Two Extreme Rarities (and Almost a Lifebird) in Central Tennessee, November 25, 2023

Early on the morning of November 25th I received this notification from the Tennessee birding Facebook group – “Ancient Murrelet at Chickamauga Dam”.  I wasn’t quite sure where Chickamauga Dam was, but Ancient Murrelet would be a lifebird for me so I might be interested in a chase.  It turns out that the dam is close to Chattanooga, some 3 ½ hours from home.  My normal one-way maximum statebird chase distance is 2 hours, and sometimes I’ll stretch it to 2 ½ hours for a really good bird.  But this would be a lifebird, so I guess I could justify more time on the road to go after it.  That is if it was reasonably reliable.

With a bit of eBird research I found out that the bird was first discovered the previous day, and was seen by many.  But with the long driving time I decided to wait for it to be spotted again on the 25th before I headed out.  In the meantime, I looked at my TN Needs Alert to see if there might be other potential statebird targets in that region.  Sure enough there was a semi-reliable Limpkin just 30 minutes away and not too far off my route to and from home.  So now I had 2 targets to pursue – I just needed to get confirmation that the Murrelet was still around.

As of 9 AM on the 25th there were just negative posts from the TN Facebook page.  There were lots of birders looking for the Murrelet, but they were coming up empty.  But just as I was about to write it off as a one-day wonder I noticed a post on Facebook that the Murrelet had been re-found.  It took me a bit of time to get myself ready, but finally at 10:30 I was out the door.  The chase was on with cautious optimism that a lifebird awaited me.

Shortly after getting on the road I noticed my travel time had increased to over 4 hours.  It turns out there was major construction on I-40 in western NC, reducing the road to just 1 lane each way.  Even though I was able to use some back roads to avoid some of the backup, I still had added more than 30 minutes to my route.  And then when I neared Knoxville I started to see signs to expect backups due to football traffic – the University of Tennessee is in Knoxville and it turns out a home football game was about to start.  That added even more time.  And then when I was just about 30 minutes away from the dam there was another backup – a tractor trailer had caught fire and was burning on the shoulder.  Now my 3 ½ hour drive had become a 5-hour drive.  But it would be all worth it if I got that lifebird.

As I neared Chickamauga Dam I checked recent reports and most said the Murrelet was feeding quite cooperatively near the dam.  It had apparently moved from the nearby boat ramp area where it had mostly been seen the day before.  So I headed right to the parking lot at the dam.  As I pulled in I noticed 2 birders walking toward their cars.  I flagged them down and found out that the bird was not presently being seen at the dam, but likely had returned to the boat ramp.  As we headed back to the cars I mentioned something like a lifebird was worth a 5-hour drive, and the one birder mentioned he was surprised it was a lifebird for me.  Hmm…  That started me thinking whether I had actually seen this bird before out west.  But there was no time to research my lifelist - my chase wasn’t over yet.

I quickly got back in the car and drove a short distance to the boat ramp lot where I spotted this group of 25 or more birders at the water’s edge.  This looked promising.

I arrived at the end of the boat ramp and the birders directed me to look to the left.  There was the Ancient Murrelet not more than 50 feet away floating near the shore.  Over the next 15 minutes it actively fed and swam in that same general area.  Interestingly, there were some large oak leaves floating on the water nearby, and it was hardly larger than the leaves.  I was able to get this phonescoped photo of the bird, complete with one of those floating oak leaves in the background.

While watching the bird I heard a photographer lament that the lighting wasn’t good.  To which another birder responded – “would you rather take pictures of a Mallard in good light or an Ancient Murrelet in bad light?”

I didn’t stay too long because I still had the Limpkin to pursue.  Plus I was way behind schedule given all the backups.  But as I walked back to my car I started thinking again whether the Murrelet was actually a lifer or not.  I pulled up my lifelist on eBird and there was the Ancient Murrelet already on my list.  I had actually seen this species in Alaska (on both of my trips there), and as a rarity on a pelagic trip out of California.  I was confusing this with the Long-billed Murrelet, another alcid that rarely shows up on inland lakes, which would have truly been a lifebird.  Another senior moment I guess.  I wouldn’t have made the long drive if I had realized it was just for a couple possible statebirds – even though the Murrelet was a first record for TN. 

But now I was off on a Limpkin chase.  This had been an amazing year for vagrant Limpkins throughout the east, and this Limpkin was being reported sporadically feeding near a bridge over a small arm of Chickamauga Lake.  After a quick 30-minute ride I arrived at the bridge and parked nearby.  This part of the country has been under an extreme drought and all the water bodies were extremely low.  Here is a picture of the wetlands upstream of the bridge – there was a huge amount of potential muddy habitat for a Limpkin to feed in. 

