Spring Break, Part 2: Location, location, location.

     A lot of birding relies on being in the right place at the right time; some birds are numerous and widespread, but others require almost as much luck as skill to find.
     Just to clarify things, the first time I saw a White-Winged Scoter (Melanitta deglandi), It was most certainly not luck. Someone else got lucky first and discovered it hiding amongst the mallards at the First and Windsor pond, and emailed the rest of the local birding community about it. I then had to go out in the pouring rain at 6:00 in the morning (due to track and the play, I had no other time to go) to trudge through the mud and see just enough to identify it from really far away before heading to school. That wasn't luck; that was insanity. Below are the photos of the conditions and the bird.

Photo by the Author.

Photo by the Author.

     Now, back to Spring Break.
     After landing in Boston, my family collected up our bags and got a rental car. It's always a bit of a lottery when obtaining a vehicle in a far-off place, since the online registration says you will get a "Halfway Decent Car X, or Similar," which usually means you get the Not-Even-Halfway Decent Car Y, which is supposedly "Similar" to what you wanted. Such was the case this time: the vehicle we were assigned was a Dodge Avenger. Not to make any commercial judgements here, but I kind of have this thing against American cars with small windows, lousy gas mileage, and uncomfortable back seats. Luckily, the rental facility had a new deal where you could switch to any other car on the lot (of "Similar" size) for free. My dad, knowing that I was the obsessive Consumer Reports reader in the family, let me pick the car. I found a nice Hyundai Elantra and we took that instead.
     We soon found ourselves on the incredibly confusing road system of Boston as we tried to make our way to Revere Beach, a local birding spot. I must say, Driver's Ed really didn't prepare me for the real world, considering the fact that I learned a dozen new types of road layout I had never even heard of before (T-Intersection Jughandle? What?). There are also a ton of large roundabouts (they call them "rotaries") out there. Not to mention 1-way streets that dead-end into each other. And train tracks cutting the beach off from the rest of the world. And nothing going in straight lines. And... yeah. We eventually got to Revere Beach, and I quickly hopped out with my spotting scope to check out the huge flotilla of dark diving ducks that were fairly close to the shore.

Photo by the Author.

Photo by the Author. SO MANY SCOTERS! (and there are even more out of the frame)

Photo by the Author. Close up, brought to you by the spotting scope.

     You gotta be kidding me.
     Only two weeks earlier I had trudged out in the rain to see that White-Winged Scoter in Illinois. In Boston, all I had to do was go to a local beach on a sunny day and I could find upwards of 500 of them offering perfect views. Not that I wasn't happy to see them, of course...
     This actually isn't too weird of a phenomenon. Though I highly discourage identifying birds solely on where they are, there is no problem with going to where a bird is most likely to be. Illinois does not have good habitat for scoters and other sea ducks, so it's expected that there will be more of them out on the East Coast. Finding the right location and habitat was what allowed me to find another duck species that you will hear plenty of later...
     But up next, we have an adventure involving birds, maple syrup, and extended family.