White Ibis

Yes, I had far better things to do, but I spent a fair amount of time this spring and summer wondering just what this latest stint in New Jersey might add to my anemic state list. I’ve missed many of the regular rarities over the years (Fork-tailed Flycatcher, White-faced Storm-Petrel), and of course there are the truly outlandish wonders (Large-billed Tern, anyone?).

And then there are those birds that were scarce, astonishing even, during our earlier stays in the state–and that have meanwhile become scarce and not in the least astonishing. I’d actually predicted Black-bellied Whistling-Duck as my first novum, but I see no reason to complain about this juvenile White Ibis, discovered Monday by Larry and still present and obliging this morning in Bergen County.

Finding the bird was no problem, but finding the site was. The ibis has been hanging out on one of New Jersey’s dozen or so “Silver Lakes,” at the end of Mill Road. I actually tried for it on Tuesday, but ended up birding a different Mill Road on a different lake in Bergen County–less than a mile south of the slightly bronze-colored Silver Lake. Pleasant enough, but no threskiornithids in sight; it worked out much better for me today, at the correct lake. There’s a lesson in that.