Particularly in the southern US, when stagnant temperatures
hover around 100 degrees, mid-summer is a time when birds become harder to find
and birders lead a semblance of a normal life- regular attendance at their day
jobs followed by time at home in their air conditioners. In the time frame
before shorebirds start their journey south for the fall and breeding birds are
not as vocal, a morning out birding can be pretty dull save for the occasional local
or state rarity that may show up. One of
these rarities gave me an excuse for my only real birding excursion in the past
few weeks however- a continuing Crested Caracara that has become comfortable
near the Cape Hatteras, NC lighthouse. As I still consider myself an active NC
state lister (even though I am currently residing in nearby GA), a rarity of
this scope was an easy choice for me to put the Corolla on the interstate.
I detoured to the Pilot Mountain area to pick up my
girlfriend, Lauren, on the way. I got a few hours of sleep at her place on
Friday night and we got off to an early 4am start on Saturday. Five and a half
hours later and several cups of coffee brought us to our destination. A couple
other birders were already on scene and I was hoping we would get lucky and
they would already have the bird scoped out for us. But behold- no such luck! A
fruitless hour of walking back and forth around the area did not produce the
bird, and we were about to take a lunch and swim break to try again in another
hour or two when a carload of birders pulled up. Fantastic! Four of my birding
friends from the Raleigh/Durham/Chapel Hill area had arrived. It worked out
well as they could hold down the fort in case the bird reappeared while Lauren
and I were taking a swim and getting lunch.
About an hour and a half later I
got a call from Ed Corey (one of the aforementioned birders)- the bird was
back! We ran up from the beach to find the young Crested Caracara picking on
the pitiful remnants of an opossum skeleton and surrounded by about twelve
birders. Success! NC #368. After clicking off some photos and sharing
triumphant grins with all the other birders present, Lauren and I joined Ed,
Mark Kosiewski, Jesse Alexander, and Jacob Farmer for a sandwich and a porter
to finish off the day in style at a nearby seafood diner. Worth the drive!
Crested Caracara: On ground near its favored opossum skeleton (not pictured) and in flight
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