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Fall/Migration Bird Walk at Oradell Reservoir & Emerson Woods

 

Oradell Reservoir


    Waterfowl/dabbling duck migration season starts in September and ends in February. I’m not talking about Mallard or Wood Duck migration, I’m talking about Merganser, Grebe, and Loon migration; these birds are rarely seen in the summer or spring. November and December are the peak time to go birdwatching for these birds, wherever you are. With these ducks lying around in large, open bodies of water, I decided to go and try to find some of these colorful waterfowl.


I decided to go to Oradell Reservoir & Emerson Woods, which is a large reservoir surrounded by forest. This place is amazing during the spring, too, because warblers and other songbirds come to the riparian woods as a stopover point. Here is a comprehensive list of the 11 species of birds I saw:


Canada Goose

50

Mallard

30

Hooded Merganser

3

Common Merganser

300

Red-breasted Merganser

1

Ruddy Duck

27

Ring-billed Gull

100

Herring Gull

100

Double-crested Cormorant

200

Great Blue Heron

2

Belted Kingfisher

1


As you can see, there were quite a lot of waterfowl in the lake, especially mergansers. I arrived at 7:30 AM on November 5th and scanned the area to see if any flocks were there- and there were. There was a giant flock of (mostly) Common Mergansers, about 90% of which were female birds. There was a rarity among the flock: A Red-breasted Merganser. The Red-breasted Merganser had more fluffy hair and a lot of other minor differences, which made it clear that I was looking at a different species. As I swiveled my scope to the other side of the reservoir, I saw a flock of cormorants being followed by a flock of gulls. I’m sure if I looked more closely I could have seen at least one rarity among them, but the gulls were all flying, making it harder to properly identify even one of them. Separated from the flock of cormorants and gulls were three Hooded Mergansers, one male and two females. The male looked brilliant in the shining sun. There were also some Ruddy Ducks on the far west side of the reservoir, but I couldn’t get a superb look at them because some trees were in the way. Overall, I had an amazing time at the Oradell Reservoir, and although I only saw four waterfowl species from the seventeen regularly seen during migration season, I still had a great time. Thank you for reading!

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