A Travellerspoint blog

December 2016

Day 1: Chicago to Providenciales

all seasons in one day 78 °F

Happy New Year's Eve! And this concludes the year of 2016 as a fresh start to 2017 lies before us!

Photos to come later since the wifi signal is too weak to upload any photos...

Today, my family and I flew to Providenciales, an island in the northern Caribbean as part of the country of the Turks and Caicos, east of the Bahamas. We will spend a week here and I will post when I can because the wifi here is spotty! A 2016 birding-year-in-review post will come out sometime soon, not sure when...

We had a pleasant and on-time flight courtesy of United, and we arrived onto the island at around 3pm, picked up our rental car, stopped to pick up groceries, and soon were unpacking at the lovely, quaint resort at which we are staying. Here is a NORTHERN MOCKINGBIRD, the first bird I identified on the island, as seen from the airport:
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And here is the view from our room:
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We ended the evening enjoying the pool and hot tub on premises, serenaded by the calls of COMMON NIGHTHAWKS overhead.

It should be a fun week! Happy birding!

Henry
World Life List: 927 (no recent life birds)

Posted by skwclar 17:10 Archived in Turks/Caicos Islands Comments (3)

Winter Catch-up Post & a Life Bird!

semi-overcast 53 °F

So...at last another busy semester has ended! It has been rewarding, though, with so many great musical opportunities through my choir, the Voice of Chicago. I did; though, manage to see a few birds in these first few weeks of winter.

Female RED-BELLIED WOODPECKER:
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On one of my bird surveys I captured this nice photo of a CEDAR WAXWING:
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December 8 turned out to be the big Sandhill Crane migration day for the fall, as thousands of these guys streamed overhead. It was quite impressive!
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Today (Monday, December 26), my family and I took advantage of the warm temps and went to the Morton Arboretum to get outside. I had three target birds: Pileated Woodpecker, Barred Owl, and a Harris' Sparrow - which had recently been seen near the Visitor Center.

Although I failed to find all three of those species (bummer!), I did gain one LONG OVERDUE life bird - an AMERICAN BLACK DUCK (note slightly larger size & darker overall than surrounding Mallards)! Thanks to birder Pete M for birding with me (he was after the Harris' Sparrow, as well) and giving this ID:
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So Bird-of-the-day definitely goes to the American Black Duck.

Stay tuned, because on Saturday, my family and I will fly down to the island of Providenciales, Turks and Caicos for a week in the Caribbean! I am looking forward to the warmer temps and hopefully more life birds!

Good birding,

Henry
World Life List: 927 Species (1 life bird today: American Black Duck)

Posted by skwclar 12:39 Archived in USA Tagged cedar_waxwing red_bellied_woodpecker sandhill_crane american_black_duck Comments (2)

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