Eileen Schwinn came over this morning and suggested a visit to Hunter's Garden which I immediately accepted (along with Maple Swamp, this is the best warbler site around here in the month of May). About half way there, we got a call from Byron Young about a Wilson's Plover at Cupsogue which inspired an immediate change of plan. This southern plover is a rarity on these shores; I had seen it out here only once before on Pike's Beach in the late '90s. This time we climbed down the dunes near Moriches Inlet to scan the flats opposite as exposed by the morning's low tide. No plover. We also checked the overlook on the bay at Pike's Beach with an equal lack of plover success. What we did find was a lot of Firsts of the Year: Common, Forster's and a few Least Terns in noisy flocks, many shore birds including a few Short-billed Dowitchers, Ruddy Turnstones, many Sanderling, Dunlin and Black-bellied Plovers, yellowlegs, both loons, Boat-tailed Grackle, etc.
After satisfying ourselves that the missing plover really was missing, we decided to go back to Plan A and head for Hunter's Garden. Eileen had negotiated permission from the DEC to drive into the area -- now a reserve -- and she even had the code for unlocking the gate which now bars the dirt road in from casual traffic. Or thought she did. Alas, try as she might, the code that she was given would not unlock the gate and we finally had to give up. As a consolation prize, we drove up the old farm road that borders the nearby Bicycle Path. The most notable feature of this stretch was the presence of four species of sparrows: Field and Song Sparrows singing somewhere inside the vegetation on the right and Chipping and Savannah Sparrows on the edge of the road by the farmland. The biggest surprise was a Cooper's Hawk (probably a migrant) soaring overhead and being harassed by the locals including, according to Eileen (I didn't see it), a Ruby-throated Hummingbird.
Eric Salzman
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