Part 1
Trying to explain the premise of a birding big day to a
sensible person gets you nowhere in a hurry. Hopefully anyone reading this is
of the non-sensible type and thus we can get through this in one piece.
Myself (Dominic Cormier), Avery Bartels, David Bell and
Lucas Berrigan had planned a Nova Scotia Birding Big Day for the end of May. We
would be attempting to see as many bird species as possible in a midnight to
midnight 24 hr period in the province of Nova Scotia; the goal, to surpass the
record of 145 species set by Clarence Stevens Jr. et al. in June 1999. A big
day can be a punishing test of physical and mental endurance birding non-stop
for 24hrs, often with little sleep. Big days are usually prefaced with a full
pre-Big Day scouting mission adding insult to injury. Our proposed route
invited incredulity; an ambitious path that would take us from Amherst down to
Upper Tantallon, then on to middle of nowhere N.S, the Valley, Digby, Pubnico, Cape
Sable Island, and our final resting place for the evening, Bon Portage Island.
For those not familiar with Nova Scotia geography, it is mildly demented, trust
me.
Crazy or not, the wheels were set in motion on Friday May 27th
when Avery, Lucas and I left Bon Portage Island where we were doing field work
and made our way to Wolfville. The following morning, Dave came and picked us
up bright and early for a full day of pre-big day scouting. Birding hard
throughout the day, we made it to the Beaubassin research station in Sackville
NB that evening, did some last minute planning, showered, and attempted some
shut eye before the beginning of our big day.
Ok enough preamble.
My alarm sounded at 11:30 pm May 28th, 2016. I
had slept perhaps an hour and a half, but did not feel too fatigued. In
relative silence, the four of us gathered our things, snagged the food from the
fridge, loaded into the van and headed off to Amherst Point Bird Sanctuary
where we would try for some night-time flight calls, marsh birds, and owls.
11:55 pm, we are on the highway mere minutes from our destination. Trooper’s
“Raise A Little Hell” comes on the radio and our spirits rise. That’s right,
“Raise A Little Hell”, sometimes the stars just align perfectly, we were going
to be raising some birding hell! 11:57 pm, wait……. yup… shit!!!… flashing blue
lights behind us. The PoPo! I guess the stars weren’t all that well aligned. “Are you serious, 115 km/hr is not speeding”
exclaims Dave the driver. Well, it is if you’re in a construction zone, albeit
an unoccupied one at midnight. With ticket in hand, we managed to arrive at our
destination only 5 minutes behind schedule.
*** The ticket was
one minute before midnight, thus we engaged in no illegal activity on the
actual big day in question. I have photographic proof if anyone has their
doubts. ***
What about birds? Well here goes. Dave had had shorebirds
present the night before, but none were to be heard in the wee hours of the
morning. With zero species at our first
stop, it was at this point that Lucas realized he had forgot a key element of a
birding big day, his binoculars! Could we have scripted a more tragic debut? We
would have to backtrack to Beaubassin, but not before a last listen for the
perennially cute Northern Saw-whet Owl and the timberdoodlin’ American Woodcock,
along with any other possible bird carving tracks in the night sky at the end
of May. As we hop out and I am closing the door, my tripod, which was poorly
positioned in the vehicle, prevents the door from shutting. As I attempt to
re-arrange a few things in the front seat, Dave and Lucas hear our first bird
of the day, a night flying Grey-cheeked Thrush giving its distinct flight note.
Of course, I missed it. All it took was 30 seconds of fiddling in the van and
that was one species down that we wouldn’t all get on our shared list.
Unbeknownst to the four of us, this would become a trend throughout the day,
where not all in our birding party would get a particular species. A distant
and expected Canada Goose became our second species, but no luck on anything
else. With time already moving doggedly and predictably forward, we made our
necessary detour to collect the forgotten binoculars and moved on.
For the next
hour or so we stalked the Amherst Sewage Ponds, and Eddy and Amherst Marshes.
