Day 321: November 17th – Rockport, Mass

Sunny, light winds, a chill in the air – 46 degrees

      

       

         Day 2 of our Cape Anne birding trip could not supply us with better weather as we venture north to the shoreline of Newburyport, Massachusetts at Parker River National Wildlife Refuge.  This trip is always a grab bag…. Each site brings new birds around each corner.  Many of them are far out at sea and require a lot of eyes peering through a lot of high power optics to pick them up.  Others bob up and down in the surf immediately in front of us while others are in the trees on the mainland and offshore bar. 

       This time of year brings many new birds into the area for a variety of reasons, but the main cause is food.  Birds go where there is an ample supply of grasses, fish, insects, fruit, or whatever it is they prefer to dine on.  Some of our top finds of the day were the result of a shortage of pine cones in Canada.  Crossbills, for example, are dependent upon seed cones and will wander widely from year to year in search of these cones.  With few cones of the proper kind to be found in Canada this year, the birds have wandered south and this year a good number have found Parker River Refuge.  We were fortunate enough in turn to find them.  At one point we had at least a dozen resting in a bare birch tree for a considerable time before heading back into the pines.

       

                The Common redpoll is another bird that moves erratically southward in winter from its summer grounds in the Arctic tundra and boreal forests.  In winter, they may be found in active groups in weedy fields actively foraging on seeds.  Today, we found many frenetically moving from field to field and occasionally stopping long enough for us to grab a quick look and a decent photo.

      

        The Pine grosbeak is another bird difficult to find in the northeast under normal circumstances.  But on this gorgeous fall day, we began to expect anything and everything.  So, why not the Pine grosbeak.  We had reports of a male as well as this beautiful female, but he did manage to elude us.  No problem, we just took our time to enjoy the views of this arctic bird.

       It’s all about food for these birds.  The Rough-legged Hawk in North America, is a medium-large bird of prey. It is found in Arctic and Subarctic regions of North America and Eurasia during the breeding season and migrates south for the winter.  While the preferred food of this hawk are small mammals, their second favorite target is small birds including the Snow buntings and Horned larks we found on site today.  While the larks are year-round residents of most of the US, the buntings are among the many winter visitors from the high arctic we find at Parker River during this time of year.

Snow buntings

       Joining the feast is the Red-tailed hawk which also prefer small mammals.  Parker River certainly offers a feast for all these birds, both the migrants from the high north and those more commonly found year round like this hawk. 

        Rounding out the menu for us birders to feast our eyes upon are the large number of ducks found in the wetlands of the refuge.  Tomorrow, we’ll again concentrate on the shoreline and the open ocean and bays to see what migrants we can find around Rockport and Gloucester.  We’re all eagerly looking forward to another great morning of wonderful birding in the winter hot spot.