VT - Brown Booby in Bennington County!

 

Brown Booby - Emerald Lake State Park, East Dorset, Bennington Co., VT. September 2nd, 2021.

A couple of days ago I learned of a Brown Booby being seen at Lake Paran near Bennington in Vermont. Being deep in the interior and a mere 80 minutes from our house in Northfield I was quite intrigued but, judging by reports, the bird seemed quite mobile and soon disappeared only to be relocated about 25 miles north at Emerald Lake State Park a day or so later. After quickly checking the Caldwell Road fields in Northfield for shorebirds (2 Semipalmated Plovers, 2 Least Sandpipers and a Wilson's Snipe were new arrivals) I buckled up for the 90 minute drive to East Dorset hot on the heels of Hurricane Ida which had just passed south of us overnight. 

Just me, the booby and a mountain lake....

On arrival I found Emerald Lake to be relatively small surrounded by mature woodland, neatly positioned between the Green Mountains to the east and the Taconic Mountains to the west. Moreover, the lake appeared to be relatively shallow and not quite what I was expecting. The booby soon appeared and put on the most fabulous display working circuits around the lake and plunge diving frequently. To some degree the experience recalled the Brown Booby at Onota Lake in the Berkshires back in August 2018, but this bird was brighter, more mature in terms of plumage and an awful lot closer!

All in all, it was a thoroughly enjoyable experience on a beautiful autumnal day and within comfortable driving distance of home. Surprisingly, I only encountered a couple of other birders during my time there and had the lake to myself most of the time. I also noted my first migrating Broad-winged Hawk of the season heading south. 

Brown Booby has been documented in Vermont before with multiple records of at least two individuals from the Lake Champlain area. 

MA - a Brown Booby in Berkshire County!

Brown Booby - Onota Lake, Pittsfield, Berkshire Co., MA. August 18th, 2018.

Rene Wendall posted welcome news of a Brown Booby at Onota Lake in Pittsfield on August 17th. The bird seemed settled and allowed plenty of local birders to catch up with it that day. The following morning, a window of time opened for me too and after a timely post from Jonathan Pierce I headed west embarking on the ninety minute drive from Northfield to Pittsfield. I needn't have rushed! After I arrived the bird sat quietly on the water for the best part of two hours before actively foraging around the north end of the lake off Burbank Bank. It was worth the wait, it looked so much better in flight careening over the water and plunge diving, successfully taking fish on multiple occasions.  Apparently, only the second for interior Massachusetts and fitting well within a pattern of recent inland freshwater occurrences with birds documented from Vermont and upstate New York in the last few years. On a personal level, this was my third Brown Booby in Massachusetts, the other two coming from Outer Cape Cod, both of those being in late August.

Gracious thanks to Rene Wendall for getting the word out and to Jonathan Pierce and Sheila Carroll for keeping us up to speed on the bird's presence via social media.