Lurking like foul creatures in the sewage ponds, we spotlighted dabblers and
shorebirds, seeing such goodies as Semipalmated Plover (rare for time of year),
Least Sandpiper, Northern Pintail, and a pair of vocal Killdeer (our only ones
of the day). Arriving at Amherst Marsh, the air was oddly hushed. American
Bitterns and Wilson’s Snipe, which are normally very vocal were silent. We even
had to coax the Sora and Virginia Rails to call. A brief squeak, barely a
whisper, from a roosting Black Tern was missed by the two older-timers (me and
Avery – 28 years old) but heard by the two younger more sharp-eared birders
(Dave and Lucas – 24 years old). After lingering as long as possible, we rolled
into Eddy Marsh where once again the bitterns and snipe were still. A walk
through the night-drenched marsh vegetation left us wet, but we heard the
nesting Marsh Wrens, and enjoyed an encounter with a family of River Otter
beneath the moonlight sky. This big marsh at night was oddly serene and
provided some nice peace in what would otherwise be a rather hectic day.
With the Marsh Wrens bagged, we stopped at Dave’s
Short-Eared Owl spot. In order to stay alert, I had drunk a fair bit of water,
and in what would be a frequent occurrence during the day, I had to step away
to relieve myself. This was of course the moment when the Short-eared Owl chose
to call. We now had a dilemma. We were missing bittern and snipe and I hadn’t
heard the short eared. Our schedule had us leaving at that moment and so we did.
In retrospect we should have tarried and cut out our next night stop, Barr
Settlement. This stop was planned as it was on-route and because last year it
had hosted an Eastern Whip-poor-will, a species that would be a Nova Scotia
lifer for all of us. While the ride was uneventful, so to were the woods at
Barr Settlement. We had to leave empty-handed, always conscious of the time. We
wanted to make Tantallon with the beginning of dawn. I did pound back a full
bag of beef jerky to keep things interesting.
On the drive, the three of us invariably started to doze off
while Dave diligently kept us going. I do remember saying something like, turn here…
take Hammond’s Plains Rd. When Dave roused us we were approaching our
destination, Hiking Trail Road. This area is a network of well kept logging
roads that run through Bowater Mersey lands and are well used by recreators (is
that even a word?) from the city. It was here we would get the bulk of our
forest birds for the day. No worse for the wear, and with light in the sky, we started
adding species. Swainson’s Thrush, White-throated Sparrow, Hermit Thrush, American
Robin, Common Yellowthroat, Alder Flycatcher. Still in semi-obscurity, a
woodcock scatters, followed closely by another whirring passed our heads.
Dave’s sharp ears pick up a Common Nighthawk and we all turn to spot it flying
into the approaching daylight. Light now starts to chase away the night, and
the woods become alive with song. Like pupils diligently replying to roll call,
the common species start flying on to our day list: Mourning Dove, Winter Wren,
Magnolia Warbler, Song Sparrow, Dark-eyed Junco. An Olive-sided Flycatcher gives its far
carrying whistles, while the ethereal songs of thrushes fill the space around
us. In the mix, a Lincoln’s Sparrow sings. As the last moments of dawn give way
to the first rays of sunlight above the horizon, two Barred Owls make their
presence known. The race is now one!
For the next hour, we snake our way up the logging road
periodically stopping along the way. A brief bog excursion produces Gray Jay,
Ruby-crowned Kinglet and Yellow-bellied Flycatcher. Boreal specialists
Bay-breasted and Cape May Warbler are heard, but the latter’s song too high
pitched and distant for Avery’s hearing. A drumming Pileated Woodpecker assures
that we will not miss this easily missed species, and our familiar friends the
American Redstart, Purple Finch, Black-throated Green Warbler and Yellow-rumped
Warbler fill the airwaves.
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| Soaking up the dawn. Photo: Dave Bell |
With the morning drawing on, we hightail it back to the
highway, our list plump with most of Nova Scotia’s coniferous forest
birds. A few blank spaces remain on our
checklist, notably in front of the names of Spruce Grouse and Black-backed
Woodpecker, and no grosbeaks or crossbills had caused our heads to turn skyward
in response to their pervasive flight calls. We also missed one of my personal
favorites, the surprisingly scarce Northern Waterthrush, and no raptors were
spied that did not support a red tail.
