My wife and I headed to New England for a few days, with a stop in the Berkshires of Massachusetts on our way to Bar Harbor. On the 1,500-mile roundtrip, I didn’t have a lot of time for birding. But at Acadia National Park, we had some lovely close encounters with ruby-throated hummingbirds, and IContinue reading “A little birding in Downeast Maine”
Tag Archives: birds
The Dinky Line Trail: Gem or joke
While I dearly love the parks and trails I regularly traverse, I am always on the lookout for something new. By fiddling with the explore function in e-Bird yesterday, I clicked a map pin on a nearby trail I never knew existed. It’s the Dinky Line Trail, a short path near the Princeton Junction trainContinue reading “The Dinky Line Trail: Gem or joke”
Some days, one bird is enough
It turned out that I aimed my camera at only one bird today, and it happened early in my walk at the Mercer Meadows Pole Farm. This Cooper’s hawk surprised me when I spotted it roughly 100 feet ahead of me. The sky was overcast and the sun was muted, but I was able toContinue reading “Some days, one bird is enough”
The (bird) dog days of summer
We are in the “dog days” of summer. The dog star, Sirius, dips low on the horizon, and our canine companions, sapped by the heat, are low on energy. For birders, this time of year brings a lull in species sightings. The migrant warblers are in their northern breeding grounds, many weeks off from whenContinue reading “The (bird) dog days of summer”
A rare evening outing, and I see Elvis
Traffic on my drive home from work was remarkably light today, so I grabbed my camera and went to the Pole Farm for a pre-dinner stroll. Under a cloudy sky, few birds were flying, and I was mainly birding by ear. Making a clockwise loop, I was well down the paved Lawrence-Hopewell Trail when IContinue reading “A rare evening outing, and I see Elvis”
Braving shoe-sucking mud for photos
The Dyson Tract along the Delaware and Raritan Canal has been drawing lots of birders to check out the little blue herons that have taken up residence for the last week or so. I’d stopped by a few days ago and went back Sunday afternoon. At this time of year, the trees are thick withContinue reading “Braving shoe-sucking mud for photos”
Sandpipers and killdeers aplenty in Hamilton
After the excitement of seeing a pair of rare sedge wrens, for a change of pace I drove to Veterans Park in Hamilton. The park has a big lake that attracts eagles and waterfowl, and I was eager to spot a few to broaden my species count for the young month. I walked across theContinue reading “Sandpipers and killdeers aplenty in Hamilton”
Sedge wrens enliven birding in Princeton
It’s always fun when a rare visitor comes to town, and the birding buzz around Princeton the last few days has been about a pair of sedge wrens who have come calling at the Mountain Lakes Preserve. Reports on the wrens had been coming in from e-Bird, and this morning I decided to take myContinue reading “Sedge wrens enliven birding in Princeton”
When birds turn their backs to you
Grateful for an overnight temperature drop from the 90s into the mid-60s, I headed to the Pole Farm this morning. The sky was overcast, with little sun to coax the birds out into the open. I had walked nearly two miles without even lifting my camera up to shoot when I heard the buzzy callContinue reading “When birds turn their backs to you”
At last, an egret
For several weeks, I’d been puzzled that I had yet to log a sighting of an egret in 2025. Great egrets usually show up in spring in these parts, but here we are halfway through summer and I’d yet to see one. I’d been seeing reports of great egrets and a little blue heron atContinue reading “At last, an egret”
The Jersey Birder 