Nature

[Rommie]

I've never seen urban turkeys until I moved to the Boston area, but they're everywhere. Had to drive around 3 in the middle of the road just this morning! Not sure why they thrive so well here and not elsewhere.

[lady_*nix]

They're bastards and Bostonians are bastards, so we kind of get along.

[Rommie]

This was wild- went for a short walk yesterday in a rather old, historic landscaped cemetery in Cambridge famous in the region for being a hotspot for birds during the spring migration. Saw some nice birds, but what stole the show as a mother-flippin' OTTER! There's a little pond a bit more sheltered, and saw something brown dive from a distance so I assumed it was a duck of some sort that didn't resurface, and walked that way. Look by a bush and am surprised to see his li'l otter head pop up, full mustache and all, even snapped a crappy iPhone pic before he dove under again (after which I didn't see him again).

Rather amazing because I suppose he must have come up the Charles River quite a ways to end up in the area. I certainly never heard of one in the city before! Also, amazed that I saw one here for the first time ever after hanging out by lakes so much in New Hampshire- plenty of mink and muskrats up there, but never an otter.

Also, husband is kinda regretting not coming for the walk this time.

[SciFiFisher]

Rommie, seeing an otter is awesome. I can't top that. I am still sort of amazed at the amount of wild life I see here considering it is a freaking suburb with lots of people, traffic, stores, and etc. Yes, the housing area I am in is close to areas that are not developed. There is a fairish amount of swampy area in and around the housing area. My backyard is still pretty squishy from the rains. But still... We have a fair amount of birds, including the murder snake headed Canadians. We also have squirrels, rabbits, deer, and we saw a chipmunk the other day. TBH since the snow melted off the deer have not come back to snack on my arborvitae trees.

[Rommie]

That's good. Our thing is bunnies. We already have several and Lordy, there's gonna be a million later this summer from what I hear about bunnies...

Got five "lifer" birds this week all told, which is definitely the best I've done in awhile- winter wren, warbling vireo, orchard oriole, blackburnian warbler, Wilson's warbler. There is a neat app feature now in Merlin Bird ID whereby if you record on your phone, it will automatically ID bird calls for you, which is SUPER handy to confirm there's a new bird about! Only trouble is I decided that I need to see the bird if I'm using it (apparently if you're a serious birder, IDing the sound counts on its own but I don't trust the tech 100%), so I must've heard 10 warbling vireos before I finally saw this one. But it net works out because the Wilson's warbler for example was hiding deep in a thicket with a ton of other birds calling around, and I highly doubt I would have gone through the trouble of finding it had I not known he was unique.

Did not see the otter since but when my husband went back with me and his new digital camera we DID see a raccoon washing food in broad daylight, so as long as he had a North American mammal to photograph it all worked out.

[Thumper]

Awesome about the life birds. I've only seen the warblers I believe. As for "birdzam" I've been waiting for that for years!
I'll have to check it out. Many serious birders accept definite bird call ID as "seeing" the bird. Others don't. My friend is on the fence. Obviously, we all want to see the bird and get good pics of it. But the audio confirmation would be nice to know what birds are hiding in the woods even if you haven't seen them yet. BTW, said friend ID's 20 warblers and a total of 94 species last Sunday alone on a trip up to Lake Erie. He's a beast. After he told me that, I can't even call myself a casual birder. He's on track to ID 1000 birds this year...

[SciFiFisher]

Awesome about the life birds. I've only seen the warblers I believe. As for "birdzam" I've been waiting for that for years!
I'll have to check it out. Many serious birders accept definite bird call ID as "seeing" the bird. Others don't. My friend is on the fence. Obviously, we all want to see the bird and get good pics of it. But the audio confirmation would be nice to know what birds are hiding in the woods even if you haven't seen them yet. BTW, said friend ID's 20 warblers and a total of 94 species last Sunday alone on a trip up to Lake Erie. He's a beast. After he told me that, I can't even call myself a casual birder. He's on track to ID 1000 birds this year...

Holy Crap! Does he sleep?

[Rommie]

I mean, they saw how many hundreds in Ecuador so that sure helps! All of North America only has something like a thousand birds, so they sure weren't all from Lake Erie.

According to my eBird account (totally a thing) I have seen 42 different bird species this month, so I'm certainly not at risk of getting as serious as your friend at that pace.

[Thumper]

I mean, they saw how many hundreds in Ecuador so that sure helps! All of North America only has something like a thousand birds, so they sure weren't all from Lake Erie.
According to my eBird account (totally a thing) I have seen 42 different bird species this month, so I'm certainly not at risk of getting as serious as your friend at that pace.

Absolutely right. I didn't have an eBird account so Mrs. T signed us up. Now Pete can share his lists. It's the only way I'd be able to tell you a tenth of the birds I saw in Ecuador. But I'm with you, I'm certainly not at risk of of getting that serious or catching up to him in any way...