Nonetheless, we were feeling good. A hodge-podge of snacks
and drinks are passed around as we keep a close eye on the tree tops and skies
whizzing by. Common Raven. Check. American Black Duck. Check. Blue Jay. Check.
We arrive at East River near Chester only ever so slightly
behind schedule. The time is 7:48 AM. In what was a rather lamentable ten-minutes,
we bolted down a cycling path to scan the river for Common Merganser with no
luck. Alas, that was our only known spot for that species and we would not see
another one during the day. Continuing onward, we took the little traveled
highway 14 which goes across the province from Chester to Windsor. Here it was
that we hoped to round out our boreal style birds for the day. As we pulled off
onto a rarely used overgrown dirt path, a Nashville Warbler sung on queue, and
arriving at a beaver pond, it is not long before a pair of Rusty Blackbirds
made their presence known. Focused as we were, we could not find the pair of
Hooded Mergansers that had graced the pond the day before, but a flock of
chattering White-winged Crossbills flew overhead just in the nick of time!
It was now time for the valley, where sprawling agricultural
fields, deciduous woods, and marshland would add a whole new suite of species
to our already promising day. Unwittingly, the valley would also precipitate an
increasing time differential between our planned route and our actual one.
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| The command centre. Photo: Lucas Berrigan |
At our first stop in Falmouth, we added our only
Chesnut-sided Warbler, Yellow-bellied Sapsucker and Eastern Pheobe for the day,
but the minutes were dragging on and a small navigation error on my part put us
another 4 minutes behind. To make matters worse, Avery went below the bridge to
see if he could spy the Eastern Pheobe (it called 2 minutes later) just as
three Evening Grosbeaks flew overhead, adding another partial species to our
day list. Continuing, we cruised the UNESCO world heritage site of Grand Pré. I
don’t think the pioneering Acadians had “making good gull habitat” in mind when
they created fertile fields by diking the surrounding marshland, but pastoral
intentions aside, Grand Pre is great for gulls. Out in the fields, those pesky
larids were congregated, and a very late Glaucous Gull along with a couple of juv.
Lesser Black-backed Gulls had us in high spirits. We viewed those two species
as “bonus” birds for the day in accordance with our highly detailed and
specific scouting report. A scan of Evangeline Beach proved well timed as a
Semipalmated Sandpiper (very rare in spring) flew by and we scoped what we thought
would be our only scoters of the day. The birds were distant but appeared to be
Surf. We left at 10:09 AM. Fifteen minutes behind but so far so good.
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| Late Glaucous Gull. Photo: David Bell |
As an objective observer, I have to say that the next hour
was somewhat of a mess, our big day novice badges shining bright. We had failed
to pin down a Merlin nest in our hometown of Wolfville, and made a shot in the
dark stop at the reservoir for non existent Veery. Had we known there were
Veery to be had down in Yarmouth county, we could have cut out a painful and
time consuming run down the Kentville Ravine to get them. At least we had a
good chuckle watching Lucas sprint through the woods atop a steep slope while
the rest of us cruised along a well travelled path! Novice badges in hand, we stopped
for Great-crested Flycatcher and dipped (not surprising given no one had seen
or heard the pair outside of dawn and dusk). At least the staked out Baltimore
Oriole and Canada Warbler at Miner’s Marsh were quick and easy, and we avoided
any unpleasant traffic (I swear Wolfville takes the prize for “most traffic
ever” for a small town in Canada). We even managed to avoid talking to anyone;
no time could be wasted talking to mere plebs, non-initiates into the madness
that is big day birding.
With many sites of brief duration, this leg had a real
whirlwind feel to it. It was also in this whirlwind that Avery and I missed,
for the second time, a Rose-breasted Grosbeak. One had called that morning
along Hiking Trail Rd. which we did not hear, and one called again in Port
Williams that was drowned out by other bird song.
With the next leg of our journey a straight path down the
valley, we ended our morning having cracked the 100 species mark and comfortably
on our way to big day glory.
Part 2
Wolfville was in the rear-view mirror. Our list numbered
over the 100 species mark and we were feeling fly. Dave thought it would be a
good idea not to count our total anymore, leaving our effort in suspense for
the rest of the day. In hindsight this was probably not the best strategy as we
could have prioritized certain spots over others had we known our total later
in the day. C’est la vie.
