New Jersey Birds

I'm trying to break out of winter blogging hibernation, and birds seem like a good way to do it. Last weekend, we went to Barnegat Lighthouse in New Jersey. There's a jetty almost a mile long that stabilizes the northern end of Long Beach Island. You can see it here. For all intents and purposes, this area appears to be a duck magnet:

Ok, ok, this isn't a duck, its a dunlin. Shorebirds seem to like Barnegat just fine, too. The ducks are coming right up - below is a group of six or so Harlequin ducks.

These guys have spectacular plumage. I saw a harlequin duck back in 2005 - I turned around, and there it was, and then it was gone. We got much better looks at them this time. In fact, none of the birds seemed at all concerned about human presence, making for some nice photographic opportunities. I'll post some more soon, maybe :)

Live on Location - Cumberland Island, GA

Northern states - I know where all of our robins went! This small clearing on Cumberland Island easily held 300 or more robins. Also in the area were about 100 yellow-rumped warblers and 100 or more cedar waxwings. I got a shot of bluebirds and cedar waxwings sitting side by side in a tree - a first for me!

Cumberland Island borders Kings Bay's Naval Submarine Base, whose specialty is ... submarines, of course! Here's one leaving the base and heading towards points unknown. At one point its hatch opened and people emerged and walked to and fro on its top as it continued its journey.

Armadillos are a common sight on the island, and aren't scared of humans. Nonetheless, they look like something straight out of prehistory or science fiction, but something still vaguely cute.

A walk on the beach side of the island revealed some great birds, including American oystercatchers ...

... and royal terns, among others that might show up in future posts.

Look what the storm blew in ...

Despite the blustery weather, or perhaps because of it, our incredibly small urban backyard was graced by a palm warbler today.

I first noticed this bird fluttering through a half-snow covered chrysanthemum. It wasn't leery of human presence at all, and approached within six feet of me several times. It flipped and flitted through the snow while I watched and snapped pictures, for a total of about 20 minutes over two or three different sessions.

As an aside, this wild nor'easter weather also failed to discourage the presence of Pennsylvania's first recorded Allen's hummingbird, which is still feeding happily away at a feeder in a suburban Lancaster County townhouse development. Us Easterners are familiar with the ruby-throated hummers, who are not particularly cold hardy. However, each year, more and more reports of rufous, and now Allen's hummers are turning up in the east. These birds are well equipped to deal with temperatures into the teens and may stay in a northern area where feeders are available until late December and even January. Quite an interesting development!

Street light, moon light

Taken on the front steps to our house, as the moon provided a backlight for the American flag at the post office:

Vegas, Baby

Nothing says you're in denial of cold weather coming like heading out to the desert in October. And while Vegas has any number of attractions and distractions, one of the things I really enjoy about it is the almost unlimited variety of color and texture.

A group of palm trees backlit by the marquee of the Flamingo casino.

An elaborate light fixture in the Golden Nugget casino.

Dusted with Snow

A few fall items covered with an early coat of snow ...

ornamental cabbage and chrysanthemums

Fulton Fall (Winter???) Folk Festival

A blast of winter greeted the FFFF this year and made for some trying conditions.

These little gourds can be had for 3 or 4 for a dollar and are a fall staple of the festival's sales spots, along with mums, pumpkins, apples, whoopie pies, and ham & bean soup. Not to mention that everything under the sun can be found at the yard sales and impromptu flea markets that sprout up across the county for this four-day festival.


The FFFF parade on Saturday also faced miserable weather conditions: cold rain interspersed with spitting snow. Nonetheless, even the little guys came out to see the tractors ride through town.

Power on the move

Our little town had quite the carnival atmosphere this weekend, because visitors were here.

Several weeks ago, two enormous steam generators destined for the Three Mile Island nuclear power plant arrived in the United States. A French company called AREVA constructed the generators, which were shipped by boat across the Atlantic, north through the Chesapeake Bay, and as far along the Susquehanna River as the water depth would allow. Then, the generators were boarded onto specialized carriers to make their way across Lancaster County at 3-4 mph. They arrived in town Friday, and were parked along a side street for the weekend.

These behemoths are 74 feet long, 25 feet high, and weigh in at over 1,000,000 pounds each. The logistics of moving them safely are apparently tremendous, as the sheer weight is a threat to local roads and bridges that were not designed to handle such loads. To help alleviate the strain, each generator is loaded onto a carrier with 24 axles. Each axle supposedly carries weight equivalent to a fire truck. The generators appear to be accompanied by a large fleet of State Police Officers at all times, and local newspapers report that the convoy is over a mile in length when on the move.


On Sunday night, these generators are slated to leave town. They must cross Route 30 to reach TMI, but they are too heavy for the bridge that would take them across the U.S. Highway. So, the plan is to close Rt. 30 in the wee hours of the morning and have the equipment to cross 30 at grade by going up an off-ramp, removing the guardrails that make up the center median, and then exiting by the off-ramp for the westbound lanes.

One of the policemen on duty said they take a corner much better than you would think!

A banner day

I carpool with a coworker most days, and we've been seeing a bald eagle very occaisionally, in a particular area where a small stream joins with the larger Codorus Creek. There's a large concrete box on the creek bank where the two streams meet. Its an industrial area and very near to the city of York, not your typical wildlife viewing habitat. Twice we've seen it sitting on the box, one time using the box as a dinner table to eat a fish.


Yesterday, however, the birds upped it a notch. As we were crossing the Susquehanna River at the start of our commute, we saw a large bird fly over the bridge. I couldn't confirm it was a bald eagle, but when I looked to the right, I saw a second bird with the distinctive white head and tail flying low and fast over the water. This eagle eventually landed on a rock in the river, next to another large bird. But they were too far away at this point to ID the third bird.

As we arrived in York, we figured it would be too great a coincidence to see our "regular" eagle. But, we kept our eyes peeled, and sure enough, the eagle was perched on the concrete box. This time he had a friend, a second eagle sitting on a small stone in the stream. We turned the car around to get a better look, and took a picture with the only camera available to us, my coworker's iPhone. Today, with my camera in my lunch sack, we saw no eagles at all ... go figure!

Honeymoon Catch-up

I guess now is as good a time as any to dig into my massive pile of photos from our honeymoon this July.

This is Summit Lake in Lassen Volcanic Park, with Lassen Peak in the background. Our first night of camping was spent in the edge of the trees to the right. Lets just say that this was a bad time to discover that we'd forgotten to pick up any bug spray. As the sun went down, I walked out along the lake and found this hidden view - you had no idea the mountain was back there from the campsite.