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The Daily Bucket: Plum Island in September, including a very special visitor [1]

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Date: 2022-09-27

American Avocets have been one of my favorite birds ever since a family trip out west when I was little. I hadn’t seen one since then. They’re extremely rare in Massachusetts (check out this AllAboutBirds map of their range). A female Avocet—apparently one which has visited Plum Island some other years—arrived this August, and stayed until September 15. I took a while to go look for her, because I mistakenly thought she was in a place where she would be hard to see…it turned out she was in a freshwater pool by a path with a good viewing spot. When other people were in that spot, I managed to get video of her through the marsh grasses at another part of the path. Two videos I made of her are near the end of this Bucket.

Some recent pics I’ve taken of Plum Island, roughly in order from the entrance at the northern end of the Island to the southern end...

Dune grass and Seaside goldenrod near Boardwalk #1

Monarch butterfly on Seaside goldenrod

Plum Island, Massachusetts, September 2022

Snowy Egrets and Great Egrets on the Salt Pannes, Plum Island MA

Beach plums, Pines Trail, Plum Island MA

Butter-and-eggs, Parker River National Wildlife Refuge, Plum Island, MA

Wild apples (full-size apples, not Crabapples), Plum Island, MA

Snowy Egrets flying above Stage Island, Plum Island, MA zoom

Stage Island, Plum Island, MA zoom

tidal marsh on the other side of the path from where the Avocet was, at high tide

Stage Island, Plum Island, MA...the freshwater pool where the Avocet was

(zoom...the Avocet is the white, larger speck by the mud-flat..the smaller ones are Greater Yellowlegs)

Click “zoom” to see these next photos better. I took the next two before I even realized that the Avocet was there! I was expecting a white, tan/rust and black bird, rather than a white and black one (with just a hint of grey, on its head and neck)...but non-breeding adults and immatures don’t have much tan/rust color. A couple of expert birders who reported her on the Plum Island bird list have said she’s an adult female. According to AllAboutBirds, female Avocets have shorter and more upturned bills than the males.

American Avocet and Snowy Egrets (zoom)

American Avocet, Snowy Egrets and Greater Yellowlegs (zoom)

Snowy Egrets and Greater Yellowlegs (zoom)

Snowy Egrets and Greater Yellowlegs (zoom)

American Avocet at sunset (zoom)

American Avocet

Greater Yellowlegs

Greater Yellowlegs and American Black Ducks (zoom)

American Avocet and Greater Yellowlegs (zoom)

Greater Yellowlegs (zoom)

path at Stage Island, Plum Island, MA (zoom)

Northern Mockingbird, Stage Island, Plum Island MA

These are two videos that I made of the Avocet, the two days that I saw her. (The first video is 3 ½ minutes long, and the second is 5 3/4 minutes, with one of my favorite pieces of music by Dutch minimalist composer Simeon ten Holt.) Normally I would apologize for the video length, but I’m very happy with how these turned out, so I won’t :) In the second video, you can see how the Avocet sweeps her beak back and forth in the water to forage for food. The other birds in these videos are Greater Yellowlegs and an American Black Duck.

x YouTube Video

x YouTube Video

Boardwalk Seven, Plum Island, MA (zoom)

Adult and immature Great Black-backed Gulls (zoom)

Garnet sand, Sandy Point State Reservation, Plum Island MA

Plum Island, MA

Harvest Moon over Plum Island, September 9, 2022

September 22, 2022: It’s raining again! All over Massachusetts (and Rhode Island and Connecticut, which have also been suffering from drought). We got thunderstorms with heavy rain this morning...it’s now a gentle shower. The last day of summer (yesterday) was gorgeous here. I saw lots of Monarchs on Plum Island, including 30+ on goldenrod in the dune grasses, and a cluster of them settling in for the night in a cherry tree next to the dike by two freshwater pools. A pic of the sunset that evening, and two-minute video of the tree with the butterflies…

North Pool, Plum Island, MA

x YouTube Video

September 27, 2022: It’s in the mid-60’s and cloudy here on the North Shore of MA this morning. It rained a little more a couple days ago. I saw dozens of Myrtle Warblers in New Hampshire yesterday...they will probably be in MA soon. I’ve seen just two Monarchs in the past few days. Hope all of you in the path of Ian or other storms are staying safe.

YOUR TURN, BUCKETEERS: WHAT’S UP IN NATURE IN YOUR AREA?

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[1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2022/9/27/2112376/-The-Daily-Bucket-Plum-Island-in-September-including-a-very-special-visitor

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