Jekyll Island is a wonderful place for birding even if it was not yet spring migration. The maritime forest, dunes, ponds, mudflats, ocean beaches, marshes, and forests of live oak, long leaf pine, palm and palmetto on this part of the Atlantic flyway give so much if you know where to look. Most birders know that often to find the best habitats, you have to leave the beaten path and journey to the less visited areas where tourists rarely tread. Such was a place off of Stable Road near the fire station: The Amphitheater.
This long abandoned entertainment center rusts and decays near a large pod with a golf course on the other side. Along the far shore of the pond we observed Roseate Spoonbill, Anhinga, Hooded Merganser, Great Blue Heron, Green Heron, and Yellow-crowned Night Heron.
Another place we found, near the famous Driftwood Beach, but a short ways down the road to a small parking lot across from a beach bound bike path, was s an open place in a marsh with a metal culvert emerging from under the road. There a very attentive Snowy Egret fished. We we were thrilled to see it catch some breakfast.
Across the marsh, seemingly oblivious to the bounty just captured by the snowy, a great Blue Heron preened in the early morning sun.
A Great Egret was doing the same.
Driftwood Beach at sunrise was eerie and beautiful.
We saw a trio of Black Skimmers zipping along parallel to the dark shore, beaks inches from the waters surface.
Later after a bike ride around the northern, more woodsy tip of the island, we took a break at the Wharf where Willet probed the mudflats.
Every where we looked on this wonderful island, birds let us know that this was indeed a great place to be!
No comments:
Post a Comment