I was stunned today to find a Red-throated Loon in close to shore as I walked the Northeast Beach. This is a rare bird for me, atleast untilt his fall, and I find her(?) very elegant and graceful. So I grabbed a bunch of shots and put them here. I love the long, slender neck, the slightly upturned beak, the expressions of curiosity as she spots me, and the sleek body, rarely seen because it’s designed for underwater work. She reminds me of a young Katherine Hepburn – hmmmm, and come to think of it, the Common Loon reminds me a bit of Spencer Tracy

(Note – there’s a button for full screen mode for this slide show which you can then exit by hitting “escape” key. )

This wasn’t the only highlight of today’s walk – another one in inclement weather where there was a constant mist out of the northeast on alight wind that raised more chop onthe bay than the ocean. In any event, as I came over the causeway I spotted a Brant  – a juvenile I believe.  I’m used to seeing these in flocks – and not very often. In fact, I can only remember seeing them here once before a few years ago.  So maybe this one’s lost, or maybe he’s just a rebel off doing his own thing, In any event, they remind me of a small version of the Canada Goose. When they mature there’s a white ring around their neck = this one has only the slightest hint of a ring.

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Click image for larger version.

And remember the Bufflehead dude from the other day – the lone male? Well, this time he had a female companion – and there were several others  along the way, but in small groups.

After walking the beach I turned inland towards the towers and couldn’t help noticing that while the landscape is pretty bleak. Here’s a view looking out at a passing ship.

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There is an awful lot of color here if you look closely. One yellow flower seems to not know winter is coming. I see it in a small bunches throughout the island. Seems to be the only thing left in bloom right now.

The bittersweet berries remain lovely.

And here are a couple of other plants that I found appealing, but I don’t have a clue what they are.

Saw quite abit of smallbird activity – but little I could identify. Maybe a Yellow Rump or three and I;m cetain of a pair of Mockingbirds.  But most were too far away and too fast forme.

On the way out I stopped on the causeway to admire some Eiders. Seems they’ve learned to avoid humans now that hunting season is here. But they’re smart. They didn’t fly – just sort of swam real fast with t heir wings. Could they be doing this on purpose? Perhaps they know they can only be shot when in the air? Nawwww . . .

Not me! I’m a ring-billed gull because my bill has a ring around it – obviously!

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Oh, you mean me? Yeah,. I’m a Bufflehead. What’s it to you?

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Yes, it was a rather slow day at Gooseberry, but we did see our first Bufflehead of the season, a lone male  easy of the causeway – kind of handsome dude, I think, but where did he get that name! My research – I looked in the dictionary – shows that “bufflehead” in the sense of “simpleton” stems from the 17th century and refers to a square head. Hmmm. . . kind of interesting, the different inflections put on a square. I mean, in the ’60s a square was someone who socially didn’t get it, but could easily be a very bright person, especially in technical areas.  Words! Constantly evolving. And let’s see, Wikipedia epxlains it this way:

The name Bufflehead is a combination of buffalo and head, referring to the oddly bulbous head shape of the species. ^]This is most noticeable when the male puffs out the feathers on the head, thus greatly increasing the apparent size of the head.

OK – in any event, I guess it’s better than what another site says he is also known as – butterball!

Saw a couple of loons today as well – one in the ocean near the parking lot and the other along the causeway nearer to Bar Rock. Wasn’t until I got home and looked at the pictures that I noticed the difference, though. Have to get more sensitive to this. Take a look. Here they are, loon one and two:

Click image for larger view.

Click image for larger view.

Notice loon one has more white around the eye? And holds it’s neck higher and looks a tad more gracefull? If you did, you should associate those traits with the Red-throated Loon – adult, non-breeding. The other, stockier fellow is a Common Loon – also in adult, non-breeding plumage.

Yipes – the radar shows thunderstorms just to the west and when I took the pups out this morning it started to pour. But I hadn’t been to Gooseberry lately and I thought I’d at least take a drive down there and see what I could see from inside the car. Wow! Great decision and lucky timing! I bagged a hunter I have been hoping to get all fall, confronted another hunter (different species from first)  and my own prejudices, and discovered a bird that I bet I’ve seen dozens of times in my life and never knew it – a bird that wasn’t even in  my vocabulary, but should have been!

