BBC New Year’s Day Birding Trip 01/01/2022

Happy New Year MassBirders!

Mark Burns and I led our 25^th “official” Annual New Year’s Day Birding Trip for the Brookline Bird Club (BBC) yesterday! At 9:00AM, 19 BBCers met at Cashman Park in Newburyport where we toasted in the New Year with sparkling apple cider, introduced ourselves, and reported on where we traveled from and what our first bird of the New Year was. Of the 19 BBCers: a splinter group of 5 went to Maine see the Steller’s Sea Eagle (good move and success for all that went), 2 stayed for the toast and camaraderie, and the remaining 12 hearty souls birded for most of the day despite the heavy fog, rain, drizzle, and temperatures in the low 40s.

We birded Salisbury Beach State Reservation, Parker River National Wildlife Refuge, and River Road in West Newbury. We called it a day at 4:30PM and tallied 52 species for the Club list. Following is a complete list of the birds we saw:

Red-throated Loon – 9

Common Loon – 12

Horned Grebe – 17

Red-necked Grebe – 5

Great-blue Heron – 1

Canada Goose – 250

Gadwall – 35

American Black Duck – 130

Mallard – 40

Northern Pintail – 24

Common Eider – 60

White-winged Scoter – 1,200

Black Scoter – 120

Long-tailed Duck – 34

Bufflehead – 24

Common Goldeneye – 16

Barrow’s Goldeneye – 2 (River Road, West Newbury)

Red-breasted Merganser – 8

Northern Harrier – 6

Copper’s Hawk – 3

Red-tailed Hawk – 2

Merlin – 2

Peregrin Falcon – 1

Purple Sandpiper – 12

Herring Gull – 350

Ring-billed Gull – 100

Great Black-backed Gull – 15

Razorbill – 8

Black Guillemot – 2

Rock Pigeon – 6

Mourning Dove – 13

Red-bellied Woodpecker – 1

Downy Woodpecker – 4

Blue Jay – 10

American Crow – 55

Horned Lark – 6

Black-capped Chickadee – 9

Tufted Titmouse – 1

Carolina Wren – 4

American Robin – 45

Gray Catbird – 1

Northern Mockingbird – 12

European Starling – 275

Yellow-rumped Warbler – 1

American Tree Sparrow – 14

Song Sparrow – 15

White-throated Sparrow – 2

Dark-eyed Junco – 12

Snow Bunting – 70

Northern Cardinal – 16

House Finch – 6

American Goldfinch – 15

Wishing you all a very Happy, Healthy, and Birdy 2022!

Laura H. de la Flor