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WORDS ON BIRDS
Team sets Superbowl of Birding records
February 03, 2007
Steve Grinley
Last Saturday, we were traveling back up the Parker
River Wildlife Refuge toward the gate with 15 minutes left to the
whirlwind day they call the Superbowl of Birding. This is a 12-hour
competition that begins at 5 a.m. and ends at 5 p.m. Teams of four to
seven members try to see as many species in Essex and/or Rockingham
County as possible. One to five points are earned for each species,
depending on its relative abundance or rarity in late January. House
sparrows are one, Baltimore orioles are five. The first team to call
in a five-point bird earns three bonus points. It's quite simple,
really.
Our team, the Raven Loon-atics, participated again this
year with Phil Brown of Essex, Margo Goetschkes of Cambridge, Linda
Ferraresso of Watertown, Sean King of Newburyport and yours truly.
Linda was tallying the score sheet in the back seat when she
announced: "Ninety-nine. I get 99 species. Can that be right?"
"No way." I replied. "That can't be right."
Last year, we had set a new record with 88 species and
we earned 191 points and it just didn't seem like it was going that
well this year. It had started out well enough. At 5 a.m., we were at
Flax Pond in Lynn with three other teams to get American coot first,
worth five plus three points. There were also other ducks, geese and
swans in the pond that gave us a running start. But the hour of
unproductive owling that followed slowed us down until Phil was able
to call in a barred owl in Nahant. We were the first (by 5 seconds) to
see, and phone in, a five-point Wilson's warbler that was coming to a
feeder of mealworms. Our next stop produced nothing, but we did get a
five-point Baltimore oriole at the following stop.
We then headed for Cape Ann, where we found several
target birds coming to feeders at a home in Gloucester, including a
five-point yellow-bellied sapsucker, along with a red-bellied
woodpecker and brown creeper. We missed the hairy woodpecker that was
a regular there. We then hurried to Halibut Point where we had found a
pair of yellow-breasted chats (5 points) and a field sparrow (4
points) the bitter cold day before. With bonus points, this stop was
planned to yield 12 points, but these two species were nowhere to be
found on Superbowl Saturday. It was a big disappointment that was only
slightly comforted by a pair of 4-point catbirds.
The rest of Cape Ann went pretty much as planned,
getting most of the target birds, including a 5-point dickcissel that
I had originally found on the 20th, but missing Bonaparte's gull, a
staked out ruby-crowned kinglet and wild turkeys that we had seen
earlier that week. We pushed on to Essex where we missed one screech
owl in its hole but found another. Stops in Ipswich gave us a 5-point
pied-billed grebe, 4-point pine warbler and a 5-point turkey vulture
and 4-point winter wren en route.
At the Ipswich River Sanctuary in Topsfield, we added
fox sparrow, cowbird and red-winged blackbird - 10 more points, but
missed bluebirds. On the way out of Topsfield, I caught site of a
large woodpecker landing on a tree by the road. We stopped short and
found a pileated woodpecker that quickly disappeared, but only after
we were able to add 4 points.
Then came, in retrospect, what may have been the
turning point. We had a choice to make. Should we make a swing through
Newbury for a 4-point snow goose that had been in the same spot for a
couple of weeks, but was absent the day before with the increasingly
frozen river? It was after 2 p.m. and we were not on Plum Island yet,
as we had planned. We still had Salisbury and the Merrimack River to
do in between.
We chose to make the swing, and as we approached the
frozen river, there was the snow goose, swimming is a small patch of
open water with a common merganser. It lifted our spirits and added
five more points. We missed grackles and wild turkeys again, as we
headed to Salisbury, but once there, we did find the pheasant and
white-crowned sparrow, each 4 points, that we hoped for, along with a
kestrel. Along the Merrimack River, we saw bald eagles, long-tailed
ducks, scaup, a great blue heron and a kingfisher. We detoured once
again for another try at wild turkey, which we still missed, and
bluebird, which we found.
We finally arrived on Plum Island at 3:30 p.m., and a
4-point merlin greeted us at the gate, jousting with a 3-point
Cooper's hawk. Our raptor luck continued with a rough-legged hawk, a
snowy owl and a short-eared owl down the island. On the ocean, we
added red-throated loon, razorbills, black scoters and sanderlings
along the beach. We searched for American bittern without success and
as the day was drawing to a close, we headed back up island and
searched for northern shrike along the way.
That's when Linda made the announcement and amazed us
all as to how well we had done. We doubled-checked her figures and
found no error. Ninety-nine species and 248 points. We had only 191
points last year. With the adrenaline flowing, we asked ourselves if
we could find one more species in the last 15 minutes to make it an
even 100? The sun was setting and we could find no shrike or bittern.
We stopped with 3 minutes left to try to "pish" something out of the
brush, but to no avail. Still, we did amazingly well (despite missing
wild turkey) and we made it back to the meeting spot with time to
spare.
Twenty-six teams gathered for the judging and to dine
on pizza and hot beverages. It was great to see so many youngsters
participating this year (and they won a lot of the door prizes) along
with some pros that included David Sibley himself. The event was great
fun for all. As it turned out, our team won the coveted Joppa Cup for
the most points. The next closest teams tallied only 88 species and
199 points. It was a Superbowl Day to remember, especially for five
Raven Loon-atics. Steve Grinley
Bird Watcher's Supply & Gift and Nature Shop at Joppa Flats
Newburyport, MA
BirdWSG@Verizon.net
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