Duck, Duck, Goose

At this time of year, when migration is done and most of the land birds I find in my travels are the same as those I can find in my backyard, I want to go where I can see something different. That usually means ducks and, to a lesser extent, geese.

Mallards and a male wood duck (Margo D. Beller)

So on this windy New Year's Day I took an afternoon walk not far from my home. There were 50 cars at the dog park, which means there were at least 50 people and 50 dogs, likely more of each. I have no dog and so kept walking along the road to the local pond.

In the pond, not bothered by the wind blowing patterns across the water, were Canada geese, some mallards, a couple of black ducks and what to my un-binoculared eyes looked like a male gadwall. These are all ducks of a type known as dabblers because they don't dive for food, merely put their heads under water or skim food off the surface. (Geese do that, too.) Usually I find a wood duck pair here but not on this day.

Besides dabblers there are the diving ducks that go under water to find their food. Common dabblers include ruddy ducks, buffleheads and three types of mergansers, among many others. For these, I need to go to bigger, deeper ponds.

Canada geese with a visiting pink-footed goose. (RE Berg-Andersson)

These ducks are short-distance migrants, finding New Jersey warm enough for them to winter in after a breeding season in the northern tundra. Various sparrows, finches, woodpeckers and jays are among the land birds I find in the trees and bushes on my walks while vultures and assorted hawks are aloft.

That's why for something a bit different, birders head to the ponds, inlets and sea coast to look for ducks, geese and other winter birds that arrive after the rails, egrets and most other shore birds have departed. (The exception is the great blue heron, which stays around all year and will frequently pop up from a close-by corner of a marsh and scare you with its size and gutteral "QUARK!" call.)

It was during the winter that a pink-footed goose was found in a small park pond not far from my accountant's office. It was also in winter someone found several northern lapwings, a plover usually found in Eurasia but visiting a farm in central NJ. (Luckily, they hung around for weeks so we could visit and not be overwhelmed by the large crowd of birders that came before us.) In recent years, several sandhill cranes have visited one of the few remaining Somerset County corn fields after the corn was harvested, searching for dropped kernels. These stately birds are always a treat to watch.

Brant geese (RE Berg-Andersson)

It was during our first-ever trip to Cape May, NJ, that MH and I found over a dozen types of ducks, most of them new at that point for us, including blue-wing teal, northern pintail and the more common black duck, mallard and gadwall we've come to know very well.

There were also American wigeons and green-wing teals. Over the years we've seen all three types of mergansers (common, redbreasted and hooded) and a vast assortment of sea ducks including three types of scoters (surf, black and white-winged), common eiders, long-tailed ducks, two types of loons (common and red-throated), cormorants (double-crested and great), harlequin ducks and the striking-looking canvasback.

One of my favorite winter ducks, the harlequin. (RE Berg-Andersson)

Meanwhile, Canada geese are everywhere there's water as well as on any golf course or office park with enough short grass to feed them. This time of year a search along sheltered coasts will bring smaller brant geese while larger marshes and fields will host snow geese, which are white with a pinkish bill.

Unless the waters freeze, these ducks and geese will be around New Jersey all winter. If a freeze comes, they head south for warmer places. Then we all hunker down and wait for spring to return.

Bearly There

On this last day of 2017 the air temperature is in the teens, some 20 degrees colder than the average for this time of year. When I wake at 6am it is dark and, because I have lowered the heat and it won't come on full until 7 am or so, it is cold. I am curled up under two quilts, a sheet, with one fleece blanket below me and a smaller one over me. MH snores by my side. I am not inclined to rise before 7am and so stay huddled up in a ball until forced to leave my warm bed.

Just like a bear.

(Director Mike Anderson took this picture in 2014 at New Jersey
Audubon's Scherman Hoffman sanctuary in Bernardsville)

Ever wonder why you feel more sluggish at this time of year or eat fewer cold salads in favor of mashed potatoes, squash or anything covered in thick gravy? It is our body telling us that, like the bear, it is time to fatten up before a harsh winter when there is less food to be had and less daylight to find it. When I had to rise at 6am to commute on the train I needed an alarm to jolt me awake. Not now. But even with daylight it is a struggle to leave my "den" for the outside world.

