The Hunt for Red Knot

For the second time in three years, I journeyed to the Delaware Bay beaches of New Jersey in search of the red knot, a long-distance voyager from South America. In 2019 I spent a day scouring Cape May County and while I had a great day of birding, I was unsuccessful. I decided to try again in a year, spending a few weekdays on vacation there to have 24 hour access to the beaches while avoiding the weekend crowds. That trip was cancelled because of Covid, although I'm sure the shorebird migration was unaffected. This year I was able to make the trip, giving myself a Sunday, Monday, and part of Tuesday to find the elusive little sandpiper.

Red knot (USFWS)

Sunday, May 23rd was one of the warmest days of the year so far. I wasn't in a rush to get anywhere so I wasn't on the road at the crack of dawn, but I didn't want to waste any daylight. Leaving by 7:30 was a good compromise. I made great time getting to the beaches in the area of Villas, NJ. Two years ago my first stop was Kimbles Beach, a part of Cape May National Wildlife Refuge. I decided to stop there first again. There were laughing gulls and "peeps", a generic term for the little sandpipers that all look alike to me. They weren't present in as great a number as 2019, and it could be because this year's trip was a little later in the migration than before.

Peeps and gulls feeding at Kimbles Beach

The tide was on its way out, and there were quite a few horseshoe crabs on the beach, and pearly green eggs in the wrack line. Some were making their way back into the bay, while others were burying themselves in the sand. Still more were dead, becoming meals for the birds and other critters. I scanned up and down the beach, but no red knots. There was a volunteer naturalist on duty, and she told me to check back later in the day when the tide is coming back in, about four in the afternoon.

Horseshoe crab eggs

It was late morning, so I had quite a bit of time to kill until then. My next stop was Higbee's Beach, where I saw my first American oystercatcher two years earlier. This time there were more people than birds on the beach so I didn't spend much time there. The highlight of this beach was a whelk egg case that had washed ashore.

Whelk egg case

The clock was still slowly ticking away until the tide returned, so I went to Fire Control Tower #23, a World War II observation tower. It was lovingly restored and opened to the the public for tours while I was living in Washington, and in 2019 I arrived just after it closed for the day. I was determined to get inside this time after years of wondering what was in there.

Skipping over the history lesson and staying on track with nature, the real reason for my visit, I had a picnic lunch at Cape May Point State Park before hitting the trails there. The trail I chose was a loop through a maritime forest and around a freshwater pond. Swans and ducks were beating the heat with a swim, songbirds serenaded me, and the air was scented with saltwater, bayberry, and eastern red cedar. Some wildflowers added a splash of color, and a muskrat lodge was the only sign of mammals. By the lighthouse, a flock of purple martins flitted around their little hotel on a pole, calling to each other and snagging insects like little flying acrobats.

Muskrat lodge

I checked in at my AirBNB just a block from the bay and took a nap until it was time for the tide to return. I went back to Kimbles Beach and waited. The horseshoe crabs were still there, and in greater numbers. The laughing gulls and peeps were still there, but no sign of red knots. A few other people came to the beach and we talked about wildlife for a while. I was scanning to the south and Liz, a birder from North Jersey, was scanning to the north. She spotted the red knots in a mixed flock. Finally, after two years I got the bird I was after. Much like the first time seeing the horseshoe crabs spawning, it was a surreal experience.

Horseshoe crabs coming ashore to spawn

A mixed flock that includes red knots

Seeing the red knot on the first day freed up the rest of my time to look at other wildlife areas. I went to Sunset Beach, hoping to catch a glimpse of Mercury and Venus after sunset, but the clouds had already come in by then. I spent some time at the gift shop and got a few items for my friends while I waited for the traffic situation there to clear out, then got some nighttime lighthouse pictures.

Monday was cloudy, drizzly, and about 30 degrees cooler. I wasn't about to let a few raindrops ruin my day. A rainy day at the beach is better than a sunny day at work. After breakfast in Cape May, I went to the Nature Conservancy's Garrett Family Preserve. It's a small property in between a residential neighborhood and Cape Island Creek. The property is a matrix of forest and field up against a salt marsh. I saw and heard quite a few songbirds, a young rabbit, a baby diamondback terrapin, a duck, a turkey vulture, wildflowers, a pile of feathers and bones, and some bee hives. In the salt marsh, there was an osprey on the nest and a bunch of holes where I saw some kind of motion. It was fiddler crabs scuttling back into the holes when they saw me coming.

Baby diamondback terrapin

My next stop was South Cape May Meadows, another Nature Conservancy property on the Atlantic. I first went there in 2019 and had a great day of bird watching. This time was more of the same, despite the drizzle. I saw my first glossy ibis and more turtles. However, it was just turtle heads poking out of the water so I couldn't tell what kind they were. There was another muskrat lodge, swans, ducks, geese, terns, and peeps. On the beach in the fenced off nesting area there were terns, oystercatchers, and some other bird that was too far for me to identify. I came across a toad, lots of feeding peeps including dowitchers, otter scat, and more piles of feathers where some bird met its demise. 

Long-billed dowitcher

Beach toad

Glossy ibis

A walk around Lake Lily brought me pond lilies, a robin fledgling, and a family of swans. After a late lunch I went to the wildlife refuge's Two Mile Beach unit on the Atlantic outside of Wildwood. While I didn't see them, there are snowy plovers nesting there. By the time I got there, the rain became steadier than a drizzle and the dark clouds and high wind made for an angry looking ocean. I continued walking the trails. More ducks and peeps, my first eastern towhee, and my first yellow warbler were waiting for me.I decided to head back to the bay to see if the red knots would be back with the rising tide. But first, I had to hit the boardwalk and grab some more gifts. Bubble blowing unicorns are in, license plates with your name are out.

Kimbles Beach was getting a steady rain when I arrived, but the wind was gone. Despite the incoming tide, the waves were almost nonexistent. So were the crabs. And so were the red knots. I decided to order dinner and call it a night. I had one last stop planned for Tuesday before going home, but my GPS wanted me to drive around a trailer park so I just left. One of the last things I saw before leaving New Jersey was a great blue heron flying over the Delaware River. 

The plan for finding the red knot worked. I avoided weekend traffic for the most part, I slept in an ideal location, the weather was mostly cooperative, I learned a lot, and saw a blend of new sites and old. I saw close to 30 different bird species, 5 that I never saw before, including the one bird I went to see. My long weekend was a nice break from the office and recharged my batteries for me, in spite of the miles I put on my feet.