Although White-faced Ibis is now seen
annually in MA and ME, it is still quite a rarity in NH with only 3 state
records before this year - all one-day wonders and all in April. I was very close to seeing the bird back in
2010 the last time it was found in NH, but work commitments kept me from squeezing
in a trip to the coast to see it. Elsewhere
in New England, I’ve recently seen White-faced Ibis in CT and RI, to go along
with earlier sightings in MA and ME. And
since it isn’t yet on the VT statelist, that meant that NH was the last state I
needed to complete the New England portion of my statebird map. So given my near-miss 5 years ago, needless
to say I really wanted to see White-faced Ibis in NH.
I would finally have the chance to try for
this bird in July 2015, though not without some significant challenges. A White-faced Ibis was found early on a
Sunday morning with a flock of Glossy’s and numerous Egrets in the marshes off
Huckleberry Lane in Hampton, NH. The
good news was that the bird was present for several hours. Unfortunately I didn’t get the news for a
while, and I arrived at the site about 30 minutes after the last sighting. Despite searches of several nearby marshes I
saw no Ibis at all. Another frustrating
miss.
But there was hope - on Thursday that week
the White-faced Ibis was again reported, this time at the large Little River
marshes just to the north. The bird was
still around – this time it wasn’t a one-day wonder! And then on Saturday a flock of dark Ibis was
seen at the same marsh. But since they
were seen at a distance, only half could be identified as Glossy’s. Could the target bird have been in that
flock? In any case, it seemed like it
was worth a shot to try for the bird again, so I made plans to give it a go the
next morning.
I arrived at the coast at 6:45 Sunday
morning and first headed to Huckleberry Lane, but found no waders at all. Then I went to the Little River marshes and
found just one Snowy Egret in the distance in the northwestern portion of the
marsh. Within a few minutes it was
joined by 5 other Snowy’s. Could this
become the critical mass of waders needed to attract the Ibis flock? Unfortunately, after another 15 minutes of
waiting, no other waders came in. So since
the Ibis flock was not in the marsh now, I decided to take a quick drive north
up the coast to check other places where waders could be feeding. Then if I didn’t find them to the north, I’d
return to Little River in hopes that the Ibis flock would return there. But despite making multiple stops all the way
to Odiorne, I found just a few Egrets and a Great Blue, and no Ibis. The waders certainly weren’t north of Little
River.
As I turned around and headed back to the
Little River marshes I wondered if I had made the right choice to take the hour
round-trip drive north – not only did I not find any Ibis, maybe I had missed
the target bird at Little River. I
returned to the Little River overlook on Route 111 and quickly refound the
Egret flock – there were now at least a dozen birds feeding in a distant
channel. Notably they were only
occasionally in view, even though they were tall white birds in a sea of
green. I kept scanning the area and
after just 5 minutes I noticed a dark Ibis fly out of that same channel. I quickly got on the bird with my binoculars
and watched it fly in profile low over the marsh for maybe 10 seconds before it
disappeared behind an island of trees in the marsh. Even though it was pretty distant I
definitely noticed that its face was much paler than the rest of the head and
body. The pictures I had seen of the
target bird (when it was much closer!) showed that although it did not have a
bright white ring around the face it did have a broader, less well-defined pale
area. It sort of reminded me of the
graying face of an old dog. And that was
exactly what I saw, even though the bird was quite far away. Another concern was that this morning’s bird
was feeding with Egrets and not Ibis, even though earlier sightings of the
White-faced put it with other Ibis.
I was pretty sure I had just re-found the
White-faced Ibis, though I was troubled about the distant view and the fact
that the bird was with Egrets. The bird
may well have dropped into the southeast part of the Little River marsh, so I
headed to Appledore Ave. to try to get a closer look at that part of the marsh. Although all the property here is private, I
was able to talk one of the homeowners into letting me walk through their trees
to the marsh edge. From here I stood and
watched the marsh, finding up to 20 Egrets, but no Ibis. After nearly an hour wait I noticed 4 dark
Ibis fly into the northern part of the marsh, roughly the same distance from me
as my first Ibis sighting. Even though I
only got fair looks at 3 of the 4 birds, I could tell they did not have the
required white area on the head to make any into a White-faced. I now felt much better about my ID of the
first bird as a White-faced Ibis.
Just as I was about to leave my post on
Appledore Ave. a dark Ibis flew out of the marsh near me, and flew off to the
far northwestern part of the marsh.
Although I watched it for 10 seconds or more, I never saw the head of
the bird due to its flight direction. I
wouldn’t be surprised that this was the White-faced Ibis I saw earlier –
luckily I saw the first bird in profile and was able to see its head.
Interestingly, later in the day, another
birder reported the White-faced in the Little River marshes, again associating
with Egrets and not with Glossy’s just like my sighting that morning. Although this time it sounded like the bird
was a lot closer - I was jealous!
White-faced Ibis was #357 for me in
NH. And despite the fact that NH is by
far my best statelist as a percentage of the total ever recorded in that state,
this was my third NH statebird in just over a month. As shown in my statebird map below, I’ve now
seen White-faced Ibis as a vagrant in 5 New England states and New York. And with their numbers increasing in the
east, maybe it will show up in VT some time soon too.
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