Date: 1/5/26 4:56 am From: CHELEMER, MARC J <000023ab3895aed6-dmarc-request...> Subject: [JERSEYBI] Team 1000Birds tries a winter Big Day (long post)
Dear fellow NJ birders,
On December 18, 2012, four of the best birders in New Jersey set out early from a starting point in Cape May to pursue a Big Day in southern Cape May country. Their remarkable exploits yielded 138 species; you can read their story in the archives of JerseyBirds. At the time, I thought the possibility of encountering that many birds in New Jersey on ANY day was astounding. I know more, having shared the excitement of ten World Series of Birding competitions...but that's in the springtime during the peak of migration. That many species in winter? I had been intrigued ever since.
On January 3, 2026, four of the NOT-best birders in New Jersey set out from the entrance sign to Forsythe Refuge to pursue a Big Day in Atlantic and Cape May Counties. We started at 6:30 and heard a Great Horned Owl within one minute of our start. Moving to another area just outside the refuge, Cliff Miller expertly whistled an Eastern Screech-Owl...and TWO answered! A heckuva start! We then began our drive around the loop. At Gull Pond, we scared up two American Bitterns and two Wilson's Snipes. The refuge was ice-covered, so waterfowl were concentrated and far off, but as we worked our way around, our list grew. From near the dog-leg, we were scanning the long line of waterfowl asleep on the ice in the Northwest Pool when, a mile off, I lucked onto a Short-eared Owl flying behind those waterfowl in the marsh beyond. A magnificent bird, we watched it for many minutes as it flew out towards the Osprey-cam platform, and then back into the southeast pool's vegetation. Three owls at our first location! Continuing, we came upon a noisy flock of passerines just after the "upper" entrance to Jen's Trail....more species. And a stop back at the visitor's center yielded more - Purple Finch, Sharp-shinned Hawk, Red- and White-breasted Nuthatch. As we recrossed the bridge to exit Forsythe, we stopped just one more time, to quickly hear/see Ruby-crowned Kinglet and Gray Catbird...thus we'd picked up all three mimids on the refuge, and 60 total species by 9:30.
A visit to South Cove at Brigantine added the expected "big shorebirds" onto our list: Marbled Godwit, American Oystercatcher, Willet, Long-billed Dowitcher. The Dunlin flock was too far off to pick out a Western Sandpiper...one of the many "misses" on the day. A visit to the Longport jetty at the southern tip of Atlantic City's barrier island yielded nothing...the Harlequin Duck found the day before was not observable. Then, on to Cape May County, with first stops at the Hereford Inlet (Peregrine on the beach across the channel, Horned Grebe in the channel, Gannets offshore), 2nd Avenue jetty (Purple Sandpiper - one! - and Ruddy Turnstone - one!). Try as we might, we could not find a White-winged Scoter among the hundreds of scoters, loons, Long-tailed Ducks, and Red-breasted Mergansers we saw on the day - another miss. At the Coast Guard ponds at the southern end of the Wildwoods, we finally saw Ruddy Ducks and Green-winged Teal (high fives all around when four flew into the only open water in the far north corner), and collected Savannah Sparrow, Black-bellied Plover, and a flyby Greater Yellowlegs (nice spotting, Avery Cunningham!) at Two-Mile. As we headed for Cape Island, we stopped to 'scope the end of the Cape May Harbor south jetty and could see the Great Cormorants sitting atop the Coast Guard beacon. We came upon at least twenty, perhaps twenty-five Yellow-rumped Warblers feeding in the gravel by the side of the road a little further on...they were frenetic. Any thoughts on what might have prompted such a feeding frenzy in the habitat normally "reserved" for juncos and sparrows?
By this time, news of a Townsend's Solitaire at Hidden Valley had reached us, but we stuck, at least at first, with our plan. A Palm and Nashville Warbler foraged side-by-side in the green grass near the entrance to the Beanery, and we'd seen the flock of Sandhill Cranes in the "magic field" across the road. A stunning Lark Sparrow adult foraged a little further on amidst farm equipment and picnic tables. A Merlin flew into the top of a nearby tree. But we could not find a White-crowned, Chipping, or Field Sparrow at all, nor the continuing Vesper Sparrow(s)...but we gave the Beanery short shrift, as at this point, we made the first of two (failed) attempts to see the Solitaire. Failing after nearly an hour, we resumed the itinerary, stopping in front of the O'Brien/Zemaitis household. Never were four birders happier to see a Carolina Chickadee or a House Finch, in addition to the desired Baltimore Orioles. We then visited the concrete ship and CMPSP, finally (on Lighthouse Pond) finding the first and ONLY Mute Swans seen all day (along with a beautiful Red-shouldered Hawk, a Killdeer, and a flyover Great Egret, plus Tree Swallows).
Back to the Solitaire spot for one more try...failed again...but a flock of Cedar Waxwings added to our list. Finally, as it got dark, we went to the Meadows and were rewarded by an American Woodcock flying right over our heads. A long walk along the new metal boardwalk and the west path yielded a far-off "Hoo" of a Barred Owl, and that was it, the end of the day. As a team, we'd amassed 111 species (a few were "dirty birds" in WSB parlance, meaning not all members of the team saw/heard them). We had devoted more than an hour and a half of daylight birding to the Solitaire, which we know would've yielded a bigger list had we pursued the original itinerary. We'd missed numerous "easy" birds like Brown Creeper, the aforementioned sparrows, Winter Wren, White-winged Scoter, Wood Duck, Redhead (on Lily Lake the day before, but not found, despite careful scrutiny, on Saturday). We'd missed harder birds like a Lesser Yellowlegs, Snowy Egret, an irregular RT Hummingbird, the Solitaire. And the tides had been wrong for visiting Nummy Island for marsh sparrows. But we were pleased with our first-time effort. Although it had been my idea originally, Cliff Miller did the hard work of scouring e-bird reports for likely species; he prepared the itinerary. Avery Cunningham and Whitney Dyer's exceptional eyes and top-notch camera work found and either confirmed (or disproved sometimes) many of our IDs. We're already thinking about Sunday, 1/3/27...
Good birding!
Marc Chelemer
Tenafly
(1,108)
(Postscript: Avery and Whitney went back to the Solitaire location on Sunday 1/4 and saw and photographed the bird after a wait of less than 30 minutes! Bully for them! And wouldn't you know, three Trumpeter Swans were on Lily Lake yesterday...)
