July 8, 2011 Mount Auburn Cemetery

Pleasant weather, warm, no wind, mostly sunny

This ended up being an amazing day.  I went to Halcyon lake to begin with just to see if there was anything around.  I actually chased around a Northern Flicker for quite some time and got some great shots of it, as well as a couple of rabbits.  Apparently Wendy thinks one of the rabbits is a hare, and the other is a rabbit.  I’m not sure what that means but she seems convinced.  The shots of the rabbit/hares came out pretty good, I’ll post some of them here.  Actually I’ll post them on their own page to compare.

OK, so the picture above is a rabbit I think she said, and the one below is apparently a hare…at least according to Wendy.  Something about the ears.   I think she’s out of her mind, but I digress.

    Alright, so after fumbling about with members of the Lepus family I decided to search for the Great-Blue Heron around Willow Pond.   So I get there and I’m by the willow with its branches dipping into the water.  As I walk to the right of this around the pond by where the workers put in a log for turtles to sun themselves on I noticed…a Great-Crested Cormorant!  I think I had seen one here a couple years ago, but this was pretty surprising.  I was shocked.   Here it is cruising along. 

 I’m including this picture on the left here only because it looks absolutely horrified.   For the record I think it might have been; when it saw me come within twenty feet of it, it scooted off into the pond and continued circling near the middle of it without getting anywhere near shore until I left.  I don’t know what brings cormorants this far in land.  I guess in the grand scheme of things we’re only about 5 or 6 miles from the ocean so it’s not that far.  Still I don’t think of Cormorants as venturing very far from the shore lines that they inhabit.  So after watching this bird for a while I decided that it was time to move along and began to walk away.  As I did I glanced back towards the log that the cormorant had been sitting on and ended up doing a double-take.  There was some sort of baby heron or bittern sitting on the log.  I did not have any of my guides with me at the time, ironically this was the first time I had neglected to bring them with me all year.  So I settled on it being a least bittern, but that was a complete guess.   I got some of the best pictures of it that I have ever gotten with this camera; here’s a couple of them, I’m going to take up the next block of space here with just pictures of this bird, it’s absolutely beautiful. 

Sad Heron is Sad

I wanted to include one of the habitat it was hanging out in as well, so there you go.  I want to start including more pictures that include the context of where the birds were as opposed to just shots of the bird itself.  So it turns out this is NOT a Bittern  at all. It’s juvenile Black-Crowned Night Heron.  These are not seen at Mount Auburn very often, but if there’s a juvenile here there must be a couple parents around somewhere.  Of course I had already written on the bird-sighting chalk-board that I had seen a Bittern, so I had to go back and make a correction the next day.  In the meantime though I was taking pictures like crazy when the Great-Blue Heron landed nearby and started fishing.  I got some GREAT pictures of it eating a frog, and then flying off to some of the trees and wandering around in the woods.  You don’t see Heron’s wandering around in the shade of trees on dry land very often.  Of course my memory card craps out and I lose all the pictures of the Great-Blue, but fortunately all the Night-Crowned pictures were safe.

Eventually I decided to leave the water fowl alone and continue walking around the pond, getting a shot of some ducks mucking around in some mud, a clear shot of a chipmunk (harder than it sounds), and a robin stereotypically eating a worm.  As I finished my lap around the pond I noticed a frog in the muck and got a good shot of that one too.  It was a pretty big frog, I think it might’ve been a bullfrog.   Also present, some bizarre looking dragon flies that looked like someone had spray painted white.

Muck Duck

All in all it was a great day, got to see a bunch of diverse life, and my first ever black-crowned night heron!  

June 25, 2011 Mount Auburn Cemetery

Was at Mount Auburn with Wendy on a cloudy overcast day to see what was around; I figured Warblers would be out of the question but who knows what else would be there.   We stayed around the Dell and by where the owls had been nesting; they have since fledged.   I did finally manage to get a few decent pictures of a Blue Jay; somehow I had gone the entire time of having this SLR and not getting a single good picture of one, so that’s always good.  It didn’t seem to mind our presence too much.   As we skulked around the dell we got a chance to see a turtle swimming around in the scum.  It’s always amazing how many frogs I heard splashing into the water as I approach as well.  I rarely see more than one or two, but judging by the racket they make when jumping back into the pond there must be close to 25 at any time on whatever side of the dell I happen to be on.  I guess that’s how the heron stays well fed. 

