Damon's Birds for the Week of June 2 - June 8

Holy crap, I will not even compare my week to Paul's. It is summertime here (not quite summer yet, but summertime at least) and the migrations have already passed through, so except for a few rare straggler birds everything is pretty much boring here in terms of new birds. So basically I have three activities I can do:

1) Try to soak up the last few birds that I should have gotten already.
2) Go to new locales to find birds that are not in the Delaware Valley.
3) Go chasing after rare birds as they pop up on eBird.

Ok, I tried #3 earlier this week. Yeah. Paul is doing #2 now and dropped an insurmountable lead on me unless I actually get to travel this year. But his trips are only a few and only every now and then, so it isn't like he is actively using that strategy for new birds. So this week I got to just look around my normal haunts for birds that are here but I just haven't seen yet. And, hey, I got three! If I get three birds a week around my  normal haunts this summertime I will be happy.

But, since I probably am not going to Florida and California and Texas and Arizona and Alaska this year, I will have to do a combination of 1 and 3. So, yeah, that Common Loon that keeps popping up on a reservoir in Delaware? Yeah, I guess I'll have to go track it down. Maybe I'll try to get into that locked quarry in my county to see the nesting (!) Common Ravens. Oh, and I'll definitely make my way down to the Cape May Bird Observatory a few times this summer (probably a few times a month).

I also saw this guy hiding under my car at Heinz Wildlife Refuge. Hey, when all you have for pictures is your phone, this is the type of photos you get.

150; Spotted Sandpiper; 6/5/13; DuPont Environmental Education Center; Wilmington, DE
151; Sharp-shinned Hawk; 6/8/13; John Heinz National Wildlife Refuge; Philadelphia, PA
152; Willow Flycatcher; 6/8/13; John Heinz National Wildlife Refuge; Philadelphia, PA