Our next free Marsh Discovery Trail guided walk is at noon on Thursday.       
   Our next free First-Sunday walk is this Sunday at DeKorte Park at 10 a.m. We'll try the marsh Discovery Trail and other hotspots for shorebirds.
   Our Tuesday MDT walk turned up a few Short-billed Dowitchers, hundreds of Semi-palmated Sandpipers, many Greater and Lesser Yellowlegs, and a few dozen boisterous Forster's Terns.

   Photographer Terrie Kane took this shot of sunflowers floating in the water fountain at the Jill Ann Ziemkicwicz Butterfly Garden yesterday.
   A shot of a Great Egret just after takeoff in the Shorebird Pool is below.
   You can see more of Terrie's photos from DeKorte Park here.

  
  Our First-Sunday-of-the-Month Walk is August 1 at 10 a.m. at DeKorte Park. We will look for migrating shorebirds, the Least Bittern and other species of interest — plus lots of dragonflies. The walk is free.

   Details follow.

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   Can anyone identify this moth-in-progress, seen outside the side entrance to the NJMC Administration Building in DeKorte Park? Answer follows.

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  Ron Shields writes:
  "Attached please find some close-up images of the Glossy Ibis as seen at the Kearny Marsh last Thursday.
      "The bird, which I have seen through Saturday, has been a regular visitor to the marsh as of late. 
   "I guess you could call it being in the right spot at the right time as the ibis landed on a mudflat almost directly in front of me allowing for these photos." (Thanks, Ron!)

   The rest of Ron's pix follow.

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   One of the many great things about Butterfly Day at DeKorte was the variety of butterflies we had — at least 16 kinds.
   We also had two types of moths, including a Hummingbird Clear-winged Moth.
   Several of the 270+ attendees actually got to see a Monarch Butterfly depositing an egg on a Milkweed leaf.  
   Having experts from the Northern New Jersey Chapter of the North American Butterfly Association was a huge help — and so was the great group of knowledgeable volunteers from Bergen County Audubon, who also helped the Meadowlands Commission set up the event from Day One.
   We also had kid-friendly scavenger hunts, butterfly cupcakes, information on gardening for butterflies (and real live plants), plus lots of other activities.
   The full list, and more pix, follows. (We thank Henry Kocanda of Carlstadt for sharing a couple of the butterfly shots he took at DeKorte yesterday.)
   The headline in today's editions of The Record said it all: "Meadowlands New Hot spot for Butterflies." (Link is here.)

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   When we were looking through our photos of the Peregrine Falcon we saw on a Hackensack River Bridge during last week's birding-by-boat cruise, we noticed that the bird was banded on both legs — green on the left and gray-metal on the right.
   We got to thinking: This rings a bell. Sure enough, we likely saw the same bird a year and a half ago, just before he dive-bombed a Snowy Owl near Valley Brook Ave. in Lyndhurst. We learned back then that the bird was banded in New York State — could not read the bands to get more info.
   Link to the original post on the banded Peregrine here.
   Link to more info on bird-banding and the Peregrine here.
   Sorry for the blurred image of the bands — the one downside to birding by boat is you are often shooting from a powerboat with the engine running.
    

    The New Jersey Meadowlands Commission would like to thank everyone who attended Butterfly Day today at DeKorte Park.  We were very lucky to have a great crowd of nearly 300 people, a bunch of beautiful butterflies, and sunny weather.
   Our co-sponsors — the Bergen County Audubon Society and the Northern New Jersey chapter of the North American Butterfly Association — did a terrific job, and we can't thank them enough.
  NY1 did a nice job covering the event. The video  is on-line here.
   We will post more pix, more media coverage, and a full list of butterfly species over the next day or two.

 
   Butterfly Day is from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. this Sunday. The free event is for the whole family, and includes walks, talks, exhibits, great door prizes and activities for kids.
   We also just might see other winged wonders, like the above Snowberry Clear-winged Moth seen on Wednesday afternoon (and most other days of late).
   More info on Butterfly Day is here.

 
   Ron Shields reports: "I saw a Glossy Ibis for a second time this summer at the Kearny Marsh on Sunday, my first sighting of a single Black Skimmer on Tuesday at 7:10 p.m.  Maybe one of the skimmers reported at DeKorte? 
    "The skimmer flew right in front of the bow of my kayak and hung around for quite awhile feeding all over the marsh." (Thanks, Ron!)