Day 335: Lesser Scaup

In this photo, there are two types of Scaup (diving ducks): the Lesser Scaup and the Greater Scaup.

The Lesser Scaup is on the bottom right of this photo inbetween two Greater Scaup. Both species look very similar, but there are subtle differences. Greater Scaups are larger, and there are differences in the bill and head shape that make it possible to identify the birds, particularly when they are side by side. Also in the photo are a Ring-necked Duck (left) and Red-breasted Merganser (top).

Day 334: Eastern Screech-owl

The Eastern Screech-Owl is much easier to hear than to see. In spite of my efforts, I haven't put eyes on one, but I've heard several during our adventures around Maryland. It is very identifiable by its distinct song, so I'm still counting it towards this list.

You can hear the call of an Eastern Screech-Owl here: http://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Eastern_Screech-Owl/id

Playing a tape of a screech owl call will often bring curious birds flocking to the scene, eager to get a look at the unwanted intruder. Screech owls are strictly nocturnal, roosting during the day in cavities or next to tree trunks. They live east of the Rocky Mountains from southern Canada to Mexico.

This is not my photo, but here's a picture of an Eastern Screech-Owl:

Source

Day 333: Yellow-bellied Flycatcher

Day 332: Summer Tanager

Adult male Summer Tanagers are bright red in color, while females are yellow/orange on the underparts and olive on top. The bird we saw below is a female.

Day 331: Merlin

The Merlin is a small species of falcon.

Day 330: Common Goldeneye

Earlier in the year, we saw a Barrow's Goldeneye and several Common Goldeneye ducks. In this photo, the Barrow's Goldeneye is in the middle. There is a female Common Goldeneye to the left and a male Common Goldeneye to the right.

Day 329: Scaly-naped Pigeon

Well, I'm starting to scrape the bottom of the barrel of bird photos that I've taken this year. It's going to be a challenge to finish, but I'm certainly going to try! I'm having to go back through my photos and post some that are not that great, so apologies for that.

Today's bird, the Scaly-naped Pigeon, is one that we saw in Puerto Rico back in March. The photos were taken from our hotel, and the pigeon is pretty far away. But, it's still identifiable!

The Scaly-naped Pigeon is slate gray with maroon colored feathers around its neck, which appear to be scaly (thus, the name).

Day 328: Dunlin

Day 327: Turkey

Happy Turkey Day! I wish you all a wonderful day spent with family, friends, and good food.

I've been saving this post for a while now. What better way to start off Thanksgiving than with a post about our main course, the turkey! We see turkeys every once in a while around Maryland. About a month ago, we saw two turkeys on Assateague Island! Turkeys were only found on the island a few years ago, when they were thought to have flown from the mainland and establish a small population.

Day 326: Royal Tern

Royal Terns can be found in Europe, Africa, the Americas, and the Caribbean islands. They live on the coast and are only found where there is salt water. Royal Terns have a bright red-orange bill and a black cap on top of their heads during the breeding season. During the winter, the cap becomes patchy.

Day 325: Nelson's Sparrow

Day 324: Black Scoter

The Black Scoter is a large sea duck. Males are all black with a large yellow bill, and females are brown with pale cheeks.

Day 323: Marsh Wren

The Marsh Wren is a small North American songbird that breeds in marshes with tall vegetation, like cattails.

Jared's great photo

Day 322: Black Skimmer

Day 321: Northern Rough-winged Swallow

The Northern Rough-winged Swallow breeds throughout much of the United States. This species has a brown back and a dusky throat. They fly around so fast most of the time that it's hard to get a good picture!

Day 320: Yellow-billed Cuckoo

Yellow-billed Cuckoos are found through much of the central and eastern United States. They are furtive and retiring by nature and are often first revealed by a loud, hollow sounding call. Yellow-billed Cuckoos have the nickname of "Rain Crow" because of their apparent tendency to call more frequently on cloudy days, although their proficiency as predictors of weather has never been demonstrated.

Day 319: Green-winged Teal

Over the weekend, we saw thousands of Green-winged Teal (a common duck) from a distance at one of the coastal marshes that we visited. They were way too far away for a photo, even using a scope, but I did manage to take a few pictures of some flying overhead.

Males birds have a chestnut colored head with an emerald green eye patch. You can just make out the green in some of these photos.

