Franklin’s Gull Chase Yields Cave Swallow (but NO Franklin’s), Lynn, MA, November 2015

November is the month for rarities in New England, and 2015 was no exception.  First there was the discovery of a Common Ground-Dove in MA – only the second state record.  And as reports of that bird lit up the MA listserve, reports of Franklin’s Gulls started to appear on the CT listserve.  By the afternoon flocks of Franklin’s Gulls were reported on the southwest CT coast, with several also on Block Island, RI, and a couple on the south shore and western MA.  A convergence of weather patterns had resulted in an unprecedented invasion of Franklin’s Gulls throughout southern New England! 

NH is my only New England state with Franklin’s Gull, so I had visions of adding this species to multiple statelists.  But there were two key challenges – first, I was extremely busy at work and would struggle to break free to chase after them even on the weekend.  And secondly, all the birds were reported from quite a distance away – the CT birds would require at least a 2 ½ hour drive and the RI birds weren’t even on the mainland.  The MA birds were closer, but would they (and any of the others) stick around? 

What to do?  The initial discoveries were on a Friday, so initially I thought about heading out first thing Saturday morning so that I could be on the southwest CT coast just after dawn.  That would put me in the prime area as the first sightings came in.  But then I worried that I might make the 5-hour round-trip purely on speculation only to find out that all the birds had left.  And of course that would take a huge amount of time away from work.  So instead I decided to watch the listserves and only head out if more Franklin’s were reported. 

Saturday morning arrived and I packed all my gear to be able to head out as soon as the first report came in.  Although I certainly wanted to see these rarities, I had huge work deadlines ahead of me.  So it was bittersweet news when the first positive post came across the CT listserve at about 7:30 AM.  A few minutes later I was out the door heading to Seaside Park in CT.  One little problem though – in my haste I headed east out of my road (as if heading to Boston) instead of west towards CT.  Another senior moment…  I didn’t realize my error until I was about 25 minutes from home, meaning I added at least 30 minutes to my drive to CT.  But then I checked my e-mails and saw that a Franklin’s was just reported at Lynn Beach on the northshore of MA.  Lynn is just over an hour from home, and even closer to where I was at the time given my wrong turn to the east.  I pulled over and thought through the options - since the drive to Lynn was so much shorter, I could try for that bird and get back home and back to work much sooner than if I continued to head to CT.  So I decided to forego a possible CT Franklin’s for a possible MA Franklin’s, and headed to Lynn.

While sitting at red lights in Lynn and just a few minutes from Lynn Beach I sent an e-mail to the birder who discovered the bird asking if he still had it.  The good news was that he sent me a quick response.  The bad news was that he mentioned the bird had flown away to the south an hour ago – an important detail he had not included in his earlier post.  Ugh.  But ever the optimist, I knew the beaches at Lynn and neighboring Nahant to the south attract many gulls this time of year, so I hoped that perhaps the bird was still around and I’d be able to re-find it.

When I arrived at Lynn Beach there were already 2 other birders there looking for the Franklin’s Gull, but with no success.  We all checked the numerous Bonaparte’s, Ring-bills, Herrings, and Black-backs, but couldn’t come up with a Franklin’s.  At one point our attention diverted to some grebes offshore, and just as I was putting my scope on them one of the birders yelled – “Swallows!”.  I looked up to see a group of 5 dark-backed swallows flyby just a few feet away.  We all watched them continue flying south for at least 20 seconds, hoping they would circle back, but to no avail.  I could see that they had short square tails, were pale below, and I think I saw a pale rump on one, but never saw any of them well.  Of course that time of year a flock of 5 swallows on the MA coast are most probably Caves, but could we be sure?  A couple minutes later I walked north up the beach to see if the swallows might be hiding out of the wind among some tall condos.  There I ran into another birder who said he just had 5 Cave Swallows flying south.  He later posted a photo of 3 of the birds on eBird showing pale rumps and pale below.  Although the throat color wasn’t evident, 5 Cliff Swallows in mid-November would be next to impossible.  So I feel good saying that I could add Cave Swallow to my MA list.  With Ground-Dove the day before, that was two consecutive days with a new statebird in MA!

