Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!ncar!tank!delphi!bob
From: bob@delphi.uchicago.edu (Robert S. Lewis, Jr.)
Newsgroups: rec.birds
Subject: Re: NA Shorebirding hot-spots
Keywords: Parker River NWR
Message-ID: <7162@tank.uchicago.edu>
Date: 13 Jan 90 00:05:05 GMT
References: <2388@leah.Albany.Edu>
Sender: news@tank.uchicago.edu
Reply-To: bob@delphi.UUCP (Robert S. Lewis, Jr.)
Organization: University of Chicago
Lines: 35

In article <2388@leah.Albany.Edu> gmr044@leah.Albany.Edu (Gregg Recer) writes:

>Parker River NWR has a similar mix of freshwater and salt-marsh
>habitats.  I've only been there once when shorebirds were present 
>(last July) and no big rarities showed up but there were lots of
>shorebirds there.  There were fewer species than at Jamaica Bay, in
>part, I think, because it was still early in the fall migration
>period.  However we did see Hudsonian Godwits (_Limosa haemastica_)
>among others.  One other interesting aspect to Parker River is the
>large movement of egrets to their roosts and night-herons off their
>roosts that occurs each evening in the summer.  It's quite a
>spectacle.
>


I was at Parker River over Christmas:  Didn't see any shorebirds (of
course), but I did watch three short-eared owls catch mice while a
harrier chased them about, stealing thier prey.  This lasted about
half an hour, until a rough-legged hawk showed up, apparently
intimidating the other predators, who quickly retired to perches.  

There was a saw-whet owl around (I couldn't find it), a shrike,
scoters of at least two species (white-winged and black were
definite), common loons, buffleheads, grebe species (probably horned,
but past the range of my binoculars), oldsquaw, goldeneyes, snow
buntings, horned larks, lapland longspurs, black ducks, Canada geese,
tree sparrows, myrtle warblers, etc.


Nearby, on the Merrimack river (about four miles from the refuge) I
saw five bald eagles and a Barrow's Goldeneye.  The last was a lifer
for me!  

Whenever I'm in the Boston area I try to get to Plum Island.  I've
only been there a few times, but I've never been disappointed.