Wednesday 12/1: Tried to grab a couple month birds immediately with no luck. Res was quiet. Nothing but cowbirds at Nine Acre, no birds at all at School St. A few ducks at Flint’s and a few more at Hardy but nothing of any real interest.
Thursday 12/2: Tried to squeeze a Newton bird or two at Forte Park but no luck. Wood Ducks and lots of Hoodies at Cookson but not much for passerines.
Friday 12/3: Did another pond loop as it was too windy for much else, nothing particularly of note. Suspect the WF Geese were on the river but no good spot to scan.
Saturday 12/4: More Newton work for no gain. Grackles and a Winter Wren at Cold Spring were the best there. City Hall was birdy but other than waxwings nothing of interest. Bullough’s Pond and Crystal Lake didn’t have much. Chestnut Hill Reservoir had the Redhead plus both scaup, a Hairy Woodpecker, and a few other things. Hammond Pond had 4 Wood Ducks and the continuing Lesser Scaup.
Sunday 12/5: Did the Earhart area hoping for some of the late warblers with pretty good success. Draw Seven was pretty dead beyond a Peregrine zooming through as I was leaving. Ton of sparrows as I got out of the car at Sylvester Baxter including 20+ White-throats and 4+ Swamp. Pine Warbler was vocal and posing but chat wasn’t obvious, so I ducked under the bridge to check Shore Dr. Found the other Pine Warbler at the end but no Orange-crowned. Back at Sylvester Baxter I heard I had just missed the chat but got a kinglet. Took a good 30-40 minutes before the chat came back out, with a few good poses and lots of hiding.
Next tried Station Landing which was quiet, lot of the brush along the train tracks was removed. Over to Earhart. Started with the casino. Ended up walking all the way to near Broadway and back. Oriole popped up in the middle, clearly a Baltimore somewhat unfortunately. Heading back, a Chipping Sparrow called and then posed by Costco and a Yellow-rump was right at the dam (along with a Hermit Thrush). Debated skipping Gateway but decided to make a quick run over. Lots of White-throats were moving around at the far side and while scanning those a Black-and-white popped up! Warbler #12 for MA in December! Also a couple Carolina Wrens turned out to be new for me here.
Monday 12/6: Another pond loop given the weather. Nothing new at Hardy, the res, or Flint’s (more mergansers there). Saw a bunch of geese on Farrar so parked and walked back but nothing good with them. Nothing at Nine Acre.
Tuesday 12/7: Fox Sparrow, 8 Red-wings, Sharpie, Yellow-rump at Dunback.