Later I checked out the beaches in Nahant, and re-checked the Lynn beaches, but found no Franklin’s.  A distant Laughing Gull briefly got me excited, but I couldn’t turn it into its western cousin.  So although I dipped on Franklin’s Gull in MA, Cave Swallow was a nice consolation, and I was able to get back to work in the early afternoon.  Then again – Franklin’s Gulls were seen throughout the day at Seaside Park which was my initial CT destination.  And one was seen on-shore throughout the afternoon in RI.  So if I had headed to CT I might well have added Franklin’s Gull to my CT list, and then gotten the RI bird on the way back home.  But that would have consumed almost the entire day and limited my work time.  Tough to have conflicting priorities…

Cave Swallow is #407 for me in MA and my fourth New England state for this species.  As shown in my statebird map below, I have also seen the Mexican race in TX and NM, and the Caribbean race in FL. 

Common Ground-Dove, Lexington, MA, November 2015

Mid-morning a post came across the MA listserve passing along an early morning sighting of a Common Ground-Dove, with photographs, in Lexington, MA.  It was at a place I had never heard of before, Waltham Street Farms, which was likely a small spot visited by birders local to the area.  With a bit of research I found the location, but wondered if the bird would stick around.  And even if it did, I worried about getting micro-directions to find the bird.  Although the spot was pretty small, there was still quite a bit of habitat that one lone Dove could use.  I traded e-mails with the person who posted the sighting, and soon thereafter got an e-mail back with excellent directions.  And a few minutes later came a post that the bird was still there.  It was time for a chase!

I arrived at the Waltham Street Farms about Noon, less than an hour after the post that the bird had been refound.  There were 6 cars parked there on the roadside, so I assumed that a number of birders were there looking for the Dove.  After a short walk I could see 10 or 12 birders up ahead along the edges of one of the fields, but only a couple were looking through their binoculars.  I worried that that meant the bird was not in view.  Or maybe it meant that most already had great looks at the target bird.  Luckily it was the latter – when I got up to them they said the bird was just a few feet away in a grassy edge.  Even though they pointed out the specific spot I couldn’t find the bird.  Then I looked through one of their scopes and saw movement – the small Ground-Dove was well camouflaged and pretty much obscured by the taller grass.  I took this phonescoped photo – with the Ground-Dove barely visible.

Can you find the Ground-Dove?

Good thing others were on the bird when I arrived.  Otherwise it might have been very difficult to find. 

That was only the second record of this species in MA, so quite a rarity.  And it was my first for anywhere in New England - #431 for my New England list, and #406 for my MA list.  And only my 8th state seeing this diminutive and declining species, though my statebird map is a pretty good match for its regular range across the southern states, except for the gap in LA and MS.

Caspian Tern and Hudsonian Godwit, Milford Point, CT, October 2015

Some of my favorite birding spots in CT are in Milford and Stratford, but I don’t get to that area often since it is beyond my self-imposed 2-hour drive limit to chase rarities.  So needless to say when a business trip to Milford came up, I decided to take advantage of being in southwest CT and added a vacation day for some local birding.  A couple days before the trip a Painted Bunting was re-found by Tina Green in Westport at the CT Audubon Tree Farm, so that would be an obvious place to start my day.  And then after trying for the Bunting I planned to go to the Quaker Ridge hawkwatch where a number of Golden Eagles had been seen so far this fall.  So that would give me two CT targets to shoot for.

I traded e-mails with Tina Green and she offered to meet me at the farm and show me the exact spot where she had been seeing the Painted Bunting.  Tina had seen the bird 2 consecutive days eating mile-a-minute berries at a location that was some of the first vegetation to be lit and warmed by the rising sun.  So she suggested we start at that spot at dawn and wait for the bird to appear to eat its favorite berries.  When we got there in the pre-dawn light I could see many plants with berries that the Bunting might like to eat.  I was now a bit concerned that this could become a needle-in-a-haystack kind of situation.  Most Painted Buntings seen in New England are birds that show up at feeders in winter, and many stick around for an extended time.  For that reason, CT Audubon had put out a feeder nearby in hopes that the bird would come to the seed.  So if we didn’t see the bird eating natural foods, maybe it might show up at the feeder.

