Ben Copeland was kind enough to send photographs of the Terek Sandpiper taken
9 August at Craney; these images were taken by Michael Lowry, indeed from out
of state, but Ben was taking the Mike and the rest of his group around the
facility that day (they were birding together, rather than separately, as I had
suggested earlier). I believe David and Linda Hughes looked for the bird
later that day, but it was not in the same location if still present. The
Williamsburg group that birded Craney yesterday noted that there were thousands
of
distant shorebirds present at Craney and that a scope would be necessary to
study them carefully. (Tereks often race around and lean forward when
feeding,
recalling a Wilson's Phalarope, so the behavior may be helpful in finding the
bird if it is still there.) Early morning is best at Craney, before the
heat waves off the mudflats make scope-birding very difficult.
I neglected to post an odd bird I saw on 13 August, about 7:10 p.m., a House
Crow (Corvus splendens) being mobbed by American Crows on Terminal Boulevard,
about 2 miles east of Hampton Boulevard. This species frequently hitches
rides on large ships (and has colonized many port cities well outside its range
in that way), and this bird's location is within just a few miles of one of the
world's largest naval bases and largest commercial shipping ports. In the
event there are more than one of these crows involved, Norfolk could get a new
breeding species, but I saw just the one. I think this species has been
recorded in or near Charleston, SC as well (and probably in Florida, which has
records of hundreds of exotic species).
Ned Brinkley
Cape Charles, VA
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