Mass Audubon Ocean State Weekend - March 1-2, 2025

I was fortunate to spend the weekend of March 1st and 2nd with a great group of Mass Audubon birders visiting sites throughout Rhode Island. Day one included locations on Aquidneck Island, including Portsmouth, Middletown, and Newport. The Ebird hotspots were Town Pond, Lawton Valley Reservoir, Sisson Pond, and Sandy Point Beach. These sites featured dabbling and diving ducks of all shapes and sizes, fresh and saltwater.

Red-tailed Hawk, Town Pond, Portsmouth, RI

Red-throated Loon, Town Pond, Portsmouth

American Wigeons, Town Pond, Portsmouth

While Aquidneck Island was never attacked during King Philip’s War, our birding adventure brought us near many locations associated with the war.

After lunch at the Roasted Clove in Middletown, we visited the Norman Bird Sanctuary. Then it was on to Third Beach, where we saw Sanderlings and Ruddy Turnstones, one of my favorite birds. This was not an especially good trip for taking pictures—at least for me—since our proximity to the Turnstones (and later, the Purple Sandpipers and Northern Lapwing) was beyond the capabilities of my Canon SX-60. Every so often, a trip like this inspires me to purchase a bigger and better camera, but I get over it once I’m home.

Sandering, Third Beach

Distant Ruddy Turnstones, Third Beach

At Sachuest Point National Wildlife Refuge, we walked along the Ocean View Loop, where we spotted Great Cormorant, Harlequin Ducks, Purple Sandpipers, and Razorbills. With the wind, this trek was about the coldest we work be, though I wore my battery-powered heated vest under my jacket and never had to fire it up.

Sachuett Point, Newport

Harlequin Duck in the breakers, prime hunting ground, Sachuett Point

More Harelequin

Harlequin joined by a Scoter

That evening, we stayed at the Atlantic Beach Resort and dined at The Red Parrot in Newport, noisy and full to the brim. (Newport deserves kudos for feeling like the middle of beach season in the cold, icy offseason.) 

Our hotel neighbor

Given the bitter cold, we assembled a New England-style annual meeting in our hotel lobby before going to bed and voted “NAY” on owling at 5 a.m. the next morning. Our leaders were willing to take us, but if I had to read their body language, I would guess they were relieved by our common sense.

Christopher Leahy’s The Birdwatcher’s Companion: North American Birdlife, describes owling as follows, which matches precisely with my experience:

Select a winter’s night on which it is highly likely to be bitter cold with record-breaking wind chill. (If you live where winters are mild, aim for a night in the wet season when you are likely to encounter a constant downpour of monsoon proportions. Wait until everyone has more or less settled in for the evening after a good dinner. ((For best results this should be at the end of a brutal day of birding that started before dawn, listening for wintering rails.) Then say: “Let’s go do some owling.” Everyone will feign great enthusiasm less they be accused of wimping out. Go to a heavily wooded trail where there are massive roots and gullies every five paces or so and walk in a minimum of one mile (more is better) to “the place where we’ve always had good luck in the past.” Now stand for an incomprehensibly long time cupping your mittened hands behind your frozen ears. You will hear nothing whatever except the wind howling in the conifers, but someone is sure to say: “There, there . . .did you hear that?”--to which no one will respond. Then play a recording of an owl call . . . Another thing you can do to take your mind off your pain and boredom is to make owl calls yourself . . . then say: “Well, not a lot calling tonight,” as if this is a perfectly reasonable outcome, and head back, if possible taking a wrong turn or two en route. You will have heard nothing except a barking dog, which one of your party will insist was a Barred Owl (“I heard it, and I’m counting it!”).

I have seen many great owls while birding, but hardly a one while “owling.” Some of my favorites:

As I said, we had a good (and experienced) group with great leaders, all of whom I blessed as Sunday morning brought more bitter cold with gusty winds—perfect owling conditions. As we headed out in the morning, we drove past a corpse of trees. Our lead guide and naturalist, the incredible Scott Santino, announced, “This spot is where I’ve had good luck with owling.” I didn’t even crack a smile.

At breakfast, our other excellent guide, Sean Kent, showed us some remarkable 3D-manufactured bird of prey skulls he created, intending them for educational use. (Since they could bounce on the floor without breaking—I think he designed them for “kids” educational use.)

At the request of a couple of our group members, we then headed back to Portsmouth to try to spot a wild Tundra Bean Goose reported in the area. After scanning more than a thousand Canada Geese with no bean goose in sight—having now determined that we had traded owling for a wild goose chase--we pushed onto Jamestown. (In our search, we did hit the parking lot of Raytheon, Dad's lifetime employer. It merged with UTC, my "life-altering" employer. The circle of life.)

Our first stop was Beavertail State Park, featuring sparking blue water, white caps, Harlequin Ducks, and Black Scoters. As we departed, we spotted birders on Weeden Lane admiring a lost Northern Lapwing native to Eurasia. As with the Ruddy Turnstones and Purple Sandpipers, my Canon SX-60 failed me. I walked away from the group to get a closer shot of the Lapwing, but I don’t like to stray too far (or too close to a target bird), for fear of delaying our travels or getting yelled at for scaring off our prey. (A group of us scared off a Spectacled Owl in Colombia by wandering too close—and heard about it.)

Our final weekend stop was Trustom Pond National Wildlife Refuge in South Kingston, Rhode Island, also home to the single bloodiest day of King Philip’s War, the Great Swamp Fight of December 1675.

Fortunately, our visit was more peaceful. The open, brackish water of Trustom Pond featured great rafts of waterfowl, including Ruddy Ducks, Greater Scaups, American Wigeons, Ring-necked Ducks, Redheads, and one Tundra Swan. It was a great way to end our weekend excursion.

Red-breasted Merganser, Trustom Pond

Two Redheads leading the pack, Trustom Pond

Ruddy Duck, Trustom Pond

My thanks to Scott and Sean for an excellent adventure, my fellow travelers (including author Bill Sargent), and Scott and Sean’s trip report, which is the basis for this post. Our most exotic bird of the trip was found in downtown Newport.