I put out the feeders. Many mornings it is my only reason for getting out of bed.

At this time of year the bears should be hibernating but this intense cold is only recent. It was relatively warm for November into early December and there was a 16-day bear hunt that lasted until Dec. 16, so I thought the bears might be on the move and would menace my feeders and feeder poles, as they have done at least four times that I know of (one of those times a bear nearly destroyed my pear tree as it tried to climb to the one small pear still on it). I have been taking the three feeders in every night. Now I don't have to although I know the deer may put their front hooves on a baffle and attempt to knock the seed feeders enough to drop seeds for them to eat. At least one baffle was destroyed that way.

And yet, the number of bear complaints is down. According to a Star-Ledger article quoting the NJ Department of Environmental Protection, as of Dec. 20, "the activity of 965 black bears has been reported to the DEP, a sharp drop from the 2116 of 2016, the department's bear activity report shows.

"In addition to 261 sightings where nothing happened, 695 bears caused 'damage or nuisance' in 2016, a more than 50 percent drop from the 1,394 problem bears last year.

"In 2016, 722 bear sightings resulted in the animals simply leaving the area without doing anything."

My only reason for rising most mornings
nowadays (Margo D. Beller)

It was in 2016 that the pear tree was damaged. It was in 2015, on a bright late September afternoon, that a bear ambled through my yard, snapped off an iron arm from a feeder pole, nearly destroyed my house feeder and then ambled off to the next street. I guess that is considered not doing anything.

Still, despite the "few" bear sightings and the lower number of bears killed 409 versus 2016's 636, during what might be the last hunt for a while (the incoming governor pledged to suspend the hunt, at least for now), the thought of even one bear foraging in my yard is enough.

No, better to brave the cold at night and in the morning.

The intense cold is as hard on me as the high heat and humidity of summer. Bears have a thick coat to withstand the cold while they hibernate. They have the right idea, which is why you'll find me huddled in my quilts and blankets and flannels on this winter's night.

It is expected to be 5 degrees when I put out the feeders on the first day of 2018. Happy new year. 

New Year's Observations

I.

New Year’s Day is the perfect time to walk not far from home into Central Park of Morris County, what used to be the Greystone property. There are no competitive events. There are no earthmovers working where there once were trees. Plus, it had been a while for me.

Did Sandy take down these trees or the county?

First thing I noticed, besides the wind suddenly hitting me in the face on Central Ave. because of the lack of trees, was a fence has been put around the terraced field that has been under construction for months, the kind of fence designed to keep a batted or kicked ball from rolling down the hill and into the road. So things are moving along. There is now curbing in spots, too.

I kept going west on Central Ave. and got better views of what’s behind the fence as I got closer to the old administration building. Quite a lot of ball fields are being fit into this area, and they will create quite a lot of noise and traffic when finally completed.

But on the other side of the street was something that surprised me - more cut-down trees. What could this be? Perhaps this is the county’s dumping ground for many of the trees blown over by Sandy. So many trees lost, they had to go somewhere.

I’d rather that was the reason for the destruction than plans for an auxiliary parking lot.

I also noticed Sandy had blown out several of the upper windows in the administration building. This is sad to see. Those open windows will let in more of the elements - such as birds looking to get out of the cold - and will hasten the decay and destruction of this huge stone hulk. It is on state land, but the state has proved by its inaction that it has other things on its mind besides the building’s preservation.

More blown out windows, more decay for the old Greystone
administration building.

II.

I have no doubt that as I was spending New Year’s Day walking on Central Ave. many birders were racing around tallying their “first of year” birds. Yet another list that means nothing in the general scheme of the world but means a lot when you are a birder and want to announce something - anything - to other birders via the various lists.

FOY cardinal. Whoo-hoo!

I was not expecting a lot of bird activity at Greystone. Cutting down trees isn’t the best way of drawing birds and in winter there‘s not a lot to feed them. Yet, some birds were around.

The huge population of turkey and black vultures were roosting in a copse of trees or flying to these trees as I walked. Vultures will fly in the wind - a bird’s got to eat - but they don’t usually do a lot on a cold, cloudy day since they have to work harder to stay aloft in the absence of warm air currents from the ground.