                Wendy noticed something that she seems to think is wild strawberries.  I have no idea what they are, but if she wanted to eat one I wouldn’t stop her. She passed.  I’ll put a picture in here, maybe someone can identify them.  Not sure what they are honestly, they look like small round strawberries.  I’ll see if they last the summer and ripen up more, then maybe I’ll try one.   It looks kind of like one of those red physio balls people use at the gym, but with spikes on it.  Actually the more I look at the picture that looks nothing like a strawberry. I’m definitely not eating one of them at any point.  I’ll let Wendy try one and see if she gets violently ill.  If not I guess I’ll have a bite of one.  

                We were also tailed at length by a male cardinal who was singing quite boisterously.  Cardinals will return to singing between broods of young, before they lay their next clutch of eggs.  I have seen some cardinal families trawling around the Cemetery the last time I came up here, I’m sure there are others that I have not seen yet as well.   This particular male was quite exuberant; I got some ‘action-shots’ of him flying away from us that came out kind of well.  I cannot wait until they start filling up the feeder again this autumn by the lakes; I was just learning how to use the camera this past winter; this time around I’ll be able to get some great midflight shots I hope.  Here’s the Cardinal: 

While I’m at it, here’s a picture of the turtle we saw in the dell as well.  You can see the scum that has started to coat the surface of the pond.  I’m sure someone out there is interested in turtles and can tell the difference between the species.  I could probably look up what kind this one is as well; I’ll take a guess and say painted until I look later.   Turtles are by far the easiest thing I photograph outside of plants; not too many lightning fast movements from these guys.  

Towards the end of the trip I got a ton of great pictures of a catbird that was hanging around the dell as well; perched on the Dell Path sign.  These are probably some of the clearest shots I’ve gotten with the camera.  I won’t be able to post them full-size in this document, but when I post them to the blog (birdinginboston.blogspot.com) clicking on them will bring up a full-sized picture.

Front View

 

Rounding out the trip we went around to where the owls used to have a nest; they’re gone but I wanted to see the area since Orioles frequent it, and Towhees on occasion.  As we stood there the sun came out and I noticed some birds flitting around that looked odd.  I scoped them with my binoculars and realized they were Purple Finches.   They used to be so common when I was a small child, but over the years they have come to Massachusetts with increasing irregularity.  Apparently at this point they’re considered an irruptive species.  When things up in Canada get particularly hairy for a winter there are species that will move further south and ‘erupt’ into more southern areas than you would usually see them.  What is interesting though is that this is the middle of June, so clearly these ones live here.  I only managed to get one picture before my camera battery died, but Wendy got several apparently.  Here’s my one Purple Finch photo; I had seen one last autumn and I recall saying that I was worried the winter was going to be hellacious.  Then we had the worst January ever for snow.  Fortunately it’s a bit warm for that now. So here’s the 2^nd Purple Finch I’ve seen in the last decade.  Wish I had gotten a better picture, but like I said I only had one before the camera died.

edit: On further inspection, this is a house finch.  Oh well, still a nice bird

June 2, 2011 Mount Auburn Cemetery

So Warbler season is pretty much over at this point, but I took a trip to Mount Auburn anyway to see what was shaking. As soon as I drove in the side gate I immediately ran into the turkey,  it actually charged my car sort of, and then wandered off to a grassy area to eat.  I got a bunch of nice pictures, before leaving to check out the dell, which was pretty much absent warblers.   Down by Willow Pond I spotted a turtle chilling on a log, so I got some pictures of that, as well as some of the flowers that are blooming.   On the way out I stopped again to get some more pictures of the Turkey, one of which you can see at the right here.

         Below here you can see a picture of one of the flowers, I think it's an iris, as well as the turtle sunning itself on the log. I also ran across a song sparrow at some point, calling from some foliage.  It was a nice trip, the Turkey has been an added surprise the last couple of trips.   I also need to check on the owls again at some point, although they very well might have fledged by now. I'll have to look for them around the dell, which is where the parents like to hang out.

May 29th, 2011: Sunday

Sunny, hot; about 86. 