Day 318: Dickcissel

The Dickcissel is a common bird throughout North America's prairie grasslands.

Day 317: Snow Bunting

We had a wonderful weekend birding in eastern Maryland. The weather was perfect, and I even photographed a few new birds. The best part of the weekend was Saturday night, when Texas A&M beat the #1 ranked Alabama football team! Whoop!! Just had to throw that in there.

On our way home yesterday, we stopped in a park in Annapolis with the hopes of seeing a Snow Bunting. There was supposed to be one hanging around, and luckily it was still there when we arrived. It appeared to be pretty tame, so we were able to get close enough for some great photos. Every year, a few Snow Buntings are found wintering in Maryland. This was my first time to see one, though.

Day 316: Wood Duck

Male Wood Ducks are beautiful birds. You can barely see the male in the farthest left side of the photo below. I wish I had a better photo to show you, but Wood Ducks are very skittish birds! We come across them fairly often in marshes, ponds, or creeks, but they do seem to scare easily and fly off before we get a good look at them.

Day 315: Greater Yellowlegs

We're off to the coast this weekend for some birding, so hopefully I'll have some good photos to share from our trip! I still need to see Harlequin Ducks (they evaded me earlier in the year), and Jared heard that they were recently spotted in Ocean City.

Today, I leave you with a common North American shorebird, the Greater Yellowlegs. They look very similar to the Lesser Yellowlegs, except they are larger.

Day 314: White-faced Ibis

The White-faced Ibis is very similar to the Glossy Ibis, which we can see in large numbers on the eastern shore of Maryland. In one large flock of Glossy Ibis (side note: what is plural for Ibis??), there might be one White-faced Ibis mixed in, if you're lucky. The only way to tell the difference is that breeding adult White-faced Ibis have a pink face bordered with white, red eyes, and redder legs.

Most of the time, we see flocks of Glossy Ibis as they fly by in the sky, so it's next to impossible to pick out one that looks different. Jared finally found a White-faced Ibis up close, though, and got the photo below.

Can you tell that the bird in the forefront of the photo below is a White-faced Ibis? Can you just make out the red eye? Pretty hard to tell, huh.

Day 313: Sedge Wren

The Sedge Wren is one of the smallest species of wren.This species breeds in wet meadows and marshes in eastern North America and central Canada. In the fall, they migrate to coastal areas in the southeastern United States through eastern Mexico.

Day 312: Semipalmated Plover

The Semipalmated Plover is a small, common shorebird that winters along coastal areas from the United States to Patagonia.  They are among the few plovers whose numbers are apparently increasing, possibly due to a varied choice of food and habitat and wide-spread coastal winter distribution.

Day 311: Snow Goose

The Snow Goose is one of the most abundant species of waterfowl in the world. During migration and on their wintering grounds, Snow Geese often congregate in huge flocks. The largest wintering populations occur in the central valleys of California, along the Gulf Coast of Louisiana and Texas, and along the Atlantic Coast from New Jersey to North Carolina. It's a magical sight to see a flock of Snow Geese "dance" in the sky.

Day 310: Barred Owl

One of my favorite things about our apartment is the creek and woods immediately behind our porch. We can see all sorts of wildlife and birds while sitting in our living room: scrawny deer, foxes, and possums to name just a few. Fairly often, we get a couple of Barred Owls hooting it up, as the day turns to dusk. I've been trying to get a photo of them for a while now, but haven't had any luck until this past weekend! It was nearly dark, but out of the corner of my eye, I just caught sight of a big shape in one of the trees. I immediately knew it must be one of our owl friends, so I scrambled (read: jumped over the couch) to grab the camera before it flew away. Luckily, I was able to get a few shots!

Day 309: Red-necked Phalarope

This picture of a Red-necked Phalarope is my husband Jared's photo from a pelagic birding trip he took off the coast of Maryland. We also saw Red-necked Phalaropes in Colorado, but they were so far away that I didn't get a very good photo.

Day 308: Common Raven

I really wish I had a better photo of a Common Raven, but unfortunately, this is all I have for now. You can usually tell a Raven by its deep, throaty croak of a call, which sounds different than the everyday crow call. Ravens are also bigger than Crows, have a larger beak, shaggy feathers around the throat and beak, and a wedge-shaped tail. They are also supposedly very smart. Although ravens are almost always black, there do exist exceptionally rare white ravens (and not just in Game of Thrones)!