With our innards being filled by sandwiches deftly crafted
by Avery, we made our first stop of the afternoon at Clairmont PP. Calling this
small pine stand wedged between farm fields and small communities a provincial
park might be a bit of a stretch, but in previous years it had hosted breeding
Pine Warblers, a rare breeder in Nova Scotia. Leaning out of the windows and the
open door of the van like drunk hooligans, we slowly drove the loop listening
intently for our favorite pine specialist, binoculars clutched in our hands in
lieu of beer. While we did not get Pine Warbler, I enjoyed our little loop; there
is just something about driving around with half your body leaning out of the vehicle
that revives the spirit.
Our next stop was also for just one species, another scarce
breeder in Nova Scotia, the Vesper Sparrow. This time it was “veni, vidi, vici”.
Easy peasy, and not a second wasted.
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| Vesper Sparrow peeking through the fence. Photo: David Bell |
It was now time for our scheduled 10-minute pit stop in
Bridgetown. This involved gassing up, using the bathroom, grabbing a bite to
eat if need be and scoping the nesting Cliff Swallows under the bridge right
behind the gas station. While we were no F1 pit crew, we kept the stop to 10
minutes and arrived at Belleisle Marsh not too long afterwards.
Belleisle is a beautiful network of marshes along the
Annapolis Basin and a spot that deserves more than the cursory ten minutes we
gave it. With the far carrying calls of the Greater Yellowlegs invading our
senses, we were able to locate the nesting Willow Flycatchers. Bobolinks sang
from the fields, a song which softens the most hardened of souls, and for the
naturalists of old, moved them to prose: “It is as if he touched his harp
within a vase of liquid melody, and when he lifted it out, the notes fell like
bubbles from the trembling strings (Thoreau).” I can just picture Thoreau
waxing poetic in a tweed jacket, pipe and notebook in hand. Sans tweed jackets
or pipes notwithstanding, we still enjoyed the “bubbling delirium of ecstatic
music that flows from the gifted throat of the bird like sparkling champagne
(Bent)” while focussed on efforts to locate a lingering American Coot. These
brief efforts were unsuccessful, and the snipe and bittern once again remained
quiet. Well perhaps not quite. According to eBird, the other three heard a
snipe call, but that species remains conspicuously absent from my checklist - I'm a good birder I swear! As we were driving out, a Hooded Merganser
flashed across the van. Easily seen by the two in the front seat, one of the
back seat passengers missed it. I am actually surprised that this didn’t happen
more often during our day, as car flybys are easy to miss.
I should note that at this point we still only had
Red-tailed Hawk, Bald Eagle and Turkey Vulture for raptors. The day before we
had scored Broad-winged Hawk, Merlin and American Kestrel no problem, but today
we were running out of time. An overcast sky wasn’t helping things and coupled
with the fact that we had yet to see an Osprey and a Ring-billed Gull a slight
feeling of panic took hold inside my gut. Trust me, no one wants to finish a
big day minus an Osprey and a Ring-billed Gull. No one!
So it went that after Belleisle came the French Basin Trail,
another marsh full of life. A lingering Bufflehead and a singing Wilson’s
Warbler whose insistent trill just barely pierced through the cacophony of
Yellow Warblers put our minds at ease; we were still adding species at a steady
pace despite running behind schedule, and I even briefly forgot about the
Osprey and the Ring-billed Gull. As we headed to our next stop, the Ring-billed
Gull drifted back into my consciousness and I finally voiced my concerns aloud.
We were headed to Digby and I said, “look dudes, we need an effin RBGU, Digby
has to have one by the water or something… if we don’t get one soon we could
totally miss it for the day.” My companions didn’t seem too concerned, but
perhaps after 32+ hours of being awake (minus the 1.5-hour nap at Beaubassin),
communication was starting to fall apart.
