Loon Breakfast + Harlequins, etc.

[Common Loon with Rock Crab this morning at Avalon. Click to enlarge photos.]

I spent about an hour on the 8th Street Jetty in Avalon this morning before work, mainly watching foraging loons. Common Loons eat a lot of crabs in winter - the one pictured brought three to the surface in the course of about 20 minutes, which leads one to speculate, just how many crabs are there under the waves? A dozen plus Common Loons and 3 Red-throated Loons were in view from the jetty. Let's just hypothesize that a modest average of 10 loons hang out at the mouth of Townsend's Inlet every day from November through March, and each eats a modest 5 crabs a day. That's 7500 crabs! Then what about all the Red-throated Loons, scoters, eiders, harbor seals and other crab-eaters?

Speaking of eiders, this was the first time this year I found no Common Eiders at Avalon, though I didn't bring a scope so they could have been hidden far offshore. Three male Harlequins were present, 2 adults and one immature - which, since there had been at least two immature males and one female, means at least 5 total have visited Avalon this winter. 13 Harlequins were counted by the Seawatch last fall. The scoter and Long-tailed Duck flock is diminished - I saw maybe 100 scoters and 50 Long-taileds.

[Many Common Loons are now molting into breeding plumage, note the heavily spotted scapulars.]

[Part of the sea duck flock at Avalon this morning - Harlequin, Surf Scoters, Black Scoters, and Long-tailed Ducks.]

Results from this morning's CMBO Birding Cape May Point walk are up on Field Trip Reports. Eurasian Wigeon was found, but what I find more interesting is that Karl et. al. indicated that the Osprey at the end of the walk was a year bird for most people. The leaders are all active birders - but seldom leave Cape Island! Ospreys have been "in" for a while now, but normally arrive first on the Delaware Bayshore.

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