Birds and Other Nature Sightings

 Today I drove down to the end of Island Beach State Park in the morning just to see if anything interesting had turned up ahead of the predicted thunderstorms.  It turned out to be rather uneventful.  There were the usual and expected sea birds around, but little else bird-wise.  Most of the shorebirds have not yet returned from their northern breeding grounds.  But a walk towards the back of the inlet provided me with some sightings to share. Besides the seaside pea and poison ivy that line the beaten path heading towards the end of the jetty, some colorful plants were noticeable.  Rugosa roses and virgin creepers were sporting red colors.  Hoary mugwort, now past its flowering stage, was lush in its minty blue hue. Rugosa rose, or beach rose, is an introduced species from Asia.    © S. Weiss   Left, a virgin creeper (genus name), most likely Virginia creeper.  Right, hoary mugwort, a naturalized coastal plant.     ...

 After a week's absence, I took a drive to one of my favorite places at the Jersey Shore, Island Beach State Park.  I spent Sunday, Father’s Day, with family.  Late in the day I saw that a couple of white ibis were reported there in the morning, and in the afternoon my friend, Chris, texted that he had seen and photographed a Manx shearwater off the end of the Barnegat Inlet jetty.  Both species, from where they were reported, are rare.  White ibis sightings in New Jersey are becoming more and more frequent and, as such, they had been removed from the NJ Bird Records Committee’s list of reviewable birds.  The Manx shearwater is a pelagic species, not uncommon in NJ waters, but rare and reviewable when seen from land.  This small shearwater could easily be missed by many birders, but Chris is an experienced pelagic birder and is very familiar with them.  It was too late in the afternoon when I saw the reports, so I decided to wait until morning to ...