For a change of pace today Wendy and I went to Arnold Arboretum.  I had not been there for a month, so I decided to see what was happening.  The Yellow Warblers I saw there were actually what inspired me to get the 55-250mm lens on my camera, as the 18-50 I had was not cutting it for capturing pictures of such a tiny bird.

                The path, I think it was called Willow Path that we usually go down to head across the marsh was supposedly closed due to a wall collapse.  We went down it anyway, like bosses.  Right away we saw a bunch of birds bathing in the stream; Catbirds, doves, house sparrows, and there were also goldfinches everywhere.  The catbird at right is not actually having a violent seizure, it’s enjoying the cold water.  Not a bad idea considering how humid and hazy it was out.  It was pretty disgusting in retrospect.  Wearing a thick polo shirt with jeans probably wasn’t the best call I’ve ever made, but I survived. 

                We made our way out to the path that cuts across the marsh and holy cow had that thing grown over since the last time we went.  Wendy commented that it looked like we were cutting a swath through a jungle as we went through.  There were brambles all across the path, so in that regard wearing jeans was a good decision.  We were serenaded as we went through by a Song Sparrow and a Red-Winged Blackbird that was making lazy circles around us and singing from the cat tails.  Wendy likes Red-Wings quite a bit, the red on their shoulders impresses her.  As we cut across the marsh we were accosted by a few bees, but other than that we escaped unscathed.  As we reached the other side I heard the Yellow Warbler calling and decided to see if I could get a few decent pictures.  I literally took 100 pictures of it, and sorted them when I got home.  A large amount of them were crystal clear, which is nice considering the last few times I’ve gone out I have not been able to get the type of photograph I’m used to taking.  Here’s a few of them, but first another shot of the Red-Wing:

I like this shot because I got the tail flaring out.

 And now for some Yellow-Warbler

Here are a bunch more shots of the Warbler. I’m very happy with how they turned out.

 

Why are you looking at me like that? Is there something on my beak?

As we wended on down the road after rejoining civilization and continued on deeper into the Arboretum we actually came across a couple of Brown-Headed Cowbirds. I have not seen any cowbirds since I came to Boston, in fact I had remarked about this about 15 minutes prior to running into this pair. 

These ones appeared to be particularly tame.  They let us approach quite closely, although they did appear perturbed, they let us get quite close.  These shots are probably the clearest I have taken with this lens and camera.  They tottered about for a while in the grass before eventually flying off, and Wendy and I carried on. 

                We kept going, and eventually button-hooked down this other path, apparently a vine garden was towards the end of the path.  I have never seen so many lilacs in one place before, off to the side of the path that leads down to the vine garden.  At the base of one of the bushes was a male Yellow-Shafted Flicker that I got several good pictures of.  Wendy got some pictures too; it was the first Flicker she had seen.  So that’s always positive. Below is a picture of the Flicker.  

              

  We carried on through the vine-garden and at this point I had a brief but awful allergy attack, not sure why.  I saw a Northern Mockingbird as we entered the vine garden.   It’s worth noting because I have not seen a ton of them this year.  Not sure where they’re all going or if it’s something ecological happening.  Now here are some pictures of flowers:

As we left here’s another picture of a Red-Wing that I snapped off,  it looks like it was about to making a bombing run on someone.  All in all it was a great day of bird watching, the pictures came out great, and Wendy liked the vine garden quite a bit. I think she wants a vine garden in her yard someday.  Not a bad thing to have I must say.  I will be returning here again at some point to walk the other trails and see what nature has in store for me then.

May 25th, 2011 Wednesday

Sunny, cloudless, beautiful

                I figured since the previous day was such a smashing success and with the weather being much nicer today I got the great idea to go to Mount Auburn again.  It appears however that with the nicer weather a lot of the migrating birds have pushed on further north, probably making their way to New Hampshire, Maine, and Canada over the next week or two.  

                I arrived at Mount Auburn, and sticking with the theme, I went to the dell, since birds love secluded wetlands.  Just outside of it I saw a bird hopping around, and got some pictures of it, thinking it was a Parula.  Arriving back home however and looking I realized I had again gotten shots of the suddenly not-so-elusive Mourning Warbler.  These shots were not that great either, I had just arrived and didn’t have time to get any of my settings in, but you can again tell from the side view this time, that it is indeed a Mourning Warbler.   After this I waited around for a while but some other people confirmed there really weren’t a whole ton of Warblers or other migrants left at this point, I guess yesterday was the last hurrah for the season.  I spotted a Black & White, but other than that nothing was really happening there.  

