Deer Island

Today I went out to Deer Island, in Winthrop, MA to see what waterbirds were around.  The first big group I found was a huge raft of scoters (~2000) off of Revere Beach, most of which were White-winged, but a few Surf as well.  My walk around Deer Island resulted in hundreds of Common Eider, and a number of Red-breasted Mergansers, Buffleheads, Brant, Common Goldeneyes and Common Loons.

The highlight, however, was clearly the Northern Shrike I found perching along the path.  This was a bird I was not expecting to see, and while these photos are just the iPhone through the scope, they're the best of have of this bird not in-hand.

Shrikes and Solitaires

As far as birds caught this week at Madre Selva there were two highlights for me: Black-faced Solitaire and Rufous-browed Peppershrike

We often hear the solitaires, letting out a song very similar to the sound of a fingertip on the lip of a wineglass, but had not seen one until it was in the net.




The Rufous-browed Peppershrike was only the third I'd seen, the first pictured here, from my time in Mexico:


And here's its Costa Rican counterpart


As with all shrike-types they are blood-thirsty




Though not quite capable of this:

NOSH 2

I caught our second Northern Shrike today...and it torn me to pieces. All blood you see is mine.

Shrike one

Northern shrike. Avoiding serious wounds from these guys is tougher than with any of the raptors we catch. I was out when they caught this, but Fud gave me a call and all he asked was "do you want to see a lot of blood?" Naturally I packed up at the library and headed back.


Immature female gos


American tree sparrow