Long-tailed Duck and American Golden-plovers Near Times Beach
Published: September 22, 2013
Tags: General Observations, Long-tailed Duck, American Golden-plover, Killdeer, American Kestrel
I stopped by a little area of beach along Fuhrman Blvd today to try out my new (but previously owned) spotting scope (wahoo! Thank you, Jim P!). One of the first things I found to focus on was a Long-tailed Duck! S/he was sitting quietly on the beach as Ring-billed Gulls walked around it. Doug thought it could be injured. It's an early migrant of its species, at any rate, not usually seen in
WNY until the last third of October.
As I was about to leave the parking lot, Kevin R. stopped by and said he had word that a pair of American Golden-plovers were seen nearby only 30 minutes earlier. With such a great opportunity, we shot down just a little south of Times Beach and sure enough, we found THREE American Golden-plovers! Two of the plovers were immature birds and the adult was in transitional plumage. We got some wonderful views! Thank you, Kevin!
Between those 2 locations, we also got a nice look at a female American Kestrel, a couple of Killdeer, and a Great Blue Heron.
What was going to be a non-birding day for me turned into a couple of very nice hours with some great finds!