So another terrible pun title for a post. I was recently in Boston for a couple of days on business and decided to throw the bins in my bag and try and get a bit of birding in whilst there. During a gap in play I headed out thursday from the hotel to Boston Common which is a rather nice park in the midst of the city. Loaded up with images from the many beautiful bird photography bloggers around this region I had (in hindsight massively over optimistic) visions of pileated woodpeckers and various warblers flitting about a suburban oasis.
Walking in harsh calling caught my ear I spun around to see my first Boston bird, European House Sparrow fighting with the second, European Starling, over crumbs with a third (feral pigeon) in the background. Not the start I was hoping for but all birds to be expected I suppose.
I decided to head to a rather nice pond area in the hope something interesting in an american duck/goose type thing would be swimming around. Oh. Mallards. Canada Geese. Right - not making much progress here are we, but wait whats that up there behind that barricade - it looks like a swan nesting.....if it lifts its head a bit more I should get it to species.....wait that looks orange...mute swan?!? At this point I was a) unsure which boston I was actually in (I used to live near and frequently see all the above around the original Boston in England) and b) a little underwhelmed. Just then a flash of orange bobbed by and I got onto my first Boston lifer; American Robin and rather wonderful it was too.
It was actually a juvenile that was still following its parents around giving me wonderful views of juvenile and adult birds fighting over worms and doing the standard fledgling Turdus style food demands.
Walking in harsh calling caught my ear I spun around to see my first Boston bird, European House Sparrow fighting with the second, European Starling, over crumbs with a third (feral pigeon) in the background. Not the start I was hoping for but all birds to be expected I suppose.
I decided to head to a rather nice pond area in the hope something interesting in an american duck/goose type thing would be swimming around. Oh. Mallards. Canada Geese. Right - not making much progress here are we, but wait whats that up there behind that barricade - it looks like a swan nesting.....if it lifts its head a bit more I should get it to species.....wait that looks orange...mute swan?!? At this point I was a) unsure which boston I was actually in (I used to live near and frequently see all the above around the original Boston in England) and b) a little underwhelmed. Just then a flash of orange bobbed by and I got onto my first Boston lifer; American Robin and rather wonderful it was too.
It was actually a juvenile that was still following its parents around giving me wonderful views of juvenile and adult birds fighting over worms and doing the standard fledgling Turdus style food demands.
Naturally, whenever the parent found something tasty it all kicked off big time.
It was really nice to watch for a few minutes and followed up with good views of blue jays and double crested cormorant. Not a blistering success specieswise but some really enjoyable birding for a little while. More to follow Boston adventures to follow.
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