The Itch to Twitch

I learned about the birding term “twitching” from Julia Zarankin’s memoir, Field Notes from an Unintential Birder, which she describes as the twitch or urge to chase a bird after an alert has been broadcasted. After reading her book, I mentioned to a seasoned birding friend that I was going to try and twitch over the weekend and he thought that I might be exploring a new type of recreational activity. During a library talk with Julia, I mentioned the twitching conversation I had with my friend and she kindly defined the term as more of a UK/Canadian thing. There’s been a few times in my birding resume, that I made the attempt to “twitch” with mostly failed attempts onsetting my permanent lack of confidence and discouraging my attempts to be successful birder.

Yellow-throated Warbler. Celery Farm, Allendale, NJ, 2022

At the start of 2022 I checked my life list and noticed that I could possibly reach 200 birds within the year and started to plot out my months to find targeted birds as well as paying more attention to eBird alerts and posts in Facebook groups. I was lucky once this year with a yellow-throated warbler. I had seen a few posts on Facebook at the Celery Farm in Allendale and was hesitant but then said “eh, let’s give it a try.” As I approached the Warden’s Watch I noticed a few birders and received a wave from my birding pal, K, who gave me the shrug signal that I had just missed the bird.

I sort of expected that to be the case and wasn’t disappointed as I used to be in the past, but after a few more birders showed up we decided to chat and wait a bit and see if the yellow-throat would make a reappearance. We introduced ourselves and I recognized many of the names from their top eBirding statistics. I gushed over how it was great to meet them like they were local celebrities which only solidified my reputation in the Bergen County birding circle as the weirdo. My friend K and I took a break from the tower and tagged along with an amazing birder who picked out a pine warbler, but we both simultaneously spotted a downy who received a surprise mating attack by a male downy. We both were surprised at the sudden hit it and quit it action and I dad-joked that they were getting “down” with it. But as we walked back to the Warden’s Watch trying to come up with more nature innuendos (you can do a lot with a shag hickory joke) we were rewarded with the return of the yellow-throated warbler. In typical warbler fashion, the bird decided to not hold still and took advantage of the bad lighting so that the birders in attendance looked like key stone cops running back and forth hoping for a good view in their binoculars or camera lens.

It was my first real “twitching” moment of success, but it felt more spur of the moment vs. an overwhelming feeling that I expected this magical birding urge to feel like.

The real twitch happened on Sunday, July 24th at the ungodly hour of 3 am.

There’s one bird that I have been calling my marsh goal bird for the past two years, and that is the clapper rail. My close attempts and near misses have included Bayonne, Cape May Meadows, and the Ocean City Rookery. My favorite near miss happened at the Ocean City Rookery the year before when I encountered other birders making a similar trip as I for the Cape May Spring Birding Festival.

Clapper Rail, Ocean City Rookery, 7/24/22

“I really hope to see a Clapper Rail.” I mentioned to two women, who were also birding from underneath the 9th Street Bridge. After spotting gulls and yellow-crowned night herons, I waved goodbye and started to head back up towards the welcome center.

“There it is!” I heard one of them shout and I whipped around quickly only to see the birders’ large smiles and no clapper rail. “I swear it just popped up and back down!”

And it was in that moment that my obsession became more intense. Hope turned into determination.

The Clapper Rail is part of a group of other rails that prefer to be on the ground and in wetland or marshy areas. Its other family members include other rails, gallinules, coots, and crakes (think sora). From what I have learned about rails, they tend to prefer the early morning hours or the setting sun and since I am not an early riser, dusk it usually is.

And while I’ve made plans to wake up early to “twitch” it wasn’t until early (very early) Sunday, July 24th, I realized that something was keeping me awake and when I hadn’t begun to feel drowsy by 2 am, I threw off the covers and began to pack for a drive to the Ocean City Rookery with gusto and targeted determination to see a clapper rail. I threw a bunch of stuff in a bag and pulled out a large bottle of bug spray because I figured I would also make a stop at Edwin Forsyth where green-headed flies hungrily wait for birders.

As you can imagine, I hit no traffic in the early hours of the Garden State Parkway and arrived at the Ocean City Welcome Center and Rookery at 5:30 am. The rookery was vocal from the sounds of egrets, ibises, and night-crown herons and the sky transformed from a deep blue starry sky to yummy sherbet colors. I took a moment to watch two black-crowned night herons fighting and I wondered if it was a female telling another male that mating season was done or just feeling territorial and protecting her area. I then decided it was time to follow the ramp to the lower level and wait under the 9th street bridge to see what fate would bring me.

And so I waited. And waited. And saw absolutely nothing.

And as the early dawn sky turned into morning, I started to cry. What was I thinking? I was overcome with a crashing moment of failure and feeling like I wasted all that time and gas (I think we all know the Summer of 2022 gas situation). I felt really lonely but looking back on the moment—I was just sleep deprived.

So accepting defeat, I turned around and like the year before slowly made my way up back to the rookery — and then I heard something. A really freaky sound of two sets of feet slapping mud and water. I turned and caught the rear ends of two odd looking birds running quickly into the marsh grasses. There’s moments when I’m birding where I quickly hold my breath and clench my butt cheeks so tightly that I hope to disappear for that moment and a secretive bird like the rail will not notice me and make another appearance. My butt clenching proved successful and the clapper rail made its chicken-like movements from the marshy grasses and stepped out into the shallow ponds in front of me to feed and bathe in the water. Occasionally a second clapper would pop out, and was chased back into the grasses by this bolder bird who didn’t mind me taking pictures.

I probably stayed with this bird for 30 minutes watching it behave and relating to its lack of confidence to fully come out of hiding but eventually taking chances. I made my way back to my car and saw a line of early rising photographers taking pictures of the egrets and herons. I probably could have stayed another hour to watch the rookery action, but my twitch and my urge was for one bird only. And it was satisfied.

And then after a quick no traffic drive down to the rookery - it took me four hours to get home which included my car losing AC and a failed attempt to fashion a female friendly road pee cup.

But seeing the clapper rail. Worth it.