Early in the morning on the 19th June 2018 I went out on the balcony to check out the wildlife in my Ipswich cousin's back garden and I saw even larger furry lawnmowers than the rabbits, White-tailed Deer, grazing on the lawn. Like Lake Roland in Baltimore, there are a lot of deer also in Ipswich, but many carry the ticks that carry Lyme disease so it is important to keep an eye out for ticks when bird-watching here.
The Brown-headed Cowbirds were in the garden again with their shiny, chocolate brown plumage. And there were two American Crows (Corvus brachyrhynchos) in a pine tree, and one flew down on to the lawn and these were the best views I had so far of the American Crow and they are about the size of a European Carrion Crow with a similar appearance.
The next bird I saw in my Ipswich cousin's backgarden this morning was another tick for me, a male Chipping Sparrow (Spizella passerina) sitting up in a bare branched tree looking directly at me on the balcony, with his chestnut cap and a black eye-stripe and a plain, pale grey breast and belly and a dark eye and shiny grey bill.
In the garden yet again, there were American Robins, Common Grackles and Eastern Bob-tailed Rabbits hopping about on the lawn and a male Northern Cardinal was sitting on a bush in the back hedge.
After breakfast, my Ipswich cousin's wife and I drove to the Parker River National Wildlife Refuge and we got to the entrance in Newburyport which is north of Plum Island and Ipswich about 11 a.m. and this is just a wonderful home to more than 300 species of birds, and the refuge covers over two thirds of Plum Island which is 11 miles long, and 4,600 acres of coastal habitat.
The first bird we saw at our first stop near the Information Centre was the Purple Martin (Progne subis) which was another tick for me, and they were nesting in big, white artificial nest boxes and these are a large iridescent purple swallow with a short forked tail, and they really were an impressive looking bird.
Next we viewed some Mallard ducks sleeping on a beach and then in the grass around a small lake, I got my first views of the only wader I saw on this visit, of an Eastern Willet (Tringa selmipalmta) which is the nominate species and it is about the size of a Bar-tailed Godwit. The Eastern Willet is a buff brown wader with a white lower belly, a long straight bill with very obvious nostril holes visible, long legs and a long neck, and a white barred tail reminiscent of the Bar-tailed Godwit. In flight, there are obvious white wing-bars and the long legs trail behind like a Black-tailed Godwit. We saw a good number of Willets on the Refuge during our visit and they nest and breed on the Refuge.
And in the distance in the grass, we saw a Great White Egret (Ardea alba egretta), and these really are a beautiful large, elegant, white bird with a bright yellow bill.
In the small lake or pan, there were little islands an on one of them, we were lucky to see a rare breeding bird in the area, the Least Tern (Sternula antillarum), at rest and in flight, and this tern is similar to the Little Tern in Europe in that it is a small mainly white tern with a yellow bill and it nests on sandy beaches.
On the day of our visit, many of the boardwalks to the beaches on the Parker River National Wildlife Refuge were closed to visitors in order to facilitate the successful breeding on the beaches of Least Terns and of another rare and endangered breeding bird that i didn't get to see, which is the Piping Plover (Charadrius melodus). So we were really lucky to get views of a hunting Least Tern at the lake.
Also at the pans I got to see my first views of a male Red-winged Blackbird (Agelaeius phoeniceus), which is a black bird which is similar in size and shape to a European Starling, and the males have a black body with a crimson red and yellow upper wing patch and we saw these throughout the Refuge. I didn't see any females and they are totally different and much duller, coloured like a female house finch, brown with a streaked breast and a strong, pale supercilium and at a distance they could probably be mistaken for female finches. These Red-winged Blackbirds are members of the Icteridae family, a New World family of Passerine birds and they are related to the grackles and the cowbirds who are also Icterids and the males were handsome birds.
Also on the same lake or pan as the Least Tern there was a small dabbling duck called the Green-winged Teal (Anas crecca carolinensis), both a male and a female, and the male has with a white bar on the side of the breast, and this bird is a different sub-species to the European Common Teal (Anas crecca crecca) which does not have this white bar. Both sub-species have a green speculum although in the strong sunlight and on the blue lake, the speculum of this male looked like a deep blue rather than green.
After this we drove a little further and came across a flock of Canada Geese (Branta canadensis) with their young, swimming on a lake or pan and please see the photo of them at the start of this blog, along with more Willets and more Red-winged Blackbirds.
We reached the Sub-headquarters maintenance buildings and restrooms in area called the Wardens (there used to be a Warden's cabin here when it was called the XXX Sanctuary) which is on the west side of Plum Island, just north of the North Pool. Around the buildings there is grey and pink multi-coloured gravel and on the gravel near the buildings there were four Barn Swallows (Hirundo rustica erythrogaster) of the American sub-species, possibly first year juveniles in the middle of a final moult, and they were unusual looking with a mix of brown and metallic blue feathers and pale worn feathers were you would expect to see crimson red feathers on the foreheads and throats. Their colours were more reminiscent of Cave Swallows that occur much further south in the USA, but these were definitely Barn Swallows.
