A Weekend: From Prospect Park to Staten Island

     What a weekend, it involved birding playdates, scoping seabirds from Coney Island, and chasing a rare hawk on Staten Island.

    In Prosect Park, Kestrel and I met up with another birding mom that we met on one of the bird walks I led. We planned to bird a little part of the lake and up to the feeders. Both areas provide great vantage points for kids to also look at birds and them interacting with each other and their environment. Kestrel recently got a camera for the holidays so she was excited to take pictures of birds. a few of her bird photos are as follows... not half bad, eh?

I suppose we should fix that timestamp setting... But here she captured the "dada" swan, a few duckies (mallard), and a baby duck (coot).

    Today, Sunday, I mostly scoped off the shores of Coney, and got the two birds I was hoping for, a razorbill and a red-necked grebe. Both are rare for our area, so I was quite happy to see them. My original plan was to kinda stop and go along the coast till I got back home. But then I saw an alert for a SWAINSON'S HAWK in Staten Island, saw it was a 15 minutes drive and my plans changed. I was really really happy I made the choice to go, I got there, grabbed some amazing looks and got home to still enjoy lunch.

When birding with the kiddos, you remember that mallards are gorgeous and deserving of attention.

We enjoyed the American coots.... or, as a 2.5 year old calls it, baby ducks.

This one had a lot of opinions.

This hooded merganser flew in with two shovelers and looks to regret its choices?

The feeders are such a great place to visit as a new birders, seasoned birder, or anyone, really. Its so fun to see them easily without a need for binoculars, being active, interacting with other birds. And also why I recommend it for anyone with kiddos who are interested in birds or animals. There is a fence to give birds their space and even the "naughty" blue jays are a delight.

When birding with kids, the most common birds are the ones you come to appreciate. They are reliable treats to the eyes, a little comfort for your bird-needing soul, and with kids, some of their first birds that they will come to recognize. SO please, give us cardinals, blue jays, titmice, and chickadees every day!

For today, I planned to start from Coney Island and bird east back toward home along the shore and waterways. 
Well.
That plan got derailed once I saw there was a Swainson's Hawk in Staten Island and ZERO traffic? Yeah, that choice was made pretty quickly.

This hawk is a juvenile. It seems to have gotten lost as it should be in Argentina or thereabouts.

It was kind of funny to come and see this bird sitting on the ground. These are birds of open fields and grasslands with few trees, so, it isn't fully out of the question to see one on the ground.

Their normal range, here in the states, is their breeding range which is more or less, Western North America, Canada and into Alaska.

I've seen Swainson's Hawks out in Colorado before, but it was a lovely treat to see this one close to come and so close. I took these first few shots from my seat in the car.

I wish I wasn't in the car for this shot, as its taken through my (probably dirty) front windshield. It woulda been a lot cooler without that "filter."

This bird has such long wings when sitting, they do look a good amount different than our common red tailed hawks.

The bird flew a few times, but keeping to the general area.

And when it did land, sometimes it chose some pretty telling background for its not so usual location

While watching this Swainson's, I also got the chance to observe a bunch of other birds, including lesser scaup, Bonaparte's gulls, common goldeneye, gadwall, and a flyover bald eagle.

Whenever out of range birds show up, it's always like a bit of a death sentence for some. As they show up, are starving, and there is little to no food around. Swainson's hawks are mammal and insect predators, so perhaps there is a chance for this bird?

A very Staten Island pic.
It's definitely cheaper to fly across.

In front of the eyes of many observers, the hawk snatched up a rat from the shoreline and flew off with it. 
A word of advice, especially to newer birders who may not know, leave a bird with prey be. Let them eat.
A few birders pursued this bird who was in perfect sight from a respectable distance, a bunch of us had scopes and happy to share. But the birders then pushed the bird to fly off and hide behind a tree to eat, keeping it out of sight for when a number of folks had just arrived to observe.

As it approached 1pm, I took a cue from the hawk. Time for lunch.