by Marion Sprague
On Saturday Feb 15th, 6 young birders joined us as we trekked to Newburyport, MA in search of owls. Laurie Pocher joined our group to guide us through the refuge to where the owls had been spotted. Our first stop was a brief visit to the Mass Audubon Joppa Flats Education Center and the Parker River National Wildlife Refuge (PRNWR) Headquarters where they were celebrating their Eagle Festival. We sent set out toward the refuge.
It was a good day for raptors! We were greeted by a Red-tailed Hawk that landed on a wire just above the roadway. Our first stop at the maintenance area yielded a Rough-legged Hawk and 2 Norther Harriers. We watched the RLHA as it soared and hovered over the marsh. At one point there was an exciting dust-up between one of the harriers and the RLHA. We also observed 2 Bald Eagles flying in tandem and flushing a flock of over 300 Black Ducks as they hunted along the marsh. There were not many passerines throughout the day, but at his stop we did pick up American Tree Sparrow and Song Sparrow.
We then drove two Lot 6 where the Short-eared Owls have been seen displaying recently. We parked and walked the trail to Stage Island. There were several birders stationed along the trail waiting for the shorties to show up, but by all accounts, they had not been sighted yet that day. You can imagine our excitement when one of the shorties flew almost overhead and then ducked out of sight behind a small ridge. Eventually a second Short-eared Owl joined the first. We watched this tete a tete for over an hour as the shorties flew over the marsh between Lot 6 and the end of Stage Island sometimes landing briefly in trees along the edge of the water. It was a great show and provided a lifer for more than one birder in our group! It was hard to pull ourselves away, but we really wanted to try for a 2-owl day and find one of the Snowy Owls known to frequent the refuge.
We tried the boardwalk next to Lot 6 first but had no luck. Our next stop was the boardwalk at Lot 3. We still didn’t spot anything and were heading back to the cars to try for another stop when a few of the group called us back. They had a snowy in their scopes!! It was a little far off, but everyone took a minute to look through the scope and appreciate the owl. With the light really starting to wain we headed back to the cars to celebrate our success with eclairs! (Thank you to Ilsa and her parents for providing them).
As we ate our eclairs and chatted about the successful day of birding, someone spotted several large white birds flying across the marsh. Were they Snow Geese, egrets or swans? We all grabbed our bins to train them on the flying birds. Seth and Weston grabbed a few photos which we valuable as we tried to identify them. Ultimately, we agreed they must be the group of Mute Swans that had been seen at the refuge earlier on the month.
It was a long but fantastic day of birding! View the full checklist of what we saw here: https://ebird.org/me/checklist/S64542797
Stay tuned for the trip announcement for out annual Woodcock Walk in March. Happy Birding!