It was time to find a brown bird in an all-brown background.  And oh by the way, it was about the size of a lot of those brown rocks now exposed by the low water levels .  I scanned the area below the bridge and found a nice flock of Ring-billed and Bonaparte’s Gulls, plus a few Killdeer, but no large brown wading birds.  Then I checked upstream of the bridge and found no birds at all.  Was the Limpkin search going to be more difficult than the search for the Murrelet?  I went back to the downstream side and scanned more slowly, but still no target bird.  Then I returned to the upstream side and noticed some movement in the water in the distance.  There was the Limpkin wading in the middle of the little stream of water that remained.  Here’s a digi-binned picture of the bird without zooming in – it really blended in with its surroundings.

And here it is heavily cropped.

My statebird map for Limpkin is inserted below.  I’ve seen Limpkin in FL which is the only state where it is regular (shaded in blue).  And now TN is my 3rd state (shaded in brown) where I’ve seen it as a rarity.

That was certainly a most successful day, despite all the driving.  In hindsight, I guess I’m glad that I hadn’t remembered my lifelist correctly or I wouldn’t have been able to add these 2 extreme rarities to my TN statelist, which now stands at 258.

Saltmarsh Sparrow On My Statelist Once Again, Kiawah Island, South Carolina, October 27, 2023

I’ve birded the southeast Atlantic coast for many years; in fact for many decades.  Much of my coastal birding time predates the split of the Sharp-tailed Sparrow into Saltmarsh and Nelson’s Sparrows.  So when the split occurred I simply had Sharp-tailed Sparrow on my statelist for each of the Atlantic coastal states.  Unfortunately, back then I did not look close enough at the sparrows to note the differences, so I have no idea if I saw either one or both species in a number of states.  And both species are present on the southern coast at the same time of the year, so the timing of my past trips doesn’t help me to determine which species I may have seen.  So for a while, I arbitrarily put Saltmarsh Sparrow on my state list for a number of coastal states. 

I partially clarified this situation for SC on October 20, 2022.  My wife and I had taken a vacation to Kiawah Island on the SC coast and of course I added in some birding time.  I had received a tip to try for these marsh sparrows near high tide, since the high water levels flush these skulking birds from the marsh grasses.  I headed to the extensive Spartina marshes near the bridge onto the island to try for the sparrows, arriving right at high tide.  I was lucky enough to spot a Nelson’s of the Atlantic race that day.  Over the next 30 minutes I flushed 2 Seasides and no less than 5 other smaller, lighter colored sparrows, but all flew deep into the marsh and dropped in without perching.  Undoubtedly all were Saltmarsh or Nelson’s, but none cooperated enough for a definitive ID.  As a result, I added Nelson’s to my SC statelist and took off Saltmarsh.  I’d have to wait for a future visit to try for Saltmarsh Sparrow. 

That next opportunity came in October 2023 when we once again took a fall vacation on Kiawah Island.  And I once again planned to head to the Spartina marshes near the bridge onto the island to look for those skulking sparrows.  My first try was the high tide the evening of the 25th.  I was successful in flushing 10 sparrows from the perimeter of the marsh, but unfortunately all were Seasides.  I felt like I had my system to spot these marsh sparrows down pretty well.  I just wasn’t finding the right species.

I had one more chance to search for my target bird the last morning of our trip with a high tide near sunrise.  Little did I know that the high tide that day was exceptionally high due to the full moon.  When I arrived at the marsh I was shocked to see nearly the entire marsh underwater.  In this picture what looks like open water is actually flooded dense Spartina marsh grasses.  And the tide was still rising!

I climbed down the bank of the entrance road and stood ankle-deep at the edge of the marsh – a spot that was far out of the water at other high tides.  My plan was to try to work the normally dry shrubs along the road embankment which was the only vegetation in the area that was above the water level.  It was still too dark for any positive IDs, so I just stood at the edge waiting for sunrise.  Soon I started to see a number of individual small sparrows flying out of the marsh to the vegetation in front of me to get out of the flooding.  I was cautiously optimistic.

When I thought it was finally light enough to be able to identify the sparrows, I started playing a few Saltmarsh call notes, and instantly got Seaside Sparrows to come out and perch just a few feet in front of me.  At one point I had 10 Seasides in view at once in a small bush, most giving pretty good views.  But still no Saltmarsh (or Nelson’s for that matter).  Then I finally noticed one bird with an orange face.  The bird had fine flank and chest streaking, and only a faint orange wash below.  I had my target Saltmarsh Sparrow.  Later I counted 11 more Seaside’s in another bush.  Even though I covered a very small area I had 21 Seasides.  Surprisingly, I only no other Saltmarsh or Nelson’s.

And now that I confirmed Nelson’s the previous year, I could finally add Saltmarsh Sparrow (once again) to my SC statelist - #302.

I’ve now seen this species in all the states in its range along the Atlantic coast except cross-hatched Georgia (see my statebird map below).  My experience with Saltmarsh Sparrow in GA is like that in SC – I saw “Sharp-tailed” Sparrows there years ago, and have seen Nelson’s more recently but not yet Saltmarsh.