Bird of the Day

I haven’t seen many Black-bellied Plovers this year, at least not yet. This one I found on the mudflats at dusk in Hampton Harbor is already well into its fall molt, and most of the distinctive black belly, breast, and throat has already been replaced with it’s drabber winter plumage. Soon there won’t be any black at all, except for the axillary feathers under the wing, a field mark only seen in flight that along with its robust plover bill, distinguishes Black-bellies from other Pluvialis plovers. This bird has a nearly worldwide distribution, breeding all around the Arctic Circle during the summer, and wintering on coastal areas on all continents except Antarctica. Outside of North America, it’s called the Grey Plover.

A few weeks ago I posted pics of this Least Tern nest with 2 eggs in the sands of Plum Island. Since then 2 chicks have recently hatched, perhaps just within the last couple of days. One is to the right of the parent, and you can just make out the other’s fuzzy head snuggling under the parent’s breast. These chicks won’t be able to fly until they’re about 4 weeks old but they’ll wander from the scrape of a nest into the dune vegetation after just a few days. I hope to follow up with more pics of these fuzzballs in another week or two. The sources I’ve read say that most Least Terns begin their migration south from New England at the end of August, so these are quite possibly the pair’s second brood of the season, and if successful, won’t be leaving until the second half of September.

Here’s a Northern Cardinal just fledged yesterday, and seems to have left the nest early as it barely had enough lift to get airborne. It’s tail is almost nonexistent with pin feathers only an inch or so long leaving it mostly rudderless in flight. But it was managing to fly from tree to tree on its own, begging for someone to come feed it, so I made no effort to rescue it. Even for such a youngster, it already has a Northern Cardinal’s perky crest. Juveniles have similar coloring to an adult female, but are more drab with little of the subtle reds and yellows, no face mask around the bill and without her bright coral beak. Juveniles take on adult plumage after their first molt later in the fall. Fetched in Kittery Point, ME.

At this time of year my backyard’s no longer full of spring birdsong, but the peepy-cheepy begging of fledgelings. This Tufted Titmouse still has that wide-beaked juvenile appearance and doesn’t yet have the rich black and detailed facial markings of an adult bird. Titmice are nonmigratory and generally live out their entire lives within a few miles of where they were born.

Common Terns can be seen in great numbers at this time of year fishing along the Piscataqua River between NH and ME. This juvenile that landed near me at Hilton Park, would beg a handout from any adult flying close by, but I didn’t see any of them feed it and after a few minutes it flew off to join the hundreds of others wheeling and diving about the river near the entry to Great Bay. Juvenile plumage doesn’t have the solid black cap, black-tipped red bill, and bright red legs of a breeding adult and looks similar to a winter adult only browner. Common Terns breed in colonies, and we have a few small ones in Great Bay and the Back Channel Islands of Little Harbor. But I’m guessing most of these birds seen along the river are from a colony that was established on Seavey Island (part of the Islaes of Shoals) in 1997, that has since grown to several thousand pairs.

Shorebirds from the Arctic have begun migrating through the last couple of weeks, starting with adult birds in worn breeding plumage, but youngsters born this summer are now beginning to arrive as well, and most have a distinct juvenile plumage. Shorebirds, especially the Calidris sandpipers, are difficult to learn and above is a key showing some of the fieldmarks I use for a juvenile Least. You can also find more info about this bird, along with photographs of adults, birds in flight, and comparisons to other peeps, in my article just posted on the Fall Shorebirds of Seapoint.

As the summer breeding season winds down, all this week I’ll be posting pics of youngsters born this year. These two Great Egrets are enormous birds standing well over 3 feet tall, but just a couple of months ago were only tiny naked chicks. You can tell them apart from the Snowy Egret by their large size, all black feet and legs, and all yellow spear-like bills. Egrets all belong to the heron family, but scientifically speaking, there’s no real distinction between a heron and an egret, it’s just the tradition of calling white herons egrets after their showy white breeding plumes (aigrettes). At one point, Great Egrets were called Great White Herons and to confuse things even more, in Florida there’s a white morph of the Great Blue Heron that is currently called the Great White Heron. Great Egrets are staging a remarkable comeback in North America. Fetched at Plum Island..