The town of Digby is an unassuming hamlet renowned worldwide
for its delicious scallops, but we were not there to sample those delicious
fruits from the sea. On a serious note, Digby has a bunch of tourist trap
restaurants so do your homework beforehand if you want to eat there; I’ve
learned the bland, mediocre, soul-crushing hard way. However, unlike the food,
Digby delivered in a HUGE way on our big day and we rode that high until the
bitter end. Here is how it unfolded. The key was a seawatch at the Point Prim
lighthouse just outside of town. This was Dave’s idea and kudos to him, because
in a fifteen minute seawatch we scoped some Razorbill, a Common Murre and two
Red-throated Loons. We then managed all three scoter species in in the bay and
the reliable House Finches on Montague Row were, well, reliable. Still no
Ring-billed Gull though. Damn gulls. However, as Avery was packing the scopes
up I saw Lucas staring dumbfounded into a tree. A quick look into the tree
revealed a female Scarlet Tanager. As I try and call Dave and Avery over it
flies off into a yard. Dave managed to see the bird fly away but Avery did not.
Despite Lucas’ lapse in communication, he immediately made up for it in one of
the deftest displays of communication I have ever seen (I am dead serious!).
The tanager had flown into someone’s yard, and as we peered into it to see if
the tanager was still visible, a friendly looking elderly women smiled and
walked over. Her property was well stocked with bird feeders and shrubs. “What
are you seeing”, she asks. “A Scarlet Tanager,” replies Lucas. “No you didn’t, those are cardinals”, she
replies bluntly. I was tongue tied and did not know how to respond, however
Lucas worked his magic. He somehow was able to convey all our knowledge about
birds, our familiarity with cardinals and tanagers, the finer points of the id
of all the birds present in her backyard while pointing them out to her, explain
that we were doing a big day, and get her feeling lucky about the fact that her
yard had just hosted a Scarlet Tanager. Amazing! Her incredulity dissipated, we
made merry, her husband came over for a brief chat, and we were on our way.
Back in the van, everything onward is somewhat of a blur. While Digby was
unequivocally a success, we were now well behind schedule, and the 33+ hours
were taking their toll. The drive to the next spot on our never ending list of
stops for the day, took us through lots and lots of forest. This was basically
one of our last chances to get our missing raptors. I also had to pee REALLY
badly, as did a few others for that matter, and so we pulled over on the side
of the highway. While enjoying a quiet moment in nature, the unmistakable song
of a Veery drifted our way, totally negating 25 minutes of effort in Wolfville.
Next big day we’ll plan to get our Veeries along that stretch of road but at
that moment, we just had to suck it up and move on.
At Mavillette Beach, we had thoughts of epic rarities, and
three additions to our day list: a newly returned Nelson’s Sparrow, a recently
spotted Brown Thrasher, and an unseasonal Purple Sandpiper. Too pressed for
time, we only managed to hear the Nelson’s Sparrow (Avery couldn’t hear it over
the wind) and we saw or heard nothing else of note. This also ate into our
eventual time to spend on Cape Sable Island where the bang for the buck is much
higher. A foolish move and one that will be dropped should we do another big
day. At least between Mavilette and Pubnico we FINALLY managed to see an
Osprey. Who knew it would take until 4:18PM of a full day of birding to see our
provincial bird. I sure didn’t!
Man this narrative is dragging on, so just imagine the
actual day. Plus, the afternoon had turned very dark and sombre, making it feel
like the end of the day was just around the corner, and probably suppressing
the birdlife somewhat.
Anyway, much like I will summon my energy to keep recounting
this tale in the next part, the 4 weary birders summoned their strengths with
the waning day, still buoyed by the success in Digby, but beginning to be
keenly aware that time was running out and that the last hooray was just around
the corner.
Stay tuned for the last push!
Part 3
And so the last push began. Our stops were - Pond Rd in
Pubnico, Overton (Yarmouth), Cape Sable Island and finally Shag Harbour to
catch our boat ride to Bon Portage Island.
If there was one guarantee on our big day, it was Pubnico.
From the shore at Pond Road, the tern colony of the Brothers Islands is visible
through a scope, with Common, Arctic and Roseate Terns coming to and fro. These
terns are harder-to-find species that are simply not missed if you bother to
show up in good weather. Pond Rd. also had an added bonus in the form of a long
staying Little Blue Heron. Driving up, we all turned expectantly towards the
pond, hoping to glimpse the white form of the juvenile Little Blue Heron. Luck
was with us, and we easily spotted the wayward wader who wandered hither from
the south.
