Ron Shields took this photo of an immature Little Blue Heron last weekend at Kearny Marsh. (Thanks, Ron!)

Stay tuned to this blog next week for the announcement of a big free event slated for early December in DeKorte Park's Meadowlands Environment Center. Really!

NJMC staffer Jim Wright's column in The South Bergenite today is about the gowing problem of released/escaped pet birds:

   First came the powder-blue Parakeet. Then a grayish cockatiel, followed by a saffron finch.

   The Meadowlands Commission’s DeKorte Park is known for drawing all sorts of unusual birds, but the one-square-mile park has been attracting the “wrong” kind of bird of late – exotic pet birds that have either escaped from their owners or have been intentionally released.

   Either way, the birds face a likely death sentence in the wild.

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Julie McCall was nice enough to provide a list of birds from yesterday's walk. I added a few that my sub-group saw as well.

Highlights included non-stop American Kestrels, a Coop, and a Golden-crowned Kinglet.

Full list follows. Email us here if we missed any.

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Jeff Nicol took this shot of an immature Bald Eagle out by the Carillon on Disposal Road: "Big crop on the Eagle, it was up there a ways."

(We saw an adult Bald Eagle in Ridgefield Park on Sunday as well.)

Jeff also got the Osprey shot below at DeKorte on Sunday.  (Thanks, Jeff!)

We'd like to thank Bergen County Audubon Society for donating a huge bag of Milkweed seeds. We are planting them in several sites. As you likely know, Milkweed is a Monarch Butterfly's best friend.

More on Milkweed here.

More than 50 people were on hand for our Third-Tuesday walk at Harrier Meadow today, highlighted by a bird-banding demonstration by NJMC Naturalist Mike Newhouse.

Those who arrived at Harrier Meadow were treated to an up-close look at an American Kestrel. The rest of us got several (more distant) views of the kestrels, Northern harriers, Sharpie, Osprey, and Cooper's Hawk…

If anyone would like to put a list together, I'd love to post it.

More pix have been posted on this Facebook Page.

Who, is, this?

Clue and answer follow.

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Mike Britt reports: "Best birds [Sunday] were 3 Caspians on the flats at DeKorte. Also, both Yellowlegs, Long-billed Dowitchers, all three peeps, Semipalmated Plovers, Pectoral, dozens of Snowy & Great Egrets, Green Heron, several Osprey, Kestrel, Harrier, GW Teal, Shoveler, etc." (Thanks, Mike!)