Purple Martin, Brant, Yellow Warbler, Piping Plover, etc.

Birdathon moments included my first ever sighting of a Brant (a kind of goose). It was very exciting . . . for a little while, anyway.

They have very pretty patterns all over. They are nice birds. But geese just aren't terribly exciting. I have way too many photos of Brants!

A very funny view of a Purple Martin. They seem to be as aggressive as he looks - they did a lot of fighting with each other!

Tom captured these awesome shots of a happy looking Yellow Warbler in front of the Pilgrim Sands hotel at Plymouth Beach.

Another great shot of the Yellow Warbler in the sunshine.

I had to include another of Tom's outstanding Piping Plover images, too!

Bird-A-Thon Pictures!

Piping Plover at Plymouth Beach.  Endangered Species.

Bird-a-thon was awesome!  It was insane and exhausting, but also fun and rewarding. Our little team of four netted 52 different bird species. I suspect that is on the low side for really enthusiastic birders, but I thought we did an outstanding job. Tom took all of these pictures, and every one of them is outstanding, too. We even saw Piping Plovers, a lifer for me, I think. They are cute, adorable, and endangered.  (BTW, you should view these pictures LARGE or ORIGINAL size at Flickr.  They are really that good!)

Willet on Plymouth Beach.

Mid-day Saturday was shorebirds at Plymouth Beach. This is a Willet. Willets are large shorebirds, speckled gray-brown with a long straight bill. Willets look quite nondescript on the ground, but once in flight or even with wings spread out, they are distinguished by their striking black-and-white color pattern.

Common Tern in Flight

We saw four different species of terns in Plymouth! Four! This beauty is a Common Tern, which is not at all common as far as I'm concerned.

Laughing Gull, May 15 2010

All four of Massachusetts' gulls were well represented, too. I couldn't resist this shot of a laughing gull.

Marbled Godwit

I wanted a Yellowlegs, but I got a Godwit. I actually failed to see more than a couple of my target species, but seeing a Marbled Godwit in the spring is quite rare, or so I've been told. Pete and I saw this guy on Saturday. A birder from another Bird-A-Thon team gave us the ID and the info on this species. If he hadn't, I'd still be looking through field guides!

More to come later on. Thanks especially to BirdingGirl (my cousin and inspirational fellow blogger!) for joining our Birdathon team and taking us birding in Bridgewater Friday evening!

IT'S NOT TOO LATE TO MAKE A DONATION!  25 CENTS PER SPECIES WILL COST YOU ONLY $13.00!  CLICK HERE OR CLICK THE FUNDRAISING WIDGET ABOVE.   THANKS, ALL!

Birding and Breakfast at Broadmoor!

I hope that every mother had a Happy Mother’s Day, and I hope that every child enjoyed celebrating Mother’s day! I had a picture-perfect Mother’s day celebration myself, and even got pictures of brand new baby ducklings with their mother.  My family took me to “Birding and Breakfast” at Broadmoor again, and this year was even better than before!

Seeing baby ducklings was a plus, but it was hardly the only  highlight of the day.  We saw Bluebirds, Tree Swallows, Robins building a nest, Baltimore Orioles, Eastern Towhees, a Blue- winged Warbler, a mockingbird, a glorious Red-breasted Grosbeak in full song, a dozen red-winged blackbirds, a brown headed cowbird, a Flicker in the treetops, a Great-crested Flycatcher, and an Eastern Phoebe.  All that in addition to the big flock of ring-billed gulls (a rarity at that site), the nesting Canada Geese, and the most beautiful assortment of Painted turtles you’ll ever see.

After birding was breakfast of homemade pancakes and homemade syrup.  Yum.  Then I guilted my husband into buying me a Massachusetts Breeding Bird Atlas for a Mother’s day gift.  And when we arrived at home I received yet another mother’s day gift!  My lovely daughter had three gorgeous summer tops all wrapped in pretty paper and ribbons waiting for me!

I had a perfect day, despite the trauma and anxiety of the past two weeks.  A big thank you to my husband and kids, and a sincere wish that everyone else ended the day feeling wonderful, too.