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| Little Blue Heron. Photo: David Bell |
This was also a moment of note for another reason. As
birders, we keep lists of the birds we see. Some are important (our life
lists), others sentimental (childhood backyard), others tongue in cheek (while
h***** s**). Recently, Dave and I had begun a friendly competition for our home
and native land, Canada. As a bluenoser, Little Blue Herons are a regular
occurrence for me. Dave on the other hand, despite gracing our province since
2013, had yet to see one in Canada. Ok, a bird he should have seen by now but
didn’t, so what? We all have those nemesis birds. True, but the lack of Little
Blue Heron was symptomatic of something else. Despite birding Nova Scotia,
Ontario and New Brunswick like a fiend, and finding rare birds left right and
center, Dave could not find or twitch a new Canada bird for his list for a good
long stretch. I’ve seen bad birding luck, but this was garbage, a genuine
curse. Of course, with one fell swoop, it was gone. Our big day had brought
Dave out of Canada lifer purgatory and he has since added six more to his
Canada life list, slowly creeping ahead of me in our “friendly” competition.
As the boys set up the scopes to scan the colony, I take a brief
moment off. Returning to find them actively scanning the colony, I spy a
lingering female Long-tailed Duck calmly riding the waves, unseen by their concentrated
faces. Quite satisfied with this unexpected addition to our day list, I work on
getting the obligatory views of the scarcest of the terns, the Roseate Tern. As
I try to pick out the white upperwing flashes in the melee of swarming terns, a
gull draws our attention for a moment. It’s a ringer! The bird causes some mild
excitement, but undeniably “mild” is the highest order of excited I have ever
been to see a Ring-billed Gull. Perhaps one day I’ll be in Peru, China, or
Australia and find the first one for that country and the excitement level will
surpass this day, but for now, “mild” was as good as it gets. Returning to the
terns, I am finally satisfied with my views of a few Roseates and away we go.
Miserably behind schedule, we decide to make only one stop in Yarmouth. We had
originally planned on trying to chase down both a Red-bellied and a Red-headed
Woodpecker but that was completely out of the question. Instead we take a
direct route to Overton where we hope there will be a Snowy Egret or two
politely waiting for us. We should have known better that Snowy Egrets aren’t
polite. With time fully dictating our birding, we made our way to the
penultimate stop of the evening, Cape Sable Island.
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| Taking a break while Dave scopes the Little Blue Heron in the background. Photo: Avery Bartels |
We had hoped to spend a minimum of an hour and a half on CSI
where the birds can be quite plentiful, but all we managed was a measly 25
minutes. Now I must confess that I thought I knew how the tide schedule worked
for the shorebirds at “The Hawk”. According to the charts, high tide was at
4:19 pm, and I thought that when we got to “The Hawk” two hours and ten minutes
after later, the mud would be nicely exposed and teeming with a diverse array
of shorebirds that had made 2016 an exceptional spring shorebird season in Nova
Scotia. Alas, imagine our collective dismay when we pulled up and saw the flats
still firmly covered in water. I was utterly crestfallen. What we thought would
be a veritable bonanza of Red Knot, Ruddy Turnstone, Dunlin, Short-billed
Dowitcher and Sanderling (all seen that morning) did not come to pass. We were
left feeling empty, scrounging for the breeding American Oystercatcher and
Piping Plover, and the common migrant Black-bellied Plover with the little time
we had. Completely unsatisfied, we made the briefest of stops at Daniel’s Head
in case an obvious Jabiru, Roseate Spoonbill or Western Reef Heron was kicking
around undetected and unreported. Not likely my friends, not likely.
