Eagles and Ducks at Long Pond and Beyond

Please join naturalist Mark Faherty for an "Eagles and Ducks at Long Pond and Beyond" birding adventure. Mid-winter is a great time to see both bald eagles and a variety of wintering ducks, especially when ponds freeze, which concentrates both ducks and hungry eagles at open water patches. We'll start searching for birds at the Cape's largest pond and caravan to other viewing sites and nearby ponds depending on recent reports of flock locations. With some luck we’ll learn to tell the greater from the lesser scaup, count big flocks of common mergansers, and look for the rare tufted duck from Europe. This walk may cover 1-2 miles on the bike path depending on flock locations. Please bring binoculars, cameras, and spotting scopes if you have them.

Dates:

Saturday, February 3rd (9-11 a.m.)

Saturday, February 10th (9-11 a.m.)

Cost: $20 per person.

Space is limited. 

Driving directions included in confirmation email.

Photos by Sue Swartzlander (buffleheads and bald eagle) and Gus Romano (lesser scaup and common merganser).

Mark Faherty has been the Science Coordinator at Mass Audubon’s Wellfleet Bay Wildlife Sanctuary since August 2007 and has led birding trips for Mass Audubon since 2002. While his current projects involve everything from oysters and horseshoe crabs to bats and butterflies, he has studied primarily bird ecology for the last 20 years, working on research projects in Kenya, Florida, Texas, California, Arizona, Mexico, and the Pacific Northwest. He was a counter for the famous River of Raptors hawk watch in Veracruz, Mexico, and has birded extensively in Peru, Kenya, Panama, Belize, and both Eastern and Western Europe. Mark is an emcee and trip leader for multiple birding festivals and leads workshops on birding by ear, eBird, birding apps, and general bird identification. He is past president of the Cape Cod Bird Club and current member of the Massachusetts Avian Records Committee. Weekly Bird Report, Mark’s weekly essay on Cape and Islands bird life, airs each Wednesday on WCAI, the Cape and Islands NPR station. He also co-hosts Bird News, a monthly call-in show all about birds, on WCAI's The Point with Mindy Todd.