Tuesday, October 30, 2007

Mount Watatic (Ashburnham, MA.) Gray Jay 10/21 to 10/29....

Sunday, when I got home from a day trip to New York, I saw a post on Massbird that a Gray Jay was found on the Summitt of Mount Watatic. Yesterday, 10/29, Oakes Spaulding reported seeing the bird about 4/5th of the way to the summit during the early afternoon, along the main hiking trail (Wapac Trail), nice to know it was still there!

This morning, I took a very quick"lung burning" hike to summit, on the way to work, and birded the summit area for about 20-30 minutes. Mashall IIliff was there, with his dog, and neither of us saw the bird while I was there, though they were staying longer. Three Snow Bunting flew past while I was there.

When I check my email at work I had a post from Bob Hill, who lives near my work in Groton, Mass. Bob hiked up Watatic, with his young son, the previous sunday 10/21 and had seen the Gray Jay then! Apparently he hikes the White Mountains of New Hampshire regularly and has seen Gray Jays up there. He did not report the bird because.... "I thought, "Oh that's cool", but am so used to seeing them in the Whites that I figured it wasn't a big stretch to see one here." .....

So its good to know the bird has been in the area for some time and perhaps others, such as myself, may still have an oppertunity to see this bird. There are photos of the bird, from 10/28 at:
http://massbird.org/sightings/hotbirds/GrayJay.htm

For updates check the Massbird listserv. link in my links section about.

Yesterday 10/29 I saw two White-winged Scoters on Crystal Lake, in Gardner, along with 450 Herring Gulls, 75 Ring-billed, 25 Great Black-backed and an adult Lesser black-backed Gull.

Sunday 10/28 I saw a probable Cackling Goose at Tomhannock Reservior just east of Troy, New York I had a great look at dozen Canada Goose flying over the car as we drove over the causeway, one of which was very small about 1/2 to 2/3 the size of the other Canadas and about 1/2 the bulk. I had been by this spot a few years back and seen a Cackling Goose then, along with ~5-6,000 Canada Geese, this is a very good waterfowl spot in New York's Capital District.

2 comments:

Larry said...

Someone in CT just reported seeing Boreal Chickadees in the same area.

Tom Pirro said...

Larry, I heard of the Boreal Chickadees seen by CT birders at the Moran WMA in Wodsor, Ma. a few days back....not aware of any on Watatic yet, but it certainly would not surprise me. While hiking in southern NH a month ago, I noted a very large number of Black-capped. Sometimes if there is an incusion of Black-caps from the north some Boreals make down our way!