First, although it’s just a couple miles south of here, it wasn’t raining at Gooseberry – the sun was even slicing through the clouds making  for some dazzling, rapidly changing seascapes. In fact, the shot below is one bookend for this post, as you’ll see.

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First up, though, were these two hunters. Yes, that’s my Marsh Hawk which I caught a fleeting picture of several weeks ago from a much greater distance. This time she was not only close, but when my camera suddenly didn’t work she waited for me to kick the tire and get it working! And yes, that’s a young duck hunter who has stopped cleaning his 12-gauge shotgun long enough to check out the marsh hawk. And yes, she is big – just shy of the redtail hawk in length and wing span and she doesn’t need a license to hunt, nor does she have a bag limit.

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The Marsh Hawk has always been one of my favorites and I have seen them frequently flying low over Gooseberry, hunting small game.  But since I started Gooseberry Journal this fall I haven’t gotten anything like this kind of good look.

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You know the Marsh Hawk by the way it flies low, following the contour of the land as it hunts – and you know it, in flight, by its distinctive white rump.

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And the other species of hunter? Well, I’m trying to understand this species – and myself, since I’m part of the same tribe – and try to be less judgmental and get rid of my anger by simply being more self aware. So I was real happy that I could approach this young man, have a conversation about his hunting, and find him likable. And when I looked at myself, I could find no anger. I liked him. That’s a big step for me. As a teenager I was a hunter. But it didn’t take me long to switch sides and eventually hold hunters in disdain. I really hate the idea of anyone making a  sport of killing.  But as I started my walk along the island’s central trail I thought about my own eating of burned animal parts and of how those animals I eat are raised and slaughtered in huge, commercial, money-grubbing farming operations and with such thoughts it’s pretty hard to dredge up self-righteous indignation about hunters. If I were a vegetarian  . .. but I’m not. And moving right along, here’s my next surprise.

What the heck is that undulating line of large, flying, mostly white birds way out at sea to the west? Too small to be swans. Too large and white and… well, look at this picture, taken with a telephoto, of course.

Clcik on image to get alarger view.

I was flumoxed. Even without the telephoto they looked like something different. But I was ready when I got home to  learn they were just gulls. Then I looked at the pictures more closely and I saw the distinctive black wing tips – and a lot of different degrees of white. What the heck are they? Take a closer look.

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Have you got them figured out? I do. But only after a bout with the “Sibley Guide to Birds” and the “Field Guide to Birds” by Donald and Lillian Stokes and yes, “Birds of New England” a Smithsonian Handbook, as well. And once I was absolutely positive I was looking at a line of  Northern Gannets, I switched  to Pete Dunne’s “Essential” – yes, it really is essential and delightful, too – “Field Guide Companion.” Boy does he ever capture what I saw and it is all the little behavior clues that make the big difference. Yes, field marks are nice, but you’re dealing with living, moving, animals and they’re all individuals.  But here are some quotes from Dunne  I found particularly useful, and another picture.

In flight the Northern Gannet is larger, stiffer, more angular, and more four-points-pointy (bill, tail, and the two wing tips) than the largest gull. . .

Adults (at least four years old) are all white with all black wingtips. The yellow wash on the head disappears at a distance . . .Older subadults are variously piebald . ..

Flies with a coursing, undulating rise and fall . . . Often flies low over the water in a line with other gannets that recalls the rise and fall of roller-coaster cars on some invisible track.

Yep – exactly what they looked like!

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So what does my species hunt? Ducks, of course – sea ducks – mostly the Eiders that I love.  So hear this girls – stop waving to everyone who passes you on the causeway. Scoot out of this shooting galler for a few months. Find, some lonely, deserted coast where you can live out your life in comfort, kept warm by that beautiful down vest!

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Oh – and the thunderstorms? They hit after I got home – no thunder here, but a lot of rain. But I escaped them on Gooseberry. As a matter of fact, as I was finishing my walk, heading north towards the parking lot, I had this beautiful view of the sun shining through the clouds and appearing to  throw a moving spotlight on buildings at Horseneck Beach more than a mile away.

What a theater we inhabit!

