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Outer Banks Ferry Trips
- To: carolinabirds@duke.edu
- Subject: Outer Banks Ferry Trips
- From: Susan Dale Arrington <sarrington@coastalnet.com>
- Date: Sun, 09 Feb 2003 21:05:02 -0500
- Delivered-to: pardo@metalab.unc.edu
- Organization: home
- Reply-to: sarrington@coastalnet.com
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Carolina Birders:
   Susan and I spent Friday and Saturday (Feb. 7-8) on a fine winter 
outing utilizing the ferries from Cedar Island to Okracoke to Hatteras 
and then from Hatteras to Okracoke and to Swan Quarter.  Our goal was to 
see as many wintering watefowl as we could.  While we saw a gazillion 
Double-crested Cormorants, many Brown Pelicans, and the usual gulls 
(including perhaps 80 Bonaparte's Gulls), the birds most worth 
mentioning are as follows:
   Several thousand Surf Scoters and Black Scoters - in mid-Pamlico 
Sound as well as at the             Great Island portion of the Swan 
Quarter trip.  Included were three White-winged Scoters         seen by 
Susan.
   Several hundred Long-tailed Ducks of which 54 were fairly much up 
close.  These were also
       seen near Swan Quarter.  We also saw one from the 
Okracoke-Hatteras Ferry.  
   Two Greater White-fronted Geese - standing on the beach at Okracoke 
Ferry Terminal along
       with several Canada Geese and one Graylag Goose.  Could these 
possibly be escapees?
   Two Razorbills from the beach just north of Rodanthe Pier.  
   Two very small black and white alcids rapidly flying just over the 
surf just north of Rodanthe
       Pier.  Could these have been two of the Dovekies seen by Jeff 
Lewis at that site that
       morning?  Looked like them to me, far though they were.
   Two Red-necked Grebes, one at Avon Pier and the other at Oregon Inlet.
   Thousands of both Red-throated and Common Loons, both in the middle 
of Pamlico Sound
       and near Swan Quarter.  Interestingly, the Commons outnumbered 
the Red-throated in the
       middle of the Sound, while the Red-throateds greatly outnumbered 
the Commons near
       Swan Quarter.
   Throw in two flocks of 12 to 15 Fox Sparrows each and one flock of 
15-18 Swamp Sparrows         (at Lake Mattamuskeet) and well over a 
thousand Cedar Waxwings on Okracoke and at             Hatteras Island, 
two Lesser Black-backed Gulls (one each at Okracoke and Hatteras Point),
       and at least 500,000 (I counted) Red Wings at Lake Mattamuskeet 
and we saw a LOT of
       birds!
   A very good trip.
Rich and Susan Boyd
Beaufort, NC