Unfortunately dawn came and went without seeing the bird.  And the feeder had regular visits of Chickadees and Cardinals, but no Bunting.  I spent about 4 hours at the tree farm, and found 55 species at this very birdy spot, including only my second ever Orange-crowned Warbler in CT, but no Painted Bunting.  That was most disappointing given that I had not chased after a semi-reliable Bunting seen the previous winter at a feeder in Stamford – beyond my acceptable chasing distance.  And the winds were out of the south so there was no reason to try for eagles or other raptors at hawkwatches.  So with no other rarities to chase, and work commitments backing up, I decided to head to my Milford hotel early and get to work instead of taking more time off.

It was now late afternoon, and not only had I missed my target bird, but work wasn’t exactly going very well either.  I looked at my watch and it was 3:30.  Milford Point, my favorite birding spot in the area and one of my favorites in all of CT, was only about 15 minutes away.  I asked myself why I was sitting in my hotel room working on a vacation day instead of birding.  So I decided to make a quick run to Milford Point and just do a couple hours of late-day fun birding. 

I arrived at Milford Point and first went to the inland side of the park.  Tide was pretty high, and I didn’t see much except a small flock of Brant.  Then I headed over to the beach to see what gulls and late shorebirds might be around.  At this high tide all the birds were way out on distant sandbars.  I could see a couple birders out that way, so I headed out to join him.  It turned out to be Steve Spector, who I birded with back in February at Silver Sands State Park in Milford to find a stakeout Long-eared Owl, and his wife Charla.  First we spotted a flock of Horned Larks on the nearby spit but no Longspurs.  Then we turned our attention to the distant sandbars where there was a nice collection of shorebirds – principally Black-bellied Plovers, Sanderlings, and Dunlin, plus a nice flock of Oystercatchers.  And of course there were a number of Great Black-backed, Herring, and Laughing Gulls.  I was scanning through the shorebirds hoping to find something else when Charla asked what this gull was with a bright red bill.  It turned out to be a Caspian Tern – new for my CT list.  Thanks Charla!  I got this phonescoped picture of the bird as it rested on the sandbar.

Although Caspian Tern is not a super rarity in CT and is seen every year along the coast, I have never tried to chase after one.  The closest CT coastline is 2 hours away from home, so even if I got news of a sighting in real time, it would take me at least 2 hours to get to the right location.  And in that time the tidal conditions would have changed enough that the bird could well be long gone by the time I arrived.  Similarly, just as with this CT bird, the only Caspian Terns I’ve seen in MA and RI have been birds I’ve run into on my own rather than chasing after.  And I still need this species for ME (see my statebird map below).

Just a couple minutes after spotting the Caspian Tern all the birds suddenly took off, flushed by a Peregrine Falcon.  As the birds milled about looking for spots to land I scanned through them hoping to re-find the Caspian.  At one point a good-sized flock of shorebirds passed through my binocular field.  The flock was mostly Black-bellied Plovers and Dunlin, but then I noticed a larger bird with a white rump and black tail – Hudsonian Godwit!  Another new bird for my CT statelist - #323 for my CT list.  The bird eventually came in pretty close, where I was able to get these phonescoped photos. 

It’s interesting that my pursuit of Hudsonian Godwit in CT has been quite similar to Caspian Tern.  The Godwit is rare but regular as a migrant on the CT coast, but I’ve never chased after one in CT given the same time and tide challenges that I’ve had trying to go after Caspians.  I’ve now seen Hudsonian Godwit in 10 states in the northeast (though I still need it in RI) as a fall migrant, 3 Plains states as a spring migrant, in AK as a breeder, and in WA as a rarity.

Steve made some calls to local birders and several were able to see the bird before nightfall, including ironically Tina Green with whom I started my day in a failed attempt for the Painted Bunting.  Interestingly, the Caspian Tern did not stick around - another one that wouldn't have been chaseable.  Sure didn’t think I would get one, let alone two, new CT statebirds after missing my key target bird.  And not bad for a little light birding late in the day.  Once again Milford Point lives up to its reputation as one of my favorite CT birding spots.  

And one last postscript on the day - although Painted Bunting is much rare than Caspian Tern and Hudsonian Godwit in CT, it is likely the easiest of the 3 to chase after.  I just have to hope that one has an extended stay at a feeder somewhere in eastern CT.