Seawatch – 7 November 2014

"It was an odd day at the Seawatch; the ocean was surprisingly flat, birds were migrating in decent but not spectacular numbers other then Dunlin which had quite the strong flight in the first hour of the count- my estimates were 3000 birds heading out of the Townsend's Inlet as well as flocks coming off the ocean heading south along the shoreline. Frustrating were too many scoters flying far off-shore not allowing for a positive ID of many of them. When you've been birding for a while, you sometimes get that "feel". A feeling that any moment that next bird winging by is going to be a good one. With visions of an early season Alcid on my mind, the day's surprise came in the form of a Ross's Goose flying with a Snow Goose over the ocean. With only two previous seawatch records (one in '94, the other '99), it was certainly the Bird of the Day. Also of note today was a Clay-colored Sparrow that flew off the ocean, pausing briefly before heading down the block. I'll be surprised if I see another of that adorable member of the sparrow family this year."  – S.H.

[Surf Scoters, with Atlantic City in the background. Photo by Mike Kilpatrick.]

Observation time: 0633 – 1706
Observer: Skye Haas

Species counted:
Snow Goose – 1
Ross's Goose – 1
Canada Goose – 2
Brant – 66
Wood Duck – 1
Gadwall – 2
American Wigeon – 4
American Black Duck – 10
Mallard – 7
Northern Pintail – 12
Green-winged Teal – 14
Greater Scaup – 2
Lesser Scaup – 1
duck, sp. – 29
Common Eider – 1
Surf Scoter – 1,124
White-winged Scoter – 3
Black Scoter – 6,248
Black/Surf Scoter – 2,546
Long-tailed Duck – 1
Bufflehead – 6
Red-breasted Merganser – 6
Ruddy Duck – 5
Red-throated Loon – 47
loon, sp. – 4
Common Loon – 38
Horned Grebe – 5
Northern Gannet – 595
Double-crested Cormorant – 2,090
Great Blue Heron – 7
Laughing Gull – 49
Bonaparte's Gull – 253
Ring-billed Gull – 79
Forster's Tern – 416
Royal Tern – 15
Parasitic Jaeger – 10

Black-bellied Plover – 22
Semipalmated Plover – 2
Red Knot – 6
Sanderling – 500
Dunlin – 3000
Western Sandpiper – 1
peep, sp. – 20

Total: 13,700