Also near the maintenance buildings we spotted this plant known as Poison Ivy (Toxicodendron radicans), a plant that contains the compound urushiol in its sap which can cause a nasty, painful, burn-like rash if it comes in contact with skin, or worse if inhaled or comes in contact with eyes, which can happen when people are clearing dead trees covered in dead ivy which still contains the compound. It is something to keep an eye out for before jumping into the undergrowth when bird-watching in America.
After leaving the Wardens, we were driving along the path with the car windows open when we heard a bird singing and we stopped the car for a minute, and from the car I photographed this little, male Common Yellowthroat (Geothlypis trichas) deep in the hedgerow with its head up and beak open and it blended well with the green foliage. This was my favourite bird on this trip and it was just so delicate looking. The Common Yellowthroat is a New World wood-warbler and it belongs to the Parulidae family.
We started driving again and came to another car stop where we saw a Gray Catbird and another Red-winged Blackbird. Then we drove further to a stop with views of a lake and I could see a pair of Gadwall (Anas strepera) dabbling ducks feeding, and nearby there were also Double-crested Cormorants and resting Mallard ducks.
I took a photo of a sign warning of an insect called the Greenhead Fly (Tabanus nigrovittatus) which is a type of large horsefly with big green eyes, and this area, around Plum Island and the Crane Estate in Ipswich, is ground zero for these flies. The larvae live in the mud and the adults take to the skies in July when the females bite any mammals including humans, as they need their blood to lay eggs. Unlike mosquitoes that puncture and suck, Greenhead flies give a big, nasty, jagged, painful bite with the aim of getting as much blood as possible in one mouthful.
The only positive note about their bite is that they do not spread diseases like malaria or Lyme disease. The best way to avoid being bitten is to stay away from the areas of coastal waters they frequent in the month of July to the first week of August. So July and the beginning of August in this area is not a good time to visit Plum Island and the surrounding beaches.
People may curse these flies when they are bitten, but they (the flies I mean, not the people) are a great source of food, both in their larval and fly forms, for the many species of waders and flycatchers and swallows that frequent this area, so any eradication projects would probably cause problems and extinctions for birds higher up the food chain.
The former inhabitants, the native Indians of the area, used to cover themselves in mud in Greenhead Fly season. Apart from wearing mud, light-coloured, protective clothes and hats would be a help nowadays, as the flies cannot bite through thick cloth. And avoiding worst affected areas is probably best, along with keeping car and house windows closed.
Further on we got more views of Willets and views of a Ring-billed Gull (Larus delawarensis) which I have seen before in Blackrock in Dundalk, Co. Louth, Ireland where American vagrants turn up.
We then reached a marshy, green area with long grasses where I spotted an Eastern Kingbird (Tyrannus tyrannus) and these are a large New World flycatcher and they probably eat the Greenhead Flies when they are in season, and I saw a few more Eastern Kingbirds sitting on or near Greenhead Fly box traps in the following days.
An Osprey (Pandion haliaetus) flew over the marsh and these birds are also a breeding species in the Parker River National Wildlife Refuge.
The next new bird that I saw was a little brown swallow sitting on its own on a branch, with its back to me of course. It reminded me of a similar little brown swallow that sat on a wire at Fort McHenry back in Baltimore, but this bird had a very clean, white cheek and throat and a bit of a crest when the wind blew its head feathers up and it was a juvenile Tree Swallow (Tachycineta bicolor).
We also heard and saw a Song Sparrow singing in a bush, and then we arrived at the Stage Island Pool Overlook where we saw Double-crested Cormorants, Herring Gulls and two Snowy Egrets (Egretta thula) which are a similar size to the European Little Egret and they also have dark bill and legs with yellow feet, and are much smaller than Great Egrets which have a yellow bill.
We then ended up at the southern end of Plum Island and this part of the island is not in the Parker River National Wildlife Refuge and these 77 acres are the Sandy Point State Reservation, and the beaches here are not closed off during bird breeding season. It is a large recreational beach with limited parking so you do not have a crowded sandy beach. One needs to get here early to get a parking spot, but it is a lovely beach to sunbathe and relax, and well worth it for a day at the seaside for a family, on a sunny day.
The birds here were Herring Gulls (Larus argentatus) and Great Black-backed Gull (Larus marinus) and the opportunistic Herring Gulls were investigating all unattended bags and sandals on the beach and they were mainly first, second and third year juveniles, like a teenage gang of bandits. It was now 2 p.m. and we had just spent 3 hours in the Parker River National Wildlife Refuge, so we headed back to Ipswich but the day's birding was not over yet.....