At least we had the foresight to order some pizza and garlic
fingers, a personal east coast favorite of mine, to be picked up in Barrington
Passage on our way to catch the boat over to Bon Portage. Grabbing the pizza,
we met Lee at the wharf right on schedule, and we were soon chugging across the
channel to the island. The shame I felt from our poor showing on CSI was
covered up by the food. The feeling when that hot greasy garlic goodness hits
your stomach after a long day is something to cherish. Embrace your carnal
instincts folks, devour the food without shame. Almost maniacal at this point
from lack of sleep, I still spun the yarn with Lee and Gerry like a true
Maritimer. If you ever want some spice in your life, a visit to Shelburne
County might do the trick, especially if you’re interested in hanging around
folks with nick names like Marsha Mudturtle, Douchebag Dan and Dicky Eyeball,
just to name a few!
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| Destroying the grub. Photo: David Bell |
Now to tell you how it was supposed to be, Bon Portage was the
feather in our cap in what we hoped would be a record breaking big day. Off
limits to most, this island which is owned by Acadia has been my home for a
large part of my masters, and has been known to have a few good birds every
once in a while, as well as a few mainstays that are not easily encountered
elsewhere.
The skies were a bleak grey by the time we hit shore,
casting a sense of gloom over the evening. We had some very clear targets. We
needed to look for the Summer Tanager that had been present around the cabins
up to the 27th, encounter the breeding Fox Sparrows, and then head
to the lighthouse for a seawatch finale - seawatching is a birding term for the
act of birding the ocean from land, usually done with a scope and from a
sheltered position if the winds are up or you are in the middle of a hurricane.
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| The hoped for Summer Tanager. Photo: Avery Bartels |
By this point in the ordeal, are brains are mush, and decision
making skills non existent. As we wandered aimlessly around the cabins, I
finally laid my foot down and rallied the troops to the seawatch before the
light waned. It seemed the tanager was long gone and the Fox Sparrows were just
not singing. Arriving at the lighthouse, we settled in with our scopes like old
pros, as a distant Fox Sparrow began to sing. Avery doesn’t pick it up over the
wind, and in my madness I suggest he go run off to find it. What a terrible
decision - never break up the group! With Avery gone, a Sooty Shearwater cuts
across the waves, and Dave starts scoping puffins arriving at their distant but
visible breeding colony on Green Island. In a panic, Lucas runs off to go find
Avery. Eventually they return but Avery had not heard the sparrow and we still
needed to get everyone on the puffins and shearwaters. With Lucas scoping the
puffins, I continue to frantically scan the ocean for another shearwater. The
light starts to wane in earnest and the ocean appears lifeless. Then in the
gloom, Avery mutters a mixture of jaeger and confusion, for it is not a jaeger,
nor a gannet, but what is it? Something in between? Why yes! Dave quickly fills
the brooding silence - guys I think its a Booby! My mind explodes, the blood
pressure rises and I quickly try to get on the bird. For you see, I was still
intently looking for a Sooty Shearwater to ensure it would be a bird on ALL of
our checklists, not just a few, and I had not turned my scope toward the bird
when Avery called. Scanning across it wasn’t hard to pick out the bird in
question. Well shit… a Booby indeed! “Avy baby” Bartels coming up BIG!
While quite far, and in sombre light, the bird was still
quite distinct. My notes are summarized in the following ebird checklist...
- http://ebird.org/ebird/view/checklist/S29986372
... and Dave’s notes are here.
- http://ebird.org/ebird/view/checklist/S29986370.
The difference in viewing is easily attributable to
Dave’s superior tripod head, for mine is slightly loose and gives the image a
slight shake at high magnification. This may seem like a trivial matter, and
for the most part it is easily overcome, but in this case it really did matter
with the low light and high zoom. Note to self, buy a new tripod head!
I now must interrupt this narrative with some listing
semantics. If you don’t give a hoot about crazy birder listing rules skip over
this paragraph. As you may have noticed in my eBird checklist, I have the bird
down as booby sp., and Dave as Brown Booby. Confident in his ID, I didn’t get
enough detail to be sure it was a Brown Booby, though the other possibility,
Masked, seems rather unlikely given both what I saw and the current plethora of
northward Brown Boobies in the Atlantic. Nonetheless, the bird went down
officially as booby sp. for our big day. This has, and is sure to raise some
heckles with birders on whether you can officially count a spuh (read – the
bird was either species A or B but neither species A or B were seen in the day so the bird represents at least one new species). Some would count that,
others not. In this case we counted it and carried on.
