Tuesday, October 21, 2008

No to King Eider, Yes to Turnstones

On Sunday afternoon someone reported a king eider in the vicinity of St. Peter's jetty in Cape May Point. Since that would be a life bird I ventured down to the beach yesterday evening to take a look. What I found were several large flocks of scoters. Unfortunately, a king eider was not among them.

On the bright side, I got some nice looks at ruddy turnstones, a bird I have not seen for several weeks, if not months. Turnstones and sanderling braved the crashing waves to forage among the rocks of the jetties between St. Peter's and St. Mary's. Many gulls lined the beach, including some late season laughing gulls. One may have been a lesser black-backed gull, but not all of its characteristics fit very well.

Elsewhere, I heard a red-breasted nuthatch yesterday.