There have been quite a number of extralimital White Ibis sightings up the east coast this summer, so I was not too surprised to see a post about one in New England - a juvenile in a marsh in the southwestern corner of Rhode Island surrounding Winnapaug Pond west of Weekapaug. Over the next several days there were several posts from birders chasing after it, but with as many negative posts as positive ones. So despite not being very reliable, I decided to give it a try. One birder suggested trying for it at high tide minimizing the chance that it could be hidden in a channel off in the marsh, so I targeted an afternoon high tide. I arrived at the key spot where it had been most often spotted (see location link below) and saw two birders with a scope trained on the nearby marsh. Sure enough - they had the bird in sight feeding in a salt panne right next to the road with 3 Glossies. If only they were all that easy! We watched it for the next 20 minutes and was able to get the phone-scoped picture at the bottom of this blog.
The flock took off at one point when we were looking away, so I started to try to refind it. Over the next 30 minutes I drove around the edge of the marsh only to realize that it is almost completed surrounded by houses, with only a very small portion of the marsh visible from public property. Now I see why so many posts were negative. I never did find it again, though it was likely very close. Boy was I lucky to see this one. It was #282 for for me in RI and the third time I've seen it as a vagrant outside its typical southeastern range (see my statebird map below).
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| Statebird Map |
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| Phonescoped photo |
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