   I decided to try Halcyon Lake for a while, more towards the front of the cemetery, and a reputed bird-spot.  I saw a Red-Winged Blackbird that was quite vocal and active, as well as a Northern Oriole who was singing merrily.  As per the usual I got about 80 pictures of its’ rear end.  I also got pictures of a Song Sparrow and a Grackle.  Fairly common, but they were all welcome sights.  Bird is bird, any of them make me happy.  After hanging out around the lake for roughly a half hour I decided to head home.  Good times.

May 24, 2011

                This was literally the best day of birding I may have had, ever.  I got to see four species of birds I had never seen before. I don’t think that’s happened since I was probably 6 months old and things such as ‘grackles’ were new to me.  What’s great is that two of the birds are rarely seen.  One of which gets seen maybe 1 day ever couple of years.  I was torn about whether or not to go to Mount Auburn today, as I had much to do.  I decided to take a brief trip there, and it was sunny as I left.   As I wended my way through the cemetery and just before I got to the dell I drove up on a wild Turkey strutting about in the road. I pulled over and got many pictures; I was quite surprised to see a Turkey milling about, I had heard there weren’t any in Mt. Auburn, but apparently there’s at least one. I hope it has company.  I stood around watching it for several minutes, it did not seem particularly perturbed by my presence which is nice.   It eventually wandered off up an embankment and I wandered off back to my car.  

  I carried on another minute and arriving high side of the dell where I’ve had so much luck I parked my car, and engaged in one of my favorite activities; taking pictures of Robins on people’s gravestones.  The one above this paragraph turned out particularly well.  This Robin was shocked at how handsome I am so it’s beak was hanging open. 

After shocking nature with my supreme aesthetics for a while I started down the path by the Irish poet’s grave marker.   On my right I noticed an experienced birder who actually showed me how to identify the Black-Throated Greens that I have seen en masse lately.  He told me that he and another birder there had just seen a Mourning Warbler, a Magnolia Warbler, and a Canada Warbler in the bush a few minutes prior.  The Mourning Warbler is exceedingly rare; spotted perhaps once every couple of years by a couple of birders and then it vanishes again.  I saw something moving around in the bush and snapped about 30 pictures of it, but it was against the back drop of the sky with the sun still quite bright, so they didn’t come out well.  The picture at the right is the best of that first batch of pictures I got of it.  You can tell it’s a Mourning Warbler at least.  All I could see was a grayish-blue head, yellowish below the neck, and a tiny black bib.  I also saw what I thought was a really washed out looking Wood Thrush, like if someone ran a thrush through a washing machine about 30 times it would look like this.  I went around to the high side of the spruce bush and the other people there confirmed that was the Mourning Warbler.   My first ever sighting of one, and what may actually be my last!  I asked if they saw a thrush in there too, and they said there was a Swainson’s Thrush in the area as well, I described what I saw and they confirmed that was actually the Swainson’s.  Another first time sighting!  Several minutes passed with no further sound or sighting of either bird so we hooked back around the spruce bush into the dell along the path.  While there we spotted a Scarlet Tanager across the dell, as well as a Black & White Warbler. I’m starting to notice the B&W’s creep around like nuthatches quite a bit.  

The sordid underside of the Tennessee Warbler

   After several minutes of observing (the fairly experienced birder there had a pair of Svwaroski 10x42 EL’s….note to self: Win lottery and buy a pair) the guy with the nice binoculars said he heard the Tennesee again, this time outside of the dell, across the street sort of diagonally in this huge tree.  We went over, and after a few minutes I spotted the bird, pointed him out, and got about 10 pictures.   By now it was overcast, so they didn’t come out great, the one at right was the best of the bunch.   The Tennesee Warbler is a rather muted colored Warbler, looking almost like a Vireo in some ways.  The song was a dead giveaway to the guy in our party though, and I was able to match up what I saw with my binoculars to the Peterson guide, it was definitely a Tennesee.   Suddenly overhead we heard a Canada Warbler flying over, and it landed in a tree a short distance away.  I spotted it with my binoculars but was not able to get any good pictures.  That marked the 4^th first time species I had seen today.   In addition to the rarity of the Mourning, the Tennesee is fairly rare, seen maybe a few times per year, and the Swainson’s and Canada are both fairly uncommon in the area as well.  

