Shore Birds
The Fast Food Gull
Also exploring the shore line at Sunken Meadow State Park Beach on New York’s Long Island were hundreds of ring-billed gulls. Mature ring-billed gulls have gray wings with black wing tips with spots of white, a white body and a distinctive black ring around the tip of its yellow bill. Some gulls were scavenging the […]
Wave Dodgers
Walk along any Atlantic Coast beach and you are likely to see Sanderlings – small grayish birds with white bellies and short black legs running back and forth in the surf zone. Sanderlings sprint behind receding waves to probe for and pluck worms, small crabs and invertebrates from the wet sand. When the next wave […]
Bounty on the Beach!
Sitting on the shore in Cocoa Beach Florida, my senses take in the sights and sounds of the Atlantic Coast. Today strong northeast winds cause an angry sea. Waves crash on the sandy beach drowning out the sounds of children playing on the beach. The wave outflow forms a swash of water that carries […]
No Stone Left Unturned
Walking along the shore of Cocoa Beach, I see a bird foraging in the wake of the waves washing up on the sandy beach. It is the beautiful ruddy turnstone. In the shallow wake water it flips shells, small pebbles and natural debris to find mollusks, worms and other invertebrates. Although you can find this […]
The Skimming Black Skimmer
Black skimmers are common on many Florida beaches. When this bird forages, it flies near the ocean’s surface with its longer knife-like lower mandible slicing the water to snatch small fish to eat. When its lower bill comes into contact with a fish, the upper bill snaps down seizing it. Sounds like a good science […]
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