Sunday, October 28, 2007

Alone in Cape May

They all left me today; Susan at Lake Life had to catch a ferry at 11 am....Delia at Beginning to Bird had to drive 5 hours back home so she left at 4 pm. Laura at Somewhere in NJ has a two hour drive home, so she left at 5 pm. So here I sit, in a breezeway on the second floor (My name is Luka....I live on the second floor....) freezing my ass off and blogging.

Bar blogging
Here we are blogging at a bar with WiFi access.
We were the oldest people in there. What happened to my coolness? I was ready for bed at 11 pm.


What the hell are you two doing

Delia wanted a picture of herself in front of the lighthouse, so Laura helped her take a picture of herself. Hellloooo? Couldn't Laura just have taken the pic for you?


Birders Higbee beach

At Higbee's Beach, there was a major warbler/accipiter/kinglet/etc fallout. We spent a half an hour standing in front of ONE tree as birds were coming back in from over the water (they got blown out there from the cold front that came through last night) and swooped in to get their bearings.

GC kinglet

Golden-crowned kinglets were in every tree.


Looking up YR warbler

So were yellow-rumped warblers. This guy is checking out the sky and he had good reason...we would get a sharp-shinned hawk rocketing in about every 30 seconds.

Palm warbler

Quite a few palm warblers, too.


TV broadcast

When the sun came out, so did the turkey vultures. We saw hundreds. Laura called the flocks "TV Broadcasts".


what is that over there

Want herons and egrets? Come to Cape May. This great egret has the funniest look on his face. "Humans? Are there humans over there?"


lighthouse

flock birding


We met up with Sharon (Birdchick) at the end of the day, just as she was packing up. She asked to tag along to go see the flock of special birds down the beach. Since she's sort of a birder, and she looked like she needed people to hang out with, we took pity on her and let her come along.

Here's what we were looking for:
black skimmer and laughing gull
Black skimmers. A big, graceful bird. There were two flocks of maybe 30 each. Oh, and that's a laughing gull to the right.
flying skimmers
They have insanely long wings for their bodies. A beautiful bird who is in danger.

It was windy.....
grab your hat shaz

"Get your hat, Sharon!"


sharon and no birds
I think Sharon was hallucinating, because I sure don't see any birds there.
(Just kidding. She was digiscoping the skimmers)



skimmers

Mixed in with the skimmer group was a royal tern....
Royal tern



And this little guy almost ran right into me as I stood in the surf:
sanderling who almost ran into me
A wee little sanderling. They are the cutest little things. I have videos to share, but that will have to wait until I am home and warm.
As my fingertips are now numb, I think I will sign off for now, read a few blogs and go to bed. Home tomorrow!

12 comments:

Mary said...

Dear Susan, when you have time, label your photos public, please? Good birds so far! I wanna see people, too!

Lisa at Greenbow said...

Wow, you can stay up until 11pm??? Wild thing.

Love the pictures. Looked like lots of fun.

Anonymous said...

Love this update! Thank you. This trip sounds like so much fun- perhaps you will do again next year? So, listen, sometimes when you're cold shoes help. Or so I'm told- I'm not big on them myself.

Unknown said...

Looks like so much fun, Susan! Awesome!

entoto said...

I was about to say what Vicki said about the shoes, but I won't. Glad you had fun. Sleep tight.

Kathi said...

Black skimmers and royal terns would be Lifers for me; I'm so utterly jealous.

Good of you to take pity on that Sharon girl and show her some birds. Maybe one day she'll make a career out of something in birding.

Can't wait to hear more!

~Kathi, whose verification word sounds Halloweenish: frishgt

Anonymous said...

such a wonderful trip you had and for sure many of those birdies would have been lifers for me! Now hurry up and get home so we can see many more of your pictures!

dguzman said...

Great pics of those skimmers and terns!

NatureWoman said...

Looks like you had a good time! Hope you're all warmed up by now. Can't wait to see the rest of your photos and videos!

nina at Nature Remains. said...

I had a yellow-rumped warbler HERE yesterday, too!
But no skimmers, royal terns, egrets or golden crowned kinglets,...:-(

Anonymous said...

Very nice post, but are you aware all your photos are private? I click on them to try and see larger views, but don't anything. Most frustrating.

Susan said...

Skimmers! I left too early!