Sunday, January 30, 2011

Red and White Winged Crossbill a double lifer

I finally made it down to Long Branch at Seven Presidents Park for both species of Crossbills which would be lifers for me.
I arrived at about 7am and got set up about 45 minutes later, why I was searching the Pines I couldn't stop wondering did all of my procrastinating over the last month, maybe the Birds have depleted the Cone crop at this location and moved on?
After about 2 hours Rob Fanning and some other Birders asked me did I see anything ,I said the only thing was hearing some fly overs, so I got in my Truck and drove down to Deal another proven location but no dice dead. , so I headed back up to the park for another try after  it only took a few minutes and  I spotted a Male and Female Red Crossbill flocking to a near conifer Hurrah!!


After taken some decent Digiscoped shots of the Red"s, I seen alot of activity in some other Japanese Pines. The White Winged were moving in , yes I had my two lifers! Plus some great shots with the Kowa TSN-10PZ Zoom eyepiece what a day!!!

4 comments:

Stuart Price said...

Wonderful Crossbill pics Kev. My fave smal bird.

Those digiscoped were with a compact right? If so they are extremely impressive.

Kevin said...

Thanks Stu yes it was with the CanonS90.

Stu do you get both CrossBills?

Stuart Price said...

Hi Kev,yes we do although the White Winged is much rarer (I haven't gotten a firm ID on one yet although I think I may have seen one a couple of years ago). Red Crossbills are common some years and absent others, a very unpredictable visitor........

Anonymous said...

Hi! Just wanted to stop by and say hello, my boyfriend and I met you at the Appalachian Trail trailhead by Vernon, NJ, we were thruhiking. I carried your business card for a long time, and then took a picture of it when it got too raggedy.. Saw the picture today, and thought we should say hi! Hope you are doing well, we had a really interesting chat with you that day :)
We were-
Second Breakfast and Slim Pickins