Flahback 2 Palm Beach County, FL 2021
Last July, my wife and I took a mini vacation with my friend, Al, and his wife to West Palm Beach, FL. It was just a couple of days so my wife could get away and relax. Of course, I used the opportunity to get in some birding. As I usually do, I spent the weeks leading up to departure by studying eBird reports of the area. I assembled a reasonable target list of birds considering that I wasn’t going to have any actual dedicated time just for birding. Plus, Al likes to bird too, so if I could get him a new bird or two, he’d be happy.
We stayed in West Palm Beach. That area of Florida was new to me. Sometimes I forget just how big Florida is until I start driving around looking for birding hotspots. It is common to have to drive well over an hour within any county to find a desired location. On the first full day I did find a spot that was only about a 15-to-20-minute drive from our hotel called Winding Waters Natural Area. While the rest of my party was relaxing poolside, I took a drive. I spent an hour walking along the edge of a lake that was loaded with all sorts of vegetation, perfect for bird life (and alligators too). I saw my first ever purple gallinules, eight in all. They were walking effortlessly across the vegetation with their long toes. I got nice open views of least bitterns, which are hard to come by back at home. I also briefly saw my first gray-headed swamphen. I took Al there the next morning before we joined our wives for the day. Al got to see the purple gallinules, but we couldn’t find the swamphen.
The next morning, I snuck out early to another location only about 15 minutes away. It was a small lake and park called Lake Catherine Park. I saw eBird reports of Egyptian geese there. As the name implies, they are an introduced species. They have become established in Florida and, as far as the American Birding Association is concerned, they are countable when seen here. It took me a little bit of searching, but I finally spotted four of them across the lake on a private residential lawn. I went back to the hotel to pick up the gang for our day trip to Peanut Island. We swung back to Lake Catherine on the way so that Al could get the Egyptian geese too. There were only two this time, but he got them. We also saw some mottled ducks, Eurasian collared-doves, a loggerhead shrike and some established feral Muscovy ducks.
The day prior to our departure, Al and his wife spent the day with his family who lived in West Palm Beach. This left the day for my wife and I to ourselves. She knew that I wanted to find birds so she said she had no problem spending the day with me doing it. After I asked her a couple of times, "Are you sure?", we set out. We headed to Green Cay Nature Center & Wetlands in Boynton Beach, about a 35 mile or so drive from our hotel. We drove along the coast to sightsee. We stopped at Snook Islands Natural Area in Lake Worth. The only notable birds I picked out there were a couple Nanday parakeets. Formerly called black-hooded parakeet, they too are an introduced species that has become well established in Florida. At Green Cay, I hoped to find fulvous whistling-ducks but I couldn't locate one. We only spent about 90 minutes there, walking the boardwalk trail. We saw the regular Florida birds there such as black-bellied whistling-ducks, common gallinules, anhingas, egrets, herons and so on. At one point on our walk, my wife pointed to a bird and asked, "Which bird is that?" Excitedly, I said it was a gray-headed swamphen, four of them! Yet another introduced species, it is now the largest rail in the United States. Thanks to her good spotting, I finally got decent photos of the bird. No new species for the day, but much better looks than I had of one a few days earlier.
The following morning, before we checked out of the hotel, I took about a 10 mile drive north to Jupiter. I had seen eBird reports of a pair of common mynas hanging out at a shopping center there, possibly breeders. Yet another introduced species, but ABA countable for those seen in South Florida. It didn't take long once I got to the parking lot before I heard and then saw them. They are particular to urban environments and were very accommodating for photos and voice recordings. In all, I picked up four countable life birds on the trip.
At Peanut Island we found some other notable nature sightings. Peanut Island is situated in the Intracoastal Waterway in Riviera Beach. Nestled at its center is the John F. Kennedy bunker. It is a tourist beach attraction accessible by personal watercraft or the island shuttle. Here we found curly-tailed lizards, brown basilisks and green iguanas. We saw a harmless manatee and a spotted eagle ray swim into the inner lagoon. I even found a small common octopus right at the edge of the beach. At Green Cay Wetlands I found a Florida softshell turtle, a pig frog and a scarlet skimmer.
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