Memorial Day Weekend 5/26/07

The Saturday of Memorial Day weekend Colleen and I drove to the Delaware Bay shore to try to photograph Red Knots and other shorebirds along Port Mahon Road. We arrived around 2pm and were fortunate that the tide was high pushing most of the birds close to the road. Semipalmated Sandpipers and Ruddy Turnstones were the most numerous shorebirds. Red Knots, Sanderlings, and Willets were also present. Shorebird migration along Port Mahon Road is an awesome spectacle. There were thousands of birds present and they were not a hundred yards away on a mudflat, they were within twenty feet of the car! Shorebirds congregate along the Delaware Bay during Spring migration to feed on horseshoe crab eggs. It is a massive staging area where the birds gorge on the eggs to prepare themselves for their next push north. This staging ground is one of the best places to observe Red Knots. Red Knots migrate up from Argentina in the Spring and breed in the far north. Unforunately the Red Knot population has plummeted and they have become very threatened. One of the main reasons for their population crash is the over harvesting of Horseshoe Crabs. Thanks to enviromental groups like The American Bird Conservancy both Delaware and New Jersey have passed moratoriums on the harvesting of the crabs. Hopefully the Red Knot population will increase. After Port Mahon we traveled up to Bombay Hook and I ticked Black-bellied Plover off my photo needed list. Bad lighting and extensive mudflats made photography difficult so we headed back home making one more stop along the Tuckahoe River in Talbot County, Maryland where I added Eastern Forktail.