North Beach, Chatham, Barnstable, Massachusetts, US

Aug 17, 2019 9:30 AM – 2:30 PM

Comments:    SSBC/BBC trip, Glenn d’Entremont leader, Ernie L, 20 participants

36 species (+1 other taxa)

Black-bellied Plover  15

Semipalmated Plover  25

Piping Plover  3

Ruddy Turnstone  5

Sanderling  20

Least Sandpiper  5

White-rumped Sandpiper  1

Semipalmated Sandpiper  20

Willet (Eastern)  1

Laughing Gull  150

Ring-billed Gull  X

Herring Gull (American)  X

Iceland Gull  1    continuing 1S bird, tertials/coverts extremely bleach and abraded with only shafts left on several feathers, so very white and bill pale/pink 7/8 to end and blackish tip

Great Black-backed Gull  X

Least Tern  1    imm

Black Tern  1

Roseate Tern  10

Common Tern  200

Sterna sp.  2000    so far out not to be IDd to species, but likely mostly commons, but the split between Common/Roseate impossible, likely 7/8 common

Cory’s Shearwater  25

Great Shearwater  500

Sooty Shearwater  10

Manx Shearwater  5

Brown Booby  1    One of the first birds seen on the foggy ocean side was a smallish sulid which showed continuous brown coloration on the upper parts and a brown looking chin throat upper chest and a clean demarcation to white (seen by one) or whitish underparts (seen by others).  The rump was the same color and we did see gannets today which in non adult plumage showed a pale/whitish rump and longer wing span.  The bird was in view for over a minute, but was hindered by foggy conditions which caused the bird to disappear as it flew away from us.

Independently several of us concluded it was a Brown Booby, likely the individual cruising around the western Atlantic with reports in Nova Scotia, Maine, New Hamphsire, and New York (via ebird).

There are reports from MA not in ebird; how many other reports from other states are not in ebird?

Northern Gannet  5

Double-crested Cormorant  50

Osprey (carolinensis)  3

Peregrine Falcon  1    not an adult, was on stones on shore, feeding on a juvenile tern, later seen chasing shorebirds

American Crow  2

Horned Lark  2

Purple Martin  4

Tree Swallow  2

Bank Swallow  1

Barn Swallow (American)  5

American Goldfinch  2

Song Sparrow  3

Baltimore Oriole  1    imm male, moving south and dropped into higher trees, flew off but Ernie called it back and the bird landed on a flag pole, orange infused blackish head, orange throat/upper chest, whitish lower chest and belly, orange vent

View this checklist online at https://ebird.org/view/checklist/S59136150