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The remnants of Hurricane Ida are headed our way  – and they kicked up a ferocious northeast wind well in advance. As we walked Gooseberry yesterday in this near gale and I saw the waves breaking over distant rocks – it was near low tide – I thought of how mariners of a century or two ago must have given this little island a wide berth. More on that – with pictures – in a moment.  On a cheerier note,  Bren and “the kids” found it tough to even stand on the southeast beach – well, Bren and Higgins anyways. Eliza seems to be saying: “Bring it on!”

The bay they saw from this vantage point was as angry as I’ve ever seen it. Here’s the view looking north towards East Point. There are usually some gentle, low roller sint his area, but not the angry white caps and breakers you see here. On the west side of the island this would be fairly common – on the east side, quite unusual. And just a few days before I walked the whole perimeter in 60-degree weather that felt more like July than November!

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Not much in the way of bird life. Most everything was hunkered down, I guess – though Bren spotted a Surf Scoter real close to the  causeway as we headed out to the parking area. I stopped and got out of the car and was just in time to get a shot of him/her flying away. What is obvious  – and helps with the identity even in flight – is the the very black body and wings and the very orange bill.

There wasn’t much wave action in close on the ocean side – it was all on the other side of the causeway.  Still, once we got to the top of the first hill it was obvious the wind was kicking up the surf in the ocean as well amnd in a very interesting pattern towards the southwest end of the island.  I could see waves breaking at different points well off shore and I took some pictures so I could check them against charts when I got home.  First up, though, is a picture from the south using the telephoto and showing the waves breaking over Hen and Chickens  rocks which are well off shore, due south of the island.

The white line you see out beyond the rocks is the waves breaking at Hen and Chickens – made famous in 1908 when the U.S.S. Yankee went aground on Hen and Chickens and stayed trapped there for 10 weeks  – eventually sinking.

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The Yankee was originally a passenger liner, launched in 1892, It was brought into the Navy during the Spanish American War and used as an auxiliary cruiser armed with 5-inch guns. In 1908 it was a Navy training ship. It grounded on Hen and Chickens in dense fog, was held fastfrom September to December, then was finally pried loose, but sank a short distance away in Buzzard’s Bay. Here’s the picture of the Yankee aground on Hen and Chickens. You can read it’s story on our Gooseberry history page.

Click the image for a larger view and you should be able to see the Yankee south of the island - and it was an island then - no causeway.

An old friend and Westport native once told me that the lumps of coal I see from time to time on the eastern beaches of Gooseberry came from some ship sinking there a long time ago. I’ve often wondered if they came from the Yankee. But I can well imagine many ships found the waters around Gooseberry treacherous. Just look at this picture taken from the small hill just south of the parking lot. The view is to the southwest and if you click the image to get a larger view, you’ll clearly see several sets of waves.   The nearest ones are just the normal breakers, in this case moving towards the east and hitting the rocky beach. But look beyond them in the center and you see breakers indicating the positions of rocks well off the island known as S W Rock, Little S W Rock and Hicks Rock.

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When I switched to a normal lens, looking in the same direction, I got this panorama which includes breakers over another complex of rock and ledges over to  the right (west) identified on my chart as Browing Ledge.

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The island has become deserted lately – not simply because of the storm, but because of approaching winter. I haven’t seen any warblers for weeks and just a few wintering shorebirds – fall mirgration appears to be over. The last of the Monarchs have all headed for Mexico.  Still, there is a wild loveliness in the landscape. I found this tangled patch of Bittersweet berries particularly attractive with the breaking sea in the background.

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Bitter sweet indeed! A good summary of the state of the island on this day.

(Oh – the hurricane. It was nothing, Just some rain and a bit more wind today than usual. It was all fragmented and spent by the time it got this far north. This is awfully late in the season even for the remnants of a hurricane.)

It’s fun contemplating that some of “our” Monarchs who passed through Gooseberry and similar locations in the past few weeks are now in Mexico at their winter retreat. Take a look at this picture – and when you do  keep in mind each butterfly you see is just a few inches across – that means they have to be darned close to you to show up in the picture at all – so I have afeeling there are thousand more just outside of camera range and the idea that “millions” are arriving in Mexico now is no exaggeration.

The picture is here.

