Cocoa, Christmas Bird Count, 12/17/2011
Blue-headed Vireo Yesterday I did a Christmas Bird Count in the Canaveral Groves area near Cocoa Beach. I arrived in Cocoa at 5:30am with about 30 other people, and 4 of us went to the Canaveral Groves area to count as many birds as we can see between about 6:40am to 5:45pm--that is, about as long as there was daylight to see birds. We traveled about 37 miles throughout our area and had a wonderful time. There were literally thousands of ducks and gulls along the Indian River. Among the ducks we saw approximately 6200 Lesser Scaup and a smattering of Mallards and Mottled Ducks. There were many in terms of sheer numbers, but not a lot of variety of species that we could see. A highlight for me, though, was seeing 4 Red-breasted Mergansers and 7 Horned Grebe. Yellow-throated Warbler We also had a lot of fun with perching birds. We saw large numbers of Yellow-rumped Warblers and Palm Warblers, but we also saw a few Pine Warblers and Yell...