                Returning to the dell after the Canada had flown off in the same bush we heard the Mourning Warbler.  After skulking about for a bit (me, not the Warbler) I was able to get into the underbrush and get several decent pictures, and get some great looks at it with my binoculars.  It’s a very simple bird; blue-gray head, yellowish everywhere else, and a black bib.   The pictures aren’t my best work, as now the sky was overcast and the underbrush dimmed much of the light, but you can tell it’s a Mourning Warbler.  We must have been an odd sight to the birds in the area.  There were five of us skulking around the outside of the shrubbery.   

          We also noticed that at the base of the bush scuttling around in the underbrush was the Swainson’s.  I got a couple of pictures, but again the lighting conditions were awful so they’re fairly blurry, but you can see one at the bottom here if you ever wondered what a Swainson’s thrush would look like to someone with really bad vision.  It began to sing intermittently as it moved slowly up the embankment.   It’s song is quite haunting, like the ghost of a Wood Thrush singing.  We lost the Mourning a bit later, and the Swainson’s moved back up the hill.   I left after that, with the Swainson’s serenading me with its ghostly song.  What a great day of birding!

May 21, 2011 Saturday

Sunny, Mild, Breezy

                A nice day out, I had other work to do but didn’t want to pass up the opportunity for some bird-watching.  This is the peak of Warbler season, so I’m trying to get out as much as possible.   I went to the dell as usual, but I’m thinking of checking out some other areas next time.

                The first thing I saw as I walked along the high path around the dell was what I thought was a rose-breasted grosbeak male, but without the red patch.  I took several pictures, and when I got home I tried to identify it for several minutes.  I then realized that because of the shade it was in I could not see the blue back on it.  Once I realized the back was blue, I could identify it as my first ever sighting of a Black-Throated Blue Warbler.  It really is a beautiful bird.   The mallards were out enjoying the dell and eating the scum that has started to form on the top of the pond, as mallards are wont to do.  I also watched a titmouse take a bath at the edge in some fetid water. I can’t imagine that doing much. 

                Outside of the dell a bit, on the side where it opens up to the rest of the cemetery, I spotted a Magnolia Warbler in a large tree, as well as a Northern Parula Warbler.  Both were singing quite a bit, although I still haven’t seen any females of several warbler species yet this year.  Total sausage party.

                At this point I realized I had not seen the owls in about a week so I trekked over to their nest and saw that one of them had left the nest and gone up to a higher branch and was looking at the observers that gathered with what can only be described a  malevolent look.   There was a male Northern Oriole also bouncing about in the branches around the Owl nest, although they paid it no mind.  This particular male was very small however, I don’t recall seeing one quite this tiny in some time.  Still, it was quite photogenic, and I obliged nature and got a few pictures of it.  Circling overhead during all this were two Red-Tailed Hawks, I presume the parents.  I need to get over to their nest fairly soon.

                On my way back towards the dell I ran into some other birders who seemed to be tracking some unknown warbler at the top of some trees as it flitted back and forth.  I heard it singing, and the couple of people there seemed to be excited because apparently it was the song of a Bay-Breasted Warbler.  I have no ever-loving idea what a Bay-Breasted Warbler sounds like, but everyone else seemed pretty excited.   I  spotted and pointed out what looked like a rather large, odd-looking sparrow.  After the others spotted it they confirmed this was actually a Bay-Breasted Warbler.  I wish I had gotten a bit of a better look at it, it was quite interesting looking, very chestnut dominated warbler.  I just checked dictionary.com and apparently “bay” is a term for reddish-brown.  You learn something every day.  After this I carried on and spotted a Scarlet Tanager, which again avoided capture by my camera.  This bird is quickly becoming my vex.

            Also in the area was a Redstart, which I got one decent picture of.  I’ve always enjoyed them, back when I was younger they were among the first warbler I learned to identify.  It was sitting near the top of a tree, singing contentedly.  Also at some point I apparently snapped pictures of another Warbler, but did not realize until later (I’m writing this after the  24^th when I saw what I thought was my first ever Canada Warbler) that it was a Canada Warbler.