My friend and I made a trip up to the Cornell Lab of Ornithology for some photo ops. My original reason for wanting to go up there were to see some Bohemian Waxwings that have been reported during the week. They were not seen all day yesterday, but we ended up going anyway to see other birds. When we parked the car at the Lab, I checked my email to see if anything interesting had been sighted and it turned out that Bohemian Waxwings were reported not far from us on Cayuga’s birding listserv. We hopped right back into the car and made our way to the birds.
When we got there, we ran into a Cornell Spring Field Ornithology class who led us to the right location, but the birds were slowly trickling away from sight into private property. At that point, I only had binocular views of them with no real looks at field marks – you could tell they were Waxwings, but I wanted to see the key marks of a Bohemian. My friend decided to go see if she could get permission to go on the property and the owner allowed us in!
We came across a flock high up in the trees and got very nice scope views of about 30 birds. We went further in for a closer look and suddenly we were surrounded by Waxwings.
Bohemian Waxwing pair
Bohemian Waxwing pair
This is a bird that I have wanted to see for a long time. We estimated that there could have been up to 80 individuals (though, I put 70 on our eBird list), plus one lone Cedar Waxwing. In our area, it is usually the opposite! We had satisfying looks from every angle.
Bohemian Waxwing
We were pleased to see some of the birds exhibiting courtship behavior by exchanging small pieces of food back and forth.
Bohemian Waxwings courtship
Bohemian Waxwings courtship
Bohemian Waxwings courtship
It was one of the best “life bird” experiences I’ve had, especially considering that I would have never expected to see so many.
Bohemian Waxwing
After this wonderful experience, we went out to look for waterfowl. While the numbers are down from the winter-waterfowl birding, we still did see a good variety including Lesser Scaup, Ring-necked Ducks, Bufflehead, both Mergansers, Redhead, Ruddy Ducks, Common Loons, American Coot and a Pied-billed Grebe. I finally got some decent photos of Hooded Mergansers, thanks to another friend who joined us!
Hooded Merganser
All of us couldn’t help but get photos of this Mallard up close in the sun. As common as they are, you cannot dismiss their beauty!
Mallard
The last highlight was another good one. We went to find local nesting Great Horned Owls and did not come up empty handed.
Great Horned Owl
A great start to a birding weekend. I wonder what tomorrow will bring…