They come from all over the country, of course, but I like to try to imagine these beautiful and delicate creatures making the flight from where I see them on Gooseberry Island to the butterfly sanctuary in Mexico where they spend the winter. (Click image for larger version. Modified Google map.)

More details on the migration can be found here.

For Monarchs on Gooseberry see this entry.

Monarchs, that is  – five of them  on a day I didn’t expect any.  In fact, I walked for over half an hour and passed through prime Monarch territory at the south end  and didn’t see a single Monarch. But between the towers and the parking lot I was surprised by seeing five. also saw several  Cloudless Sulphurs, Cabbage Whites ,and I believe an American Painted Lady.

Yes, it was about 52 degrees and calm and near noon, so it was a good time for butterfly activity. No sign of the other migrants – the warblers though. Not a single Yellow Rump -  in fact, I don’t think I saw a single songbird, nor did I see any shore birds and I walked the entire east and south coasts before heading down the central road. I did get a glimpse  – in fact two glimpses – of something sleek and grey and flying very fast. My best guess – a Merlin, but there’s no way I can be sure.

Here’s a sampling of what I did see, starting with a barge towed by a tug so far off that it’s out of the picture. These are common – just as coasting schooners were common a century ago. I think I would prefer seeing a coasting schooner – we do pay a price for modern efficiency.

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I think I read somewhere it takes the kids three years to develop the full, male suit of feathers. (I think that’s the same as the Herring Gull.) In any event, the different arrangements continue to catch my eye – here’s a mature male, an immature, and a female.

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Cloudless Sulphur – they are beautiful. They stay the winter, I understand. My biologist friend thinks they just sort of shut down – go into a form of hibernation. Wonder when they’ll stop being active?

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OK – here  he is – one of the five Monarchs.  Hope he still plans to head south!

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What can I say? We went, we saw little, we came home. Higgins loved it. Eliza is always eager. On the last two trips Higgins has been in uncharacteristic high gear, tugging constantly at his leash, always wanting to take the point.  I think he still  remembers that Woolly Bear from a couple of trips ago and is determined to go find it again, mighty hunter that he is

With a northeast wind threatening rain – there were a few drops as we were leaving – the only songbirds we saw were a couple of sparrows in the parking lot. We walked out the central road past the towers to the southeast beach. There was a tiny raft of seven female Common Eiders there bobbing in and out of sight in the small chop. There were also some near Bar Rock and along the west side of the causeway. That was it.

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I really didn’t want to go to Gooseberry yesterday. Natural inertia was high, aided by grumpy morning weather, but I went and it turned out to be a great visit because I found a pair of Red-throated Loons – rare for me – and this after being greeted by Turkeys on the way there.

OK, don’t look for the red throat, but examine this pair on the bay side of the causeway and . . .

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. . . compare them to this one snapped on the west side of the causeway a couple minutes later. (You’ll probably need to click to enlarge the images. )

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What I see in the first shot in the loon closest to the camera is a white neck that goes all the way up and around the eye and thin black area down the back of the neck.  Contrast that with the white area on the loon in the second picture.  There are two other differences I noticed. The first loon seems more delicate, is floating lower, and is holding it’s bill with a slight upturn. All that makes it a Red-throated Loon. The one with it doesn’t have so much white on the throat, but I think it’s another red-throated, but a juvenile.  (As always, corrections welcome!)  The overall differences in bulk and shape remind me of the more delicate appearance of the American Golden Plover when  ompared to its “street brawler” cousin, the Black-bellied Plover – or the difference between the Common Merganzer and the Red-brested Merganzer.

I rarely have seen a Red-throated Loon. The first – and only – one I recall was seen off Plum Island (north of Boston) about 15-20 years ago and was pointed out by an experienced birder we saw there who had it in his telescope and let us look. I can still recall him talking about the upturned beak and I  have carefully examined the loons I see form time to time – mostly at  Gooseberry – for this trait. Nothing until this encounter – so yes, that made by trip – which started out with this encounter on Rt .88 about half a mile from Gooseberry. (OK – the picture was taken through the car windshield as I rolled past, so it’s lousy. Until a decade or so ago the wild turkey was never encountered in these parts. Now they are quite common – and quite tame for a bird that is hunted and reportedly difficult to bag.  The ones I see seem to stand around discussing the scenery and ignoring people.

