Take Two - Big Year in a small town
I’ve been thinking a lot about what my birding focus should be in 2021 and I think I’ve finally decided. Of course, as it did last year, it might change. Life in general will be different when I retire in early April and who knows when life will get to the new normal.
Here is the 411 at this point:
· Add to my Life List – I’d like to be able to travel a little and expand my birding horizons as well
· Get to know the Rhode Island birding spots I am unfamiliar with
· Work on my idea of developing a series of Rhode Island Birding Map paintings
· Do bird paintings
· Learn more about birds & birding – Song, Behavior, Biology – this list goes on. Actual take the classes & read the books I’ve purchased.
· Spend more time in nature
· Have more bird moments
You will note -- there is no Big Year list on here. Even so, yesterday I spent the day birding (mostly in my car). No new birds for the Life List, but 55 “New” birds for 2021. More importantly a renewed awareness of what a beautiful place I live in. Impromptu meet ups with other birders reminded why I enjoy this merry band that drops everything when the text rings out to chase the next rarity.
As for birds, I found a white goose, but only while processing my photos and it is not a good enough photo for an ID. I saw three different Northern Harriers and Re
d-Tailed Hawks. There were six Northern Pintails in the same place, an off-season Baltimore Oriole and a plethora of other usuals. I have no photo of my favorite sighting of the day – 2 Adult Bald Eagles sitting in an Osprey nest that sits over the highway in Narragansett – just watching traffic go by.
It’s going to be a good year. I feel it down to my feathers. Come fly with me...
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