Wouldn’t it be great if you could record the song of a bird you can’t identify and have it instantly recognized? The Cornell Lab of Ornithology has taken a major step forward in realizing that dream with its recently launched Sound ID feature in the Merlin app. I’ve used that app for the past fewContinue reading “A new tool for better birding: Merlin’s Sound ID”
Author Archives: Dan
Seattle: City of Crows
Other than making a few quick trips across the Delaware River into Bucks County outside Philadelphia, I’ve been a New Jersey birder exclusively since the COVID pandemic arrived. Finally I was able to venture afar, traveling to Seattle to visit one of my sons. When I lived in Seattle 30 years ago, I didn’t payContinue reading “Seattle: City of Crows”
I’m uncommonly fond of the common yellowthroat
I believe I crossed the threshold from casual birder to thoroughly hooked last spring when I began recognizing the song of the common yellowthroat. The song was unique, and it was driving me crazy that I couldn’t see the bird chirping it from the trees at the Pole Farm at Mercer Meadows Park. Finally, IContinue reading “I’m uncommonly fond of the common yellowthroat”
A close encounter with Brood X
This afternoon I set out into the 90-degree heat to look for birds in the Institute Woods, whose paths Albert Einstein walked during his Princeton years. The woods, named for the adjacent Institute for Advanced Study, are ordinarily a place for a quiet, contemplative ramble on the trails through the trees, with birds chirping andContinue reading “A close encounter with Brood X”
Naming our neighbors in nature
Like so many others keeping close to home since the onset of the coronavirus pandemic, we’re paying much more attention to the creatures inhabiting and visiting our yard and neighborhood. We can’t resist naming some of them. I mentioned recently that we’ve named Aeneas and Dido the house wrens who’ve moved into in our backyardContinue reading “Naming our neighbors in nature”
Now are the foxes
On another futile rose-breasted grosbeak watch this morning, I looked out across the golf course beyond our property line and spotted a couple of red foxes. It’s not unusual to see a fox trotting across the course, sometimes even venturing onto our backyard grass. The golf course maintenance superintendent told me that foxes have livedContinue reading “Now are the foxes”
On rose-breasted grosbeak watch, a mighty fine surprise
We’re in the second week of May, and I’ve been watching the reports of rose-breasted grosbeaks roll in from other birders nearby. No such luck here at home, even as I’ve camped out with my coffee and camera each morning, hoping one of them will arrive at our feeders. This afternoon as I passed byContinue reading “On rose-breasted grosbeak watch, a mighty fine surprise”
The early bird gets the sightings
Up and about earlier than usual this morning, I headed over to the Mercer Meadows Pole Farm and was rewarded richly. I had barely walked out of the parking lot at Cold Soil and Keefe roads when two tree swallows beckoned me in to one of the best birding locations in Mercer County. Red-winged blackbirdsContinue reading “The early bird gets the sightings”
Home is where the house wrens are
Spring has sprung here in central New Jersey, and I’ve been on high alert for seasonal visitors who are due to arrive soon, some just passing through and others who will stay awhile. I was on the back patio the other day when I spotted what I was almost certain was a house wren checkingContinue reading “Home is where the house wrens are”
The first bird I identified on my own
As a kid growing up in northeast Ohio, I knew the basics of the birds that frequented our neighborhood. Mom always pointed them out, marveling at the cardinals and their song, tisk-tisking the raucous blue jays (“those bullies!”), and pointing with delight at the cute house wrens popping in and out of the birdhouse thatContinue reading “The first bird I identified on my own”
The Jersey Birder 