2007 World Series of Birding team report

Our team was able to track down 156 species of birds and raise over $2,100 for the New Jersey Audubon Society Conservation Fund and over $500 for the Lehigh Gap Nature Center.

Here is a quick summary of how our day went:

Three of our team members started their trek up north from Cape May at around 5:00pm on Friday May 11th. They came up to the Atlantic City area where Art and I joined them. We loaded up my SUV and left my house at around 8:00pm heading towards the Great Swamp. A couple of close calls (wrong turns etc.) did not stop us from getting to the Swamp in time for some last minute scouting.

We started driving around the swamp at around 10:30pm. Some areas were easily accessible while other were much more challenging. The 4-wheel drive got us out of some 'interesting' situations a couple of times (they don't call it the Great Swamp for nothing!!). At around 11:40pm we heard a Sora calling. We decided to stay and wait for it to call again which it did right after midnight.

The team in action at around 2:00am

Our first bird of the WSB was in the bag and we were very happy to say the least. Soon there after we heard Mash Wrens calling (this was the most common sound in the Swamp as we must have heard 2-3 dozens of them in the 2 hours that we were there). Next we heard Virginia Rail and then a Woodcock soon there after.

We left the Great Swamp by 2:30am and headed to the "Vesper Hill" on Sally Harden Road. We arrived there at around 4:00am and stayed 'till around 5:00am. This location was kind of disappointing for us as we did not get a Vesper's Sparrow. We did get to hear a few Grasshopper Sparrows and a few other more common birds (American Robin, Killdeer etc.).

In transit

Our next stop was the High Point State Park, all the way up north. It is the Highest elevation in the state of NJ at 1806 feet. We were there early enough and seemed to be in the same places the top teams were. We missed out on Common Raven and Winter Wren among other things but we did get to see Bay-breasted, Cerulean, Chestnut-sided, Golden-winged and Blue-winged Warblers, both Water thrushes as well as Pileated Woodpecker, Broad-winged and Red-shouldered Hawks and a Bald Eagle.

Around NJ in 30 hours

By the time we left North Jersey we were closing in on 100 but we knew that it would be very difficult to reach our goal of 175.

We decided to skip a couple of spot in Central Jersey and head all the way down to Woodstown. The drive was long and very tiring. We finally got out of the car and started looking for birds again in the farms around Featherbed Lane at 2:30pm. We found some nice birds such as a flock of Snow Geese (they should be up in Northern Canada by now), Eastern Meadowlarks and Bobolinks.

Next stop was further south past Bridgeton and near Bear Swamp where we got a Summer Tanager and an Eastern Bluebird.

Time to shift our emphasis to shore birds and Heislerville had a good number of them including a Curlew Sandpiper along with the more common Black-bellied and Semipalmated Plovers, Dunlin, Short-billed Dowitchers as well as Ruddy Ducks and Red-breasted Merganser. The Wood Duck decoy was a keeper until someone in the team pointed out that we could not count it because it was made out of plastic...

10:30pm....Are we done yet?

A quick stop at Goshen helped us get a Ruby-throated Hummingbird and a Carolina Chickadee...

It was just around 6:00pm when we arrived at Hereford Inlet/Nummy's Island so time was running out. We got some good birds there such as a Common Loon, a Long-tailed Duck, American Oystercatchers and Whimbrels.

Next stop was Cape May Point where we stayed until after sunset. We were able to get Red-throated Loon, Parasitic Jaeger, Piping Plover and Least Tern.

We decided to drive to Jake's Landing in hopes of hearing the calls of Black Rails, Whip-poor-will and Chuck-wills-widow. None of them materialized so we headed back to the finish line knowing that we were DONE in more ways than one!! We handed in our score sheet at 11:15pm, had our team picture taken by the National Geographic folks and after eating a quick meal we were finally going home!

The team at the finish line

The drive from Cape May to EHT was not fun at all. I was up for close to 40 hrs straight (minus two 15 minute naps) and my brain was playing games with me. At one point I slowed down to 10mph in the middle of the Parkway because I thought that the signs on the side of the road were cars coming towards me.... Luckily there was no traffic at that time of the night and I somehow managed to get home.

It was a great experience and I am thankful to the guys on my team as well as those of you that helped us raise money for NJAS and the Lehigh Gap Nature Center. I hope I can do it again next year!!