November Ramblings (03-30Nov2024)

November in North Carolina is the month where we get vagrants that migrated the wrong way and now are stuck in our beautiful state.  So its always good to get out and look around.  This November the biggest  rarity was a White-throated Swift that Ed C found on the way to the Rarity Roundup in Dare County.  It was only seen for several hours and I never pulled the trigger on chasing it.

Brown Pelican - of course its always in the back of my mind when I visit my favorite spots like Fort Fisher Rocks to look for rarities.

Prairie Warblers flag as rare in eBird this time of year but really are pretty expected.  This one was at Airlie Gardens.

Nothing rare about Northern Flickers in November.

Baltimore Oriole - There was still plenty of ripe fruit on the Ghost Dogwood tree at Airlie Gardens into mid November.

Laughing Gulls are back to basic plumage.

Boat-tailed Grackle hormones never seem to calm down.

Another Prairie Warbler down at Battery Buchanan.

Orange-crowned Warbler

The Loggerhead Shrike at the Ferry Parking is still hanging out.

Young Red-shouldered Hawk at Fort Fisher.

I was on my way to Wrightsville Beach when I noticed some swallows flying around near the Bridge Tender restaurant.

Cave Swallow!

Every late fall we usually get 1-2 reports of Cave Swallows flying through, usually on a good NW blow.  This time they have stuck around in pretty large numbers even up to the day of my writing this (11Dec).

Red Knot at sunset.

The next day I went in the morning to try and get some better photos of Cave Swallows.

I could have sat there all day trying for the perfect shot, but I moved on to Airlie Gardens.

Another Orange-crowned in the camellias.

Hermit Thrush in the Ghost Dogwood.

A very late Swainson's Thrush had also been gorging on the Ghost Dogwood berries.

Blue-headed Vireos will always be one of my favorites in Wilmington.

The huge flock of Gadwall are back at Ashley High School ponds.

Sam and Jacob found this Ash-throated Flycatcher at Fort Fisher in almost the exact same spot that I found one in several years prior.

White-winged Scoters are hard to come by most years but this year they have already been offering good looks at Fort Fisher.

Black Scoters are much more common but its still good to see them up close.

Surf Scoters are not rare in NC but also not usually easy to see in New Hanover.  They really like sounds like the ones up in Carteret County where you can see hundreds in large flocks.

You could almost mistake this Surf Scoter for a Black Scoter if you weren't careful, but the bill structure is very different.

The ocean was so calm this day that an American Coot mistook it for a lake.  I can't recall ever seeing a coot on the ocean.

Great Blue Heron at the north end of Wrightsville Beach in the morning light.

A Nelson's Sparrow doing calisthenics.

Tundra Swans doing a flyby at Airlie Gardens.  They are quite rare in New Hanover.

A pair of Bald Eagles have started nesting already at Airlie Gardens and this one took a break to get a drink.

This Hermit Thrush almost looked like the Swainson's with the eye-ring but I think it was in fact a Hermit.

Could this have been a different Swainson's in the Ghost Dogwood, a younger looking bird?  If so that means there was at least two of them hanging around.

My parents and brothers came for Thanksgiving and we had a great time.  My brothers and I went fishing at Fort Fisher and caught a mess load of Bluefish.  I think my fishing spark might be re-ignited.  Lately I have been taking my rod with me when I go birding.

My father is totally into star-gazing lately and he convinced us to head to Green Swamp at night so he could take some videos.  It wasn't ideal but the light pollution was definitely less than in Wilmington.

My brother Noah took this photo with his iPhone.

Dinner at Circa with my wife to celebrate a successful hosting of my extended family.  Melissa was exhausted after feeding 12 people on Thanksgiving so we treated her to a nice dinner out.