Tweeters,

Leora and I Jet Blued to Boston for a long weekend of looking over the
coastal birds of New England. We drove up the coast, as best we could,
from Logan Airport until we were about 25 miles into Maine.




The sea side gulls there are
about 65 % Herring, 30% Ring-billed, and 5% Greater Black-backed. We
found 1000 or so Bonaparte's in 4 widely spaced flocks, all very active
in the surf.

For Sea Ducks, lots of Long-tailed, Harlequin, and all three Scoters.
The most numerous species is Common Eider, thousands of them, usually
close to shore, munching shell fish.

Our only shorebird species was a couple hundred Purple Sandpipers, but
we could only find them four times. The only place for Gannets was
Cape Ann.

I had been watching the hotlines and knew that very few Alcids were
being seen. We saw zero and thought about going down to the tip of
Cape Cod for them, but that area was predicted to have a heavy snow.

No Little Gulls were on the hot lines and only a few Black-headed. We
did track down two Black-headed Gulls early Saturday morning. They
were in with a flock of Bonaparte's, with temperature and wind both at
30. We found one little group of Great Cormorants on Cape Ann and
checked the wind tips of every Herring Gull in New Hampshire until we
found a single Iceland.

The further north we went the better we liked it. The high point and
turn around spot was picking a lone King Eider out of a flock of 500
Commons off Maine's Marginal Way.

It was a lot of effort for not a lot of new birds, but I guess that's
how the game is played.

The area does have a lot of American historical interest going for it.

The USS Constitution and Bunker Hill Monument are both free and close
to Logan.

Do you know what the heck the War of 1812 was about?

Do you know who won the Battle of Bunker HIll?

Do you know the Battle of Bunker Hill wasn't on Bunker Hill?

If any of you want to take on such a trip we would be happy to give you
more details.

Larry and Leora Schwitters
Issaquah