As I've written before, there is something majestic about a flock of 70 or so of these large, dark birds (with their bare, ugly heads) in several trees - unless it’s your trees. Then it becomes a big mess.

A few years ago I was driving back at dusk from hiking not far from home, in Morris Township. I was stopped at a red light. Ahead of me it seemed a lot of turkey vultures were flying in low. I crossed the intersection and stopped across from a house and was startled to count at least 75 turkey vultures in the backyard spruces. Weeks later I brought my husband to the same area at dusk and there they were - if not more of them.

Late last year I was in the same area and stopped at the house, curious. All the spruces had been cut down. That’s one way of dealing with vulture overpopulation.

Some of Greystone's vulture population, Jan. 1, 2013

As I watch on Central Ave., most people walk or ride under the vulture-laden trees and ignore what’s above them.

The county is also leaving the Greystone population alone, at least for now. Despite the mess they leave on the roofs of the few standing structures the birds have plenty of space (again, for now). Also, they don’t attack living things. They have a useful function most of us would consider pretty disgusting: They are nature’s sanitation crew. Dead deer, bear or fox in the road and you can‘t get a human crew out to dispose of it? No problem.

They are lucky enough to be among the few birds in an increasingly overdeveloped area that not only have a continuous source of road kill but have found enough habitat - in this case Greystone - to support them.

III.

Death was not far from my mind the last week of 2012. First, we found out about the death of an old friend from whom we’d been estranged for five years. He took to the grave whatever it was that had so upset him he refused to speak to us.

Then my husband and I came down with flu. Was the deep, continual coughing the worst or the onset of fever chills? Hard to say, but there comes a time when you start wishing the whole thing was OVER.

But we survived.

The last day of 2012 was the first time I was able to take a morning walk and, coming after the first significant snow we’d had in over a year, the walk gave me much to think about.

I don’t know where I’ve seen more of man’s inhumanity to man - the 13 months I spent driving Interstate 80 to and from work every morning and evening, or the previous 18 years spent walking the streets of my little town to and from the commuter train.

In the car I faced death from drivers who are distracted by the phone, the need for speed, an argument with a passenger, a GPS that says TAKE THIS EXIT (so the driver must then cut across three lanes of traffic).

They cut me off when they don‘t signal a lane change, wouldn’t let me in when I was trying to enter the highway, or used a lane that’s about to end to pass me on the right in order to cut ahead. They think everyone on the road is out to get them and they are the only sane driver present. They believe the commercials for their ultimate driving machines.

But while walking in rain, wind, ice and snow I faced people who got every last bit of snow from their driveways but barely touched their sidewalks. People who used snowblowers on the sidewalks but couldn’t be bothered to do a point where I could step into the street (forcing me over slippery hills of piled-up snow).

I would be walking home in the dark, lit flashlight in hand, past a huge pile of leaves the homeowner had put in the street, with a car going much faster than the 25-mile-per-hour speed limit giving me the barest of clearances as he or she rushed by. Sometimes the car would be coming at me as I was in the middle of what became a one-lane street because of huge leaf piles on both sides.

And in summer were the people who set their sprinklers so high (and ran them so long during the day) the sidewalks would get as wet as their lawns, forcing me into the street. Once, in the middle of a downpour, I got a shot of water in my face UNDER my umbrella from one of these sprinklers. Not pleasant.

Again, I lived. Now, the dark street I no longer have to walk every night has a sidewalk on one side, put in last year. It has been a blessing. If only I had had this luxury when I was walking home in the dark all those autumns!

But on the last day of 2012 I was destined to be disappointed by some of my neighbors yet again. You’d think I’d have learned. While many took their responsibilities seriously, a few homeowners either didn’t bother to clear their new sidewalk of snow or had taken one pass with a small shovel to do the bare minimum. Either way, the result was a slippery mess.

In the Brooklyn of my youth the police would fine you for not clearing the sidewalk, so people did it. But that was Brooklyn, part of nitty-gritty New York City. Out here fining someone for being selfish, lazy or stupid is just not done.