What a Wrack!

Nothing about today shouted it would be a great day to head to the beach. None the less, that is where we ended up. We even deviated from our usual stomping ground, Jetty Park, but only by a mile. The tot and I stopped off at a small park, loaded the wagon, and headed up the beach. While my son searched for buried treasures, I searched for birds. The weather has been poor the last few days, so I was hoping something unexpected might show up.

As we entered the beach, it was kind of hard miss the massive wrack line that spanned as far as we could see. We headed north, toward Jetty Park, which was a possible destination, so long as the threat of rain remained low.

Semipalmated Plover

I was happy to see that the abundance of sea debris attracted an abundance of shorebirds.

nonbreeding Sanderling

breeding Sanderling

Least Sandpiper

Semipalmated Sandpiper?

breeding Ruddy Turnstone

It was a good idea to watch your step today...

Luckily we avoided any painful steps...

Coming into to the port...

 Have a relaxing weekend!

(This little fellow fell out of an oak tree in my yard and landed a few feet from me...thankfully not on me)

Beach Birds

 The Least Terns have returned to the area! I saw my FOY Least Tern on Easter morning along the Indian River near my house. This week I saw a dozen of them at the beach near Jetty Park. These tiny terns are rather boisterous and I usually detect their presence upon hearing their distinctive calls. Luckily for this Least Tern, very few gulls were at the beach today so it wasn't harassed when it arrived on the beach with a fish!

Over the past two months, the Royal Terns have been developing their breeding plumages. Breeding plumages can only mean one thing!

Courtship appears to be going well!

Among the large group of Royal Terns and Black Skimmers, there was this lone Sandwich Tern. The tern is also developing its black cap.

I've been to Jetty Park twice over the past two weeks and both times there have been ten or more banded Royal Terns among the large flock. I've only been able to read a few of the many numbers on the bands.

Today, I saw this banded Ruddy Turnstone. The colored flags are much easier to read!

As I walked along the surf, the Skimmers were making their way to the water to cool off.

One skimmer made its way to the water followed by the entire flock...one at a time!

MINWR 9/15/12

I had a hard time deciding where to go this morning...a nice sunrise at Jetty Park or Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge, but we decided on the refuge. As we approached our exit on the highway, some large storm clouds appeared along with some rain. I had a feeling it wasn't going to last, and thankfully it didn't.

Luckily for us, with the rain, comes rainbows. And we saw a bunch of rainbows this morning!

We headed out to the shore first, but things were pretty quiet there. I had hoped to see some Black-bellied Plovers, but once again, they were not there.

Ruddy Turnstone

But there were several Ruddy Turnstones foraging in the sand.

Sanderling

And this sweet little Sanderling preening in the sand.

Dragonhunter

This dragonfly was resting along the sea grape plants. After the beach, we decided to make a loop through Black Point Drive. It was pretty quiet there as well. We saw plenty of herons and egrets. We saw 2 Reddish Egrets which are always fun to watch.

Finally, from quite a distance, we saw some of the plovers we were looking for. In this area, we saw the largest number of birds. There were Black-bellied Plovers, Willets, a Caspian Tern, Black Skimmers, Forster's Terns, Laughing Gulls, some Blue-winged Teals, and probably a few others that we missed.

Turkey Vulture

On the way home, we drove along the edge of the causeway where there were numerous Turkey and Black Vultures scuffling over a small dead fish.

Turkey & Black Vulture

I loved the look on the Turkey Vulture's face when the Black Vulture took its food. It looked as if to say..."hey, I had that first!!!".

juvenile Black Vulture

Little did they know, this juvenile Black Vulture was sitting on a jackpot just up the shore.

Dowitcher

We also saw two Dowitchers, which I think were Long-billed....We made one more stop at another small park on the way home.

Northern Mockingbird

We saw some interesting interactions between this Mockingbird and a Brown Thrasher.

The two were attempting to occupy the same tree, but the Mockingbird was not pleased about that.

The moment the thrasher would come out of the brush, the mocker would attack him.

The Thrasher didn't give up though. It kept trying to claim an upper branch. This is about as far as it got.

Loggerhead Shrike 

This shrike was observing the action from the next tree over, wondering what all the fuss was about...

Hope you're having a great weekend:)

Great Balls of Fire

We headed out of the house a little before 5:30 am yesterday morning to watch the launch of a Delta rocket. We landed at Jetty Park in Cape Canaveral, where there was a lot going on to keep us entertained during the three hour delay.

A pre-sunrise walk on the jetty.

A cruise ship coming into port.

                                                           
                                                           The sunrise from the beach.

A Skimmer skimming the shoreline.

Terns touching down.

A Laughing Gull soaring the skies.

A small crab putting up a fight.

Finally, the Delta rocket launching!

Walking the Plank

Ruddy Turnstones
Indian River Lagoon

A small flock of Turnstones and Sanderlings appeared this week along the Indian River Lagoon. These Ruddy Turnstones were "walking the plank" to a get to a sandy area  for alittle foraging. Watching them hunt for food is always entertaining as they wildly toss sand and turn stones with their odd shaped bills.