Posted by John Boyd on October 23, 2016 at 05:48:33
About 20 birders joined me at the Coe Visitor's Center. Some were a little delayed, partially due to traffic on the Ingraham Highway being slowed due to an overnight road closure. There wasn't much bird activity at Coe. Since the gate to Lucky Hammock was closed, we headed straight into the park. Fortunately, the repairs at Anhinga Trail were finshed, and we had the pleasure of walked on the newly resurfaced asphalt and the new wider boardwalk. Sadly, the two trees by the visitors center have been removed, along with some Paurotis Palms. We had seen many warblers in those trees over the years. There were some Cattle Egrets in the parking lot. It is often hard to find them in the park, but not today. These were fairly widespread in the park. We found relatively few waders. We did find at least 5 Short-tailed Hawks, one dark morph and four light morphs, including an immature. Other birds of particular interest included a Merlin or two and some Bobolinks. It was clear that Eastern Phoebes are back. A walk on the Gumbo Limbo Trail yielded a female Black-throated Green Warbler and American Redstart, to add to previously seen Palm (of course!), Prairie, and Common Yellowthroat. Part of the group walked the whole trail, the rest of us walked half and returned on the Old Ingraham Highway. We were delayed a bit leaving due to the women's room being closed for cleaning. Eventually, we got the men's room cleared out and the women were able to use it instead. Then we headed off to Research Road. Our next stop was around gate #2. We walked the road rather than the trail, adding Downy Woodpecker, Pine Warbler, and heard-only House Wren. A Common Grackle feeding on pinecones like a crossbill was a bit of a surprise. We then drove out Research Road, adding heard-only Eastern Towhere and Northern Waterthrush in the pinelands. Once we got out of the pines we added Northern Harrier, and Red-tailed Hawk. Continuing along through the gate we found 3 swallow species (Tree, Northern Rough-winged, and Barn) as well as Eastern Meadowlark, Loggerhead Shrike, American Kestrel, and another Merlin. We were unable to locate the White-tailed Kite that Paddy Cunningham had seen earlier. It was about noon when we arrived at the day use area of Long Pine Key, where we ate our lunches. After lunch we added a male Yellow-bellied Sapsucker and a Yellow-throated Warbler. We then walked the Three-in-one Trail before heading further into the park. Outside Mahogany Hammock we found 2-3 Belted Kingfisher. Inside, we encountered an Ovenbird, then ran into a small flock. The flock included White-eyed Vireo, American Redstarts, some Black-and-white Warblers, and a Magnolia Warblers. A Great Crested Flycather was also in the area. After that, it was on to Paurotis Pond. There wasn't much on the pond, with a quickly disappearing Blue-winged Teal being the only bird of note (we would see more of them at West Lake and Mrazek Pond). There were some land birds present, including a close heard-only Northern Waterthrush and another female Black-throated Green Warbler. We skipped Nine-mile Pond and continued to West Lake. We added American Coot and Pied-billed Grebe to our day list. Little was seen from the boardwalk. Mrazek Pond had more Blue-winged Teal and our only Common Gallinules of the day. At that time, our list was rather less than impressive. Our luck changed when we arrived at the Flamingo Visitor's Center. For starters, there were three West Indian Manatees eating algae on sea wall. You only had to look down and wait to get great looks at them. Then there was the sandbar, which was well-exposed and had many birds in great light. We finally caught us on many of the waders we had been missing, including a couple of Great White Herons and Roseate Spoonbills. There was a good variety of shorebirds: Black-bellied Plover, Marbled Godwit, Ruddy Turnstone, Least Sandpiper, Western Willet, and Short-billed Dowitcher. Eventually, some scanning turned up 8 Red Knots! There were also three species of tern (Caspian, Royal, and a single Forster's), Brown Pelicans, and Laughing Gulls. Eventually, some White Pelicans started showing up---a long line of them. We estimated 600. We then headed over the Amphitheater and walked the shoreline. Here we added Semipalmated Plovers and both Western and Semipalmated Sandpipers, and repeated many of the shorebirds from the sandbar. When we returned to Amphitheater, we noticed the three Black Skimmer (two immature) that we had walked right by earlier. We finished with a brief stop at Eco Pond, adding our last new bird of the trip, a Northern Shoveler. Then we headed home. I picked up a few additional birds in Florida City on the way home, including Common Myna. I ended the day with 78 species, the group total was at least 82. Blue-winged Teal Northern Shoveler Pied-billed Grebe Mourning Dove Eurasian Collared-Dove (Florida City) Rock Pigeon (Florida City) Common Gallinule American Coot Black-bellied Plover Semipalmated Plover Marbled Godwit Ruddy Turnstone Red Knot -- 8 Dunlin Least Sandpiper Semipalmated Sandpiper Western Sandpiper Western Willet Short-billed Dowitcher Black Skimmer Caspian Tern Royal Tern Forster's Tern Laughing Gull Anhinga Double-crested Cormorant White Ibis Roseate Spoonbill American White Pelican -- about 600 Brown Pelican Cattle Egret American (Great) Egret Great Blue Heron Great White Heron Tricolored Heron Snowy Egret Little Blue Heron Turkey Vulture Black Vulture Osprey Red-shouldered Hawk Short-tailed Hawk -- 4 dark (1 juv.) + 1 dark Red-tailed Hawk (seen by others) Northern Harrier Belted Kingfisher Yellow-bellied Sapsucker Red-bellied Woodpecker Downy Woodpecker American Kestrel Merlin Great Crested Flycatcher Eastern Phoebe White-eyed Vireo Loggerhead Shrike American Crow Tree Swallow Northern Rough-winged Swallow Barn Swallow Blue-gray Gnatcatcher House Wren (heard only) Gray Catbird Northern Mockingbird European Starling (Florida City) Common Myna (Florida City) Eastern Towhee (heard only) Bobolink Eastern Meadowlark (seen by others) Red-winged Blackbird Common Grackle Boat-tailed Grackle Ovenbird (seen by others) Northern Waterthrush (2 heard only) Black-and-white Warbler Common Yellowthroat American Redstart Magnolia Warbler (seen by others) Palm Warbler Pine Warbler Yellow-throated Warbler Prairie Warbler Black-throated Green Warbler Northern Cardinal West Indian Manatee -- 3