Birding Cape May Point - Saturday, August 13th, 2016

The highlight of this morning's bird walk wasn't a bird at all. It was the black rat snake with a mouthful of muskrat, as seen in the photo below. Rat snakes kill by constriction and this one eventually dragged his prey further into the grasses to continue his food prep. Some bird highlights included a very cooperative male Blue Grosbeak, a Pectoral Sandpiper feeding with some Least Sandpipers and Stilt Sandpipers. Leaders: Kathy Horn, Roger Horn, Karl Lukens, and Kyle Chelius.
49 species

Canada Goose  25
Mute Swan  45
Mallard  42
Great Blue Heron  3
Great Egret  10
Glossy Ibis  1
Black Vulture  1
Turkey Vulture  1
Osprey  3
American Oystercatcher  3
Semipalmated Plover  4
Killdeer  4
Stilt Sandpiper  2
Sanderling  2
Least Sandpiper  9
Pectoral Sandpiper  1
Semipalmated Sandpiper  18
Short-billed Dowitcher  22
Spotted Sandpiper  2
Lesser Yellowlegs  5
Laughing Gull  130
Great Black-backed Gull  15
Least Tern  48
Common Tern  22
Forster's Tern  25
Royal Tern  1
Mourning Dove  9
Red-bellied Woodpecker  1
Downy Woodpecker  2
Eastern Kingbird  1
Blue Jay  1
American Crow  1
Purple Martin  15
Tree Swallow  15
Barn Swallow  4
Carolina Chickadee  5
Tufted Titmouse  2
Carolina Wren  7
American Robin  3
Gray Catbird  1
Northern Mockingbird  1
European Starling  43
Cedar Waxwing  2
Common Yellowthroat  2
Song Sparrow  1
Northern Cardinal  4
Blue Grosbeak  1
Red-winged Blackbird  8
American Goldfinch  3

This report was generated automatically by eBird v3 (http://ebird.org)

Stilt Sandpipers [Photo by Roger Horn]

Black Rat Snake devouring a Muskrat [Photo by Roger Horn]