Cape May - Saturday afternoon, birding by boat

The boat trip covered four and half hours in the end and there was so much to watch that rather than a chronological sequence, this one is alphabetical. First up then 'a row of Double-Crested Cormorants':



The star bird of the trip, an American Avocet:

American Oystercatcher:

Black-bellied Plover (know as Grey Plover in the UK):

Black-crowned Night Heron (this one photographed in the evening light):

Boat-tailed Grackle (new species number two):

A bridge over some of the backwaters:

You can just make out a fast approaching boat. These idiots sped past with abandon. Our boat got inundated twice, a house boat we passed fared much worse. Thoughtless idiots.

As the afternoon went on some cloud gathered, a precursor of the weather to come for the rest of the weekend:

Caspian Tern:

Clapper Rails, the second new species of the trip:

A Great Blue Heron:

A Greater Black-backed Gull feeding on an expired horseshoe crab:

An adult Little Blue Heron:

A pair of Peregrine Falcons, as you can see one (the female) is notably bigger than the male:

Royal Tern:

Tri-coloured Heron:

And the third new species of the trip a (juvenile) Yellow-crowned Night Heron:

As noted previously, we thoroughly enjoyed the trip and would recommend it to birders of all levels of expertise. Once docked we headed back to the motel for pizza and wine!