First up a couple of photos from an ill fated trip to Sutton Lake back here in Wilmington to look for a Yellow-headed Blackbird Sam C heard in a flock of cowbirds. I found the cowbirds but could not pick out the YHBB.
Most of the cowbirds were young males molting into their adult plumage.
The island we stayed on in Maine is Cushing's Island. A small island that can be walked around in an hour or two criss crossed with trails and countless swimming holes. Beautiful! Melissa took all the scenery pics and I managed a few pics of the wildlife. I only birded a couple times as this was truly a family vacation and I already have all the birds that were hanging around the island.
Cabbage White butterfly.
Common Yellowthroat
Snowberry Clearwing - one of the hummingbird moths we get on the east coast. Readily distinguishable by the black stripe through the eye.
Black Guillemot - wow! these birds are really sharp in breeding plumage. I found a nice flock of them fishing on the east end of Cushing's.
Out of focus but interesting as it seemed they were mostly catching Sculpin. They kept flying right towards me where I was scaling some rocks and stupid me I was not understanding why. Turns out they had chicks in the cliff faces and were trying to get me to leave or distract me.
The light was not great but otherwise it was a truly amazing opportunity to study these cool birds and I stayed with them for a while. They soon grew accustomed and flew back and forth feeding the chicks unseen in the crevices. Before long I realized the tide was closing it and I had to retrace my steps wading waist deep. Later I would come back to this spot to do some cliff jumping at about 40 feet off the cliffs.
Pileated WPs.
American Goldfinch
Common Tern
Yellow Warbler
A strange molting Red-eyed Vireo? Or juvie...
For the last two days of vacation we went to New Hampshire to hike and cool off in the White Mountains. I had 5 target species to find (Spruce Grouse, Boreal Chickadee, White-winged Crossbill, Black-backed Woodpecker and Bicknell's Thrush) and unfortunately I dipped on all but one (Boreal Chicka). We were a little too late in the season and birds were quiet. Also, the couple of spots you can get to high elevation with a ton of hiking were only open past 9am which did not help. Mount Washington we got to late on the first afternoon and the top was socked in. We stopped at a couple turn outs on the way up and there was some bird activity but we were definitely late for Bicknell's. The Park Ranger said he never saw them in August despite some reports on eBird.
The next day we headed to Cannon Mountain but the first chair lift only ran at 9am and it had already been light for 4 plus hours. Birds were not really active.
Cannon Mountain.
Luke doing an Irish jig.
Hmm, not even sure. I thought maybe Blackpoll but can't be sure.
Of course the only Chickadee I could find was the Black-capped Chicka.
On the way to our hotel in the late afternoon I was so upset that I dipped on all my targets that I convinced my family to do a longer hike up the Cap's Ridge Trail to Mount Jefferson. There were quite a few recent reports for that trail which has the highest accessible public trail head in the whites. Mount Washington is higher but is private and not cheap.
It was good that I had them with me because half way up the mountain they heard some chickadees making a racket.
Boreal Chickadees! They never came out into the open so I had to settle for some horrible looks and pics taken with manual focus through some heavy foliage.
Horace's Duskywing - I think that is what it is anyway. Taken back home in my front yard. The similar Juvenal's Duskywing has some more prominent spots on the hind wings.
Jamie - you must post the film of you jumping off Cuahing's Whitehead - and promise it will be your last time!
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