Month: December 2019

Just as I was promised, first thing this morning at the feeders I added American Tree Sparrow (553). Once again I find myself in the lap of luxury here in this snowy wonderland in Bow, New Hampshire. This morning’s low was upper 20’s; tomorrow’s high will be lower 20’s.

Flush with victory, we made our way to the coast. The first bird we found was Great Cormorant (554) perched high on a navigation marker on the Hampton Beach jetty. Up the coast at Rye Harbor State Park we searched for Purple Sandpiper but we just couldn’t find one. While mulling our options, then taking one step to leave, along came a flock of 8 shorebirds. Dunlin? They landed! On the jetty! Could they be? I dropped my scope and ran across the top of the jetty for point-blank looks at Purple Sandpiper (555)! Good one! No need to go up the coast so we went straight to Salisbury, where we still could not find Snow Bunting.

On to Plum Island where Zeke astutely found a photographer focused intently on something. Snowy Owl? We went down to Lot 2 and a photographer on the way out confirmed the presence of an owl in the dunes. We went down to the next boardwalk and walked north along the beach until I saw a large white bird fly towards me. It landed in some bushes on the highest dune: Snowy Owl (556)!

Then bad news. The road was closed past Hell Cat. There goes Northern Shrike! We moped around Hell Cat for a few minutes and got in the car. Then it happened – a Christmas miracle struck. Better than the one on 34th Street. Suddenly the gate was open – wide open! I thought aloud that now we will probably find a shrike within 100 yards. We did! There it was perched up in a tree not far off the road: Northern Shrike (557). Since the road was open we continued to Sandy Point in hopes of Snow Bunting. Instead we got a perfect Black Scoter (558) in the scope, clearing up a soso Black seen earlier. That makes 6 out of the 7 I needed. We worked our way back up the NH coast, finishing in the fading light at Odiorne but unable to find any buntings.

Coming up one short only accentuates the drama. Somehow I need to overcome this one point deficit. There are some other possibilities out there. Tomorrow I have some targets lined up but it will take good luck and good navigating. I think I can do it.

The flight left Tucson almost on time and arrived in Chicago on time. Good, I’m better than half way. But departure from Midway was delayed so we could unload some freight to lighten the load so our landing on a slick runway in Manchester would be easier. Never seen that before but I was all in favor. We got into Manchester at 5:45 pm instead of 5:20. On the drive up to Bow in my Kia Rio (I used to own one of these and actually used to drive in snow with it) the drizzle changed to steady snow at the Hooksett toll booth. It all came back to me – this is why I moved three years ago. I made it to Bow at 7 pm where Zeke Cornell has been kind enough to put me up (put up with me?) for the duration of the week. He promises me American Tree Sparrow at his feeder at first light tomorrow morning. That’s one.

Then we head out for an all-out coastal blitz for the next 6 so-called easy ones. If we can get out on the fishing boat Friday for 3 more I will just need one more – Barrow’s Goldeneye in Manchester – to reach 11. It looks like the Pink-footed Goose in Dighton is gone as is the Barnacle Goose that was in Boston. I may not need these but it sure would help. Can I endure the cold, bleak, snowy landscape for 4 days? Will I overcome the elements, and, with shear determination, find what I came all this way to see? It’s a big Big Year.

One last shot at the gold. The whole year comes down to these final two weeks. Tonight I rest comfortably in a Tucson Airport hotel so I don’t have to scramble around early tomorrow. Then I take off for New Hampshire with a stop at Midway. Chicago weather looks clear and calm, then it’s on to Manchester where I can expect light snow and brisk conditions the rest of the week. I must get 11 new species in New Hampshire and Massachusetts, then 7 more in San Diego/Salton Sea, totaling 570. The 3 rosy finches at Sandia Crest will give me the win.