Actually, when I got to Gooseberry the first thing I noticed as I started out the causeway was this Common Eider – and I wondered if this is a juvenile on its way to adult plummage, or an adult male changing into mating plummage? But as near as I can tell from Sibleys it is an adult male going into mating plummage which they assume from October to June – well good for them! No wonder I’m seeing so many more of them.

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What I still haven’t pinned down is this next one  – it looks to me like a female Common Eider and I see them often, but none of my books show those two white lines in the area of the wing and I can’t find any other duck that has two and looks like this?

The bird that seemed to zing by when Bren and I were walking the other day and I thought might be a Black-bellied Plover? Well, I’m more convinced that’s what it is because I saw one zipping from the area of the parking lot to Bar Rock as  I left and in flight it showed the white rump and black tail as I remembered and when it landed I was certain it was a Black-bellied Plover.

 

It was a raw day in the upper forties with a northeast wind and gloomy skies and Gooseberry’s smaller residents seemed to be hunkered down out of sight as Bren, Higgins, Eliza and I walked out to the towers and back on the central path.

No butterflies, of course, and just a  couple Mockingbirds – maybe one or two Yellow-rumps – and one mystery speedster . . . that was it. Of this last  I had a general impression of thin, pointed wings, white rump, and black tail. Bren saw the white rump and a longer than usual beak. It was not a falcon  – so my best guess, putting it all toegther, is a black-bellied plover, though I didn’t know they could fly that fast.This guy was motoring at the speed of a dove in a hurry.

The one “discovery” of the day was made by Bren – a lone loon off the east side of the causeway, hidden by  the low chop kicked up by the wind a good deal of the time – and much of the rest of the time diving. I have about three pictures that show nothing but waves – and this one that proves it is, indeed a Common Loon – probably a juvenile.

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Yeah, I’m something of a plane nut, and while I failed to photograph a hawk in flight, and did catch a swan family, first up was this Cessna Super Skymaster. It caught my eye just as Bren and I and Higgins and Eliza started our walk yesterday. I knew it was an unusual combination of tractor and pusher propellars (one in front, one behind) and the twin booms were obvious – and honest, even before I got home and looked it up in Wikipedia, I knew it was a Cessna, but I couldn’t remember its name. Turned out Cessna made about 3,000 of these, stopping production about a quarter century ago. No, I don’t know why the tractor propellar seems to be feathered while the pusher one is doing all the work – but maybe some pilot out there can explain it!

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Of Hawks and Monarchs

Meanwhile, back closer to the ground the hawk – I’m 90 percent sure it’s a marsh hawk – gave me another fruitless flyby. I haven’t seen it since I took these shots more than two weeks ago. Yesterday it came cruising by and I drew a blank – just couldn’t get the camera’s autofocus to grab it. But we were able to see three Monarch butterflies. The temperature was about 52 with not much wind and all three were at the south end where I have seen the most Monarchs and all were seen within about 10 minutes.

What bothered me was the possibility that these are the result of a release of some Monarchs hatched in captivity because the morning New Bedford Standard-Times had a front page picture of a Monarch that was released, but all I could learn about it was in the caption which read in part:

. . . a monarch butterfly released by breeder Una McGurk on Sunday as part of Bioneers by the Bay, a three-day environmental conference that took place downtown.

Was there just this one? or many? They could have easily made the short flight from New Bedford to Gooseberry, assuming they’re on the way to Mexico – where many have already arrived, by the way. So were the three we saw part of that release, or just random stragglers of the naturally-grown sort?

Now what I am sure of is that this is a family of Mute Swans – two adults flanking two juveniles, who were heading east-to-west across Gooseberry.

And this is Higgins determined to sample a Woolly Bear we had just passed on the path. (We didn’t let him, mighty hunter that he is

It was one of three and they all were marked pretty much the same, predicting a mild winter similar to the first one I saw a week or so ago. (See this post.)

Banded bird

Now this was a bit of a mystery. I am assuming it’s a Slate-colored Junco, but the slight tinge of yellow underneath has me puzzled and so does what looks like a band on its leg. (I never notice such things until I get home and start reviewing the images. )

No mystery here – just a pair of Common Eiders – youngsters I think – maybe preening for a date?