Reeling from the booby, and intently discussing what we had just seen, the day
came to close with a dark grey curtain washing across the sea. Stumbling back
to the cabin, we made one last ditched effort to hear a Fox Sparrow to no
avail. Despite adding Sooty Shearwater, Atlantic Puffin and Fox Sparrow on the
island, we could not count them towards our final tally as we had not all seen/heard
them. Back at the cabin, we took stock of the situation, caught our breath and
returned out into the night one last wretched time.
Leach’s Storm-Petrel cover the island at night in the tens
of thousands, their ghostly shapes flashing by the beams cast by our headlamps,
which left us with one final quarry for the day, the Great Horned Owl. In what
can only be described as pure mockery, the resident pair of owls did not utter
a hoot. Frequently heard pronouncing their vespers around the cabins, not even
a whisper could be heard in the night sky. Wasted from fatigue, we nonetheless
stumbled through the darkness, all energy reserves directed towards our ears, hoping
without real hope that we would hear the owls if we penetrated deeper into the
island. Unrelieved of our pain, and not being able to stand anymore, I cast
myself down in the dirt. The minutes ticked on in the breathless darkness, Dave
still determined, blasted owl cries from his phone in the hopes the owls would
be tricked by his electronic mimicry. At some point, I imagined the far off cry
of something turned Great Horned Owl, and so we plodded along the beach stone
to the southend like lost souls, the eerie laugh and cries of the storm-petrels
filling the space around us. The southend held no answers and so ended our big
day, not with a bang, but an exhausted sigh into our pillows. The most
stout-hearted of our crew, Dave sat outside till the bitter stroke of midnight,
though I know not whether it was with any hope, or simply out of pure
stubbornness.
The End.
 |
| Photo: David Bell |
Actually, just kidding! You probably have a lot of questions that need
answers. Had we broken the record? Did we have fun? Did it really go down the
way I said it did? Was it really that miserable? What were the totals? What did
we miss? Any highlights? Would you do it again?
1) Yes we broke the record (well only if we count
the booby sp.).
2) Hell yeah it was fun.
3) I left out a few things; acting like a mad
pirate while sticking grapes in my eyes, our brief attempt before the last owl
hunt to try and count up all our species for the day and figure out who exactly
had seen what, when Avery ALMOST missed Ruby-throated Hummingbird for the day,
Dave HONESTLY not speeding once (he didn’t want another ticket, and as a side
note, I’m sure this is actually the only big day ever done where the participants
didn’t break the speed limit), me actually eating TWO bags of beef jerky, and
an infinite amount of other things that I forget but that Lucas, Avery and Dave
will feel were an essential part of our Big Day experience.
4) No. I like to give a slight self-deprecating
feel to my stories. After all, it's only birding!
5) Shared total – 139 species, Dave - 156, Lucas - 149, Dominic - 148, Avery - 142, and total
using ABA rules - 146.
6) Common species missed by all - Common Merganser, Black-crowned Night-Heron, Sharp-shinned Hawk, Broad-winged Hawk, Great Horned Owl, Northern Saw-whet Owl, American Kestrel, Merlin, Northern Waterthrush, Red Crossbill. Species not seen by everyone - Northern Pintail, Sooty Shearwater, American Bittern, Least Sandpiper, Wilson's Snipe, Atlantic Puffin, Black Tern, Short-eared Owl, Grey-cheeked Thrush, Cape May Warbler, Nelson's Sparrow, Fox Sparrow, Scarlet Tanager, Rose-breasted Grosbeak, Brown-headed Cowbird, Evening Grosbeak.
7)
Garlic Fingers
... in a heartbeat.
The Crew
 |
| Dominic Cormier aka "The Dominator" - Navigator and Raconteur. |
 |
| David Bell aka "The Squid" - Driver and Bird Whisperer. |
 |
| Avery Bartels aka "Big Poppa" - Time/List Keeper and Swashbuckler |
 |
Lucas Berrigan aka "Wild Eyes" - Ebirder and Vagabond
|
 |
| The route with straight paths between stops. |
And the official list!