Meanwhile, it’s time for only what all the world has been waiting for – sadly likely for the last time – Fan Mail! Once again I will blindly reach into the one of the many sacks marked “US Mail.” I’m feeling around. But not checking for any contents. I think I have one. Here it is. I’m tearing open the envelope. Inside is a letter. I’m opening it – and I’m just as surprised as you are – it’s from a woman from overseas. But not just any lady – it’s from the Queen of England! Or, to be exact, “Elizabeth the Second, by the Grace of God, of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and of Her other Realms and Territories Queen, Head of the Commonwealth, Defender of the Faith.” Can I just call her “Your Highness”? True to form, the envelope includes the verifying photograph:

“Robert, your Big Year Blog is really rather astonishing!”, she gushes. “Your international renown is quite extraordinary if not somewhat inexplicable,” she continues. “I’m not quite prepared to knight you,” she explains, “but rather some say I should crown you.” Thank you, your majesty, I would be honored.

Yesterday I got a solid lead from Theresa Lawson on a goshawk in Ramsey Canyon. She said it was reported the day before too. I had pretty much given up on goshawk for the year at this point. But as I’ll point out in a minute, I’m desperate for a new species right now. So I defied the weather (rain) and climbed the Hamburg Trail up Ramsey Canyon as far as the Pat Scott trail and took a seat on a log. This is the exact spot I had two immature goshawks on 7 August, 2017. After an hour I got up to see what Red-breasted and White-breasted Nuthatches were fussing about. I was hoping they were mobbing a raptor but it was a false alarm.

Before I took my seat again I looked up and saw a large bird soaring, causing me to think it was either a Red-tailed Hawk or raven, not Cooper’s Hawk. I put my binoculars up and I could see it was not a Red-tailed and not a raven either. It was big and buteo-like but Short-tailed Hawk, the only other possible buteo realistically, isn’t recorded in the winter. It wasn’t a flying cross like a Cooper’s, leaving only goshawk, an immature Northern Goshawk (552)!

This is big, very big. Before today I needed 19 new species in New Hampshire and San Diego/Salton Sea. I have a list and I’m checking it twice, and I only see about 7 that I can get I can get in California, leaving 12 in New Hampshire. That’s a lot. But now with the Goshawk, I “only” need the 7 in California and 11 in New Hampshire. That’s a big difference. There are 8 seconds left in the game, it’s third down, I’m on the 20 yard line, and a touchdown wins the game. I really would like one more species here before I leave next week, just to get closer to the end zone. I play in an outdoor stadium and the weather could determine the outcome. It’s a real cliffhanger.

The end is near! (I can hear the cheering.) The Big Year is down to its final days. Two weeks from Tuesday, the 17th, I make my final push and arrive in New Hampshire to search for species on the list below. Then it’s on to San Diego and Salton Sea, finishing in New Mexico. My goal, you will remember, is to top Roger Tory Peterson’s record-setting Big Year of 1953 with 572. Currently I have 551. I need at least 10 new ones in New Hampshire, 11 would be good, that’s 562. Eight in California gives me 570, then three more in New Mexico gives me 573. I’ll need every one I can get – no misses. It’s doable if all goes well.

Last week’s Puzzler was about calculating which sack contains the fools gold. There are several sacks, one is all fools gold the others have real gold. Fools gold weighs one pound one ounce and regular gold weighs one pound each. You only have a penny scale and one penny. Weighing the whole sack doesn’t work for a lot of reasons. So instead … you take one piece from sack one, two pieces from sack 2, and three pieces from sack 3. You have 6 pieces on the scale. Put the penny in. If the total is 6 pounds, 1 ounce, the fake gold is in sack 1. If it weighs 6 pounds and 2 ounces, the fake gold is in sack 2. If it weighs 6 pounds, 3 ounces, the fake gold is in sack 3, etc, etc, etc. Do we have a winner? Yes! The winner is JP Gotrocks of Greenwich, Connecticut. JP is a retired Wall Street investment banker who knows his gold. He made his fortune the old fashioned way – by trading default credit swaps, collateralized debt obligations, and over-the-counter derivatives. If you are wondering where your house, your job, your health insurance, and your pension went over the past 10 years, you are looking at some of it, here’s JP’s “summer cottage” on Lake Winnepesaukee:

New Hampshire and Massachusetts birders should be on the look out for some of the following:

See you in two weeks!