to Flint’s, I could see ducks in close. Walking down the road, I kept finding more and more at each different viewpoint. The majority were Hoodies, but there were plenty of Common Mergansers and a few Bufflehead, Ring-necks, Common Goldeneye, and Ruddies mixed in. Two Great Blue Herons were along the shore as well. Not too bad.

And in perfect timing, I headed home and was putting the lens cap on the camera in the driveway when I noticed the window was wet. Two minutes later and there was a nice sleet/rain mix coming down that I had missed entirely.