black-and-white warbler – The Jersey Birder

Another trip to the pines: warblers, lizards and a snake

A blue-winged warbler perches in a pine tree. The bird is yellow, with a black beak and a black eyeline.

Hoping to spot a summer tanager, my pal Jim and I drove south into the Pine Barrens this morning to the Michael Huber Prairie Warbler Preserve. The tanager would have been a lifer for me, and Jim figured our odds of spotting one were good because he’s seen them there for a few years running.Continue reading “Another trip to the pines: warblers, lizards and a snake”

What a day to forget my binoculars!

Cape May warbler perched among green tree leaves. The bird is mostly yellow with brown streaking and an orange spot ringing its eye, mostly below.

When I got to the Mercer Meadows Pole Farm this morning, I realized that I’d left my binoculars at home. Oops. It wasn’t worth the drive to fetch them, so I set out on the trails with only my camera. In the end, it was a minor inconvenience on what turned out to be aContinue reading “What a day to forget my binoculars!”

A three-lifer day in the Pine Barrens

My buddy Jim and I drove through the fog down to the Michael Huber Prairie Warbler Reserve in the Pine Barrens this morning. Although we did spot a few prairie warblers, they weren’t the day’s highlight. Jim has been to the Huber reserve many times, but this was my first visit to the sprawling stretchContinue reading “A three-lifer day in the Pine Barrens”

A Labor Day lifer

It’s the Labor Day holiday in the United States, and I headed out onto the trails of the Mercer Meadows Pole Farm hoping that I’d get a glimpse of the early-arriving migrating warblers that had eluded me. I did spot black-and-white and prairie warblers while hanging out near the old AT&T Building One oval withContinue reading “A Labor Day lifer”