Snapshots of Nature: December Wrap-up and A LOT of Crossbill

Oh, hey. It's been a while, so let's catch up! December was a whirlwind, even with holidays being done so differently and zero hustle and bustle, it left me little time to tend to this blog. But here we are!

Found some cool birds this month, even broke my year list record with 273 birds (2019 was 271). A trip to Texas surely helped a ton. Travel will be VERY limited in 2021, so this may be my high point. In 2021, I want to try and hone in more on my Kings County list, of which I am at 251 species. I'd love to really bulk that up, I know 300 is possible. Speaking of 300, I'd LOVE to get my 300th NYS bird, I am at 298. TWO-NINETY-EIGHT!!! Ugh, it almost hurts to end the year just shy of that!

So, even if I don't top this year's number in 2021, I have some other milestones I would really like to approach and achieve.

Anyway, let's get to the birds from this month. Strap yourselves in, because it's about to get very crossbill heavy toward the end...

I was happy that I could participate in the Christmas Bird Count. While there was snow on the ground and we had a very cold start, the sun made it nice enough for us to sit outside and have a socially distanced lunch with our teammates. We didn't share cars and wore masks the entire time, which meant we also fought fogged binoculars.

I birded at Floyd Bennett Field, we had an epic sunrise, fields of crunch, hard to walk in snow. It would sometimes hold your weight for a few cautious steps, then the next step, you'd fall through. It was awful. We enjoyed red-shouldered hawks, peregrine falcon (one even carrying a fish, which was so whacky), snow bunting, horned larks on the NYPD sections of runway, lots of chickadees, and few wipeouts on the ice, especially as it melted.

A flyover flock of geese revealed 3 snow geese, one of which is a blue morph. In addition to participating in the CBC, I also emceed the compilation... with Gizmo also adding in his two cents often. Whether or not to the liking of the people in attendance. I won't lie, I enjoyed doing this, I love talking into microphones or being an announcer of things, despite my often introverted self, I love the power of being an announcer.
Don't even get me started on how much I miss karaoke.
But anyway, the CBC for Brooklyn was a good one, we broke our record with 138 species spotted that day. Pretty amazing. And many New Yorkers think there is no wildlife beyond pigeons and rats to see - and this is only one borough and one class of vertebrate animals!

Another day, I spent some time along the Brooklyn waterfront, from the Army Terminal to Gravesend Bay. I found a few gulls, including these ring-billed gulls.

I also found two separate Iceland Gulls at the Brooklyn Army Terminal. This is one...

... This is the other one! Both were busy snacking on the menhaden still floating around, dead after that massive die-off earlier in November.

I think they are gorgeous gulls. I love winter gulling and finding that one bird different from all the others.

Speaking of different Gulls, I walked Breezy point one Saturday and walked right into a group of Bonaparte's Gulls, with one not Bonaparte's gulls. Two other birders were already on it, a black-headed gull (the one with orange bill and legs).
It was really cool to see it in comparison to the similar Bonni's, it is much bigger!

Got a nice 40 minute view of it before it took off to another part of the beach or beyond.

So the one good thing birding also brings, in addition to the birds is the ability to socially distant socialize in the outdoors. Went birding in Green-Wood with the baby and a good friend earlier this week. We enjoyed the feeders at the Dell Water but also managed to run into a red-shouldered hawk, pine siskins, and Rover. Who's Rover, you ask?

This is Rover, Bald Eagle, Band R/7 and has been frequenting the cemetery for sometime, and from the evidence of lunch on beak and talon, is doing alright here.

So, I have a confession to make, I have an addiction. To crossbills.
I have spent a number of hours at Jones Beach just this week.
And when your mom says, "I'll watch the baby while you bird." Well, she is just fueling your addiction.

This is not a Crossbill, but upon my arrival, I was treated to a decent size raft of common eiders and a few others sprinkled in the mix...

... Like this white-winged scoter. So close to shore, hunting and eating mussels, shell and all!

What a treat to have this guy so close! They are usually much further out.

Oh, the treats kept coming, there were plentiful Bonaparte's Gulls. They are dainty, small, but throwing their weight around, hassling these mergansers for their catch and possibly making a profit off of their dives, driving fish toward the surface where many were just plucking fish from the surface too. It was pretty awesome to observe.

There were also some loafy eiders too.
But I had some crossbills to find.

So, the best place to find them is the median strip of the parkway. I just walked in and there they were (it is not usually this easy).

Normally it's a game of chase, but today, they were right there, surrounding me and a few other birders. Then they dispersed, as crossbills do. Jip-jip'ing into the distance.

A little patience, and being stroller free allowed me to happen upon them once more. These are red crossbills, the females being more olive-yellow and the males being red. The immature males are a mix of that olive and red color.

As their name implies, their bills are crossed,
Not a defect but an asset. They can break into pine cones, especially the ones that have not yet opened up and that other birds can't get to.

Like parrots, they dangle sideways, upside down doing whatever it takes to get the delicious pine nuts. They also, like parrots, when feeding go silent and with a large group, all you can hear is this crackling and snapping of pinecones as they tediously break in to them. It sounds like the trees are burning with the furiousness of the need to open and get to those delicious nuts.

And a male red crossbill on that fresh green needle with those cones, how perfect is this winter scene?!

A friend of mine argues this should be the bird of Christmas, replacing cardinals.
I whole heartedly agree.

Not only can they be Christmas colors, they also dangle like ornaments. Cardinals don't dangle off Christmas trees with such style and perfection.

Here is a nice example of an immature male, as it gets more red and less of that olive color.

When you go to the beach everyone wants to know if you've seen "the owl."
I don't care much for the snowies as much as I feel for them. Also, people like this ruin it for me. I took this photo from well over 100 yards away, zoomed in at 500mm. This guy is way too close. What else you don't see are the 15 other people surrounding it, trampling the very delicate dunes.

While I LOVE big birds, there are so many other birds around worth looking at. On the water a few of us nabbed a red necked grebe, razorbill, these cheeky little purple sandpipers, some more scoters and gulls, and even some harbor seals who stare right back at you.

So since the kid-watching offer was made, I went back a second day hoping for better light and crossbills.
I got both.

They made me work hard this time though. While they don't seem to mind people watching them, actually they are quite not caring about people in general. They will land right in front of you if there is a delicious cone bearing tree.
But this time a harrier AND merlin were working this flock. At one point the merlin singled out one member of the flock and pursued it. What a conflict in my heart, I LOVE BOTH OF THESE BIRDS. But that's life, survival is the real deal out there, everyone has to eat.

Following in the flurry of the flock, as they chipped away at the pine cones, were red-breasted nuthatch and black-capped chickadees, seemingly benefitting from opened cones or dropped food.

Why all the Crossbill rage? Well, they came more south than usual due to food supply shortage up north. They also had a good year of young, so a bumper crop of birds pushed into our area. A good friend of mine explains more about this phenomenon here: https://www.audubon.org/news/this-winter-marks-incredible-superflight-hungry-winter-finches

Before calling it a (successful) crossbill day, I checked the Coast Guard Station for waterfowl. The White-winged scoter continued to feed, as did all the common eiders.