Tag Archives: chris bosak nature photographer

Hooded merganser kicks off “Duck Week”

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Photo by Chris Bosak Male hooded merganser in New England, March 2025.

Welcome to Duck Week, birdsofnewengland.com’s very unofficial declaration to celebrate the spring duck migration. Duck Week will be a collection of duck photos I have snapped over the last few weeks. Now seems like a good time, as I’m starting to see fewer ducks as they make their way north to their breeding grounds.

I’ll start with the hooded merganser, one of my favorite birds of all time. I saw a ton of hooded mergansers this late winter/early spring. Look for them in fresh or brackish water, including relatively small bodies of water.

Click here for more information on the hooded merganser.

Photo by Chris Bosak Female hooded merganser, March 2025.

One more bonus photo …

Photo by Chris Bosak Two male hooded mergansers pass each other in a small pond in New England, March 2025.

Bald eagle in flight

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Photo by Chris Bosak Bald eagle in New England, March 2025.

Saw this beauty the other day in New England by a reservoir. It’s so nice to see bald eagles more frequently now.

For the Birds: Early favorite for Bird of the Winter

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Photo by Chris Bosak An American robin eats border privet berries in New England, January 2025.

The American robin has secured a spot as the frontrunner for the Bird of the Winter.

I usually announce my Bird of the Winter much later than the second week of January, but I could tell already that the robin is likely to be the winner. The Bird of the Winter recognition, of course, is a very unofficial designation made by yours truly. It goes to the bird, as the name suggests, that is seen in surprisingly high numbers throughout the winter.

Past winters have included snowy owl, barred owl, dark-eyed junco, and eastern bluebird. This year the robin is running away with it.

It started on Christmas Day when I looked out of a window into the side yard and noticed a lot of activity in an eastern cedar tree. The activity, as you probably have guessed, was robins going in and out of the branches, gobbling up the berries in the tree. The robins came and went for hours upon end, and, all told, there had to be over 100 of them. 

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A few weekend surprises

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Photo by Chris Bosak – An eastern bluebird gets a drink from a birdbath in New England, January 2025.

I had a nice bird walk this weekend and found 24 species in the bitter cold. When I got home, I was treated to a surprise eastern bluebird sighting in the yard. Below, a winter wren was one of the highlights of the walk.

Photo by Chris Bosak – Winter wren in New England, January 2025.

Birds spark many Christmas memories

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Photo by Chris Bosak A cardinal and chickadeee share a platform feeder following a snowfall in Danbury, CT, March 2019.

When birdwatching has been an integral part of your life for so long, almost everything has an association with birds. Christmas is no exception.

For this holiday season, I’m going to examine some of my favorite Christmas birding associations and memories.

This one is a little morbid, but it clearly sticks out in my mind. When the boys were little, about 7 and 4, we sat on the floor by the tree Christmas morning passing out their gifts one by one. I glanced out the sliding glass door onto the deck only to see a Cooper’s hawk devouring a mourning dove about six feet away.

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American robin acrobatics

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I got lucky with this photo. I assumed the birds did not like the dark berries in a small tree in the side yard because winter was moving along and nothing was touching them. As I sat at my desk working the other day, I noticed a flurry of activity out of the corner of my eye. It was a flock of a dozen or more robins descending upon the tree at once. I sneaked onto the covered porch by the tree and hoped the robins wouldn’t take off at the disruption. Most of the photos did not turn out well because of distracting branches in the way, but this one turned out pretty well.

I’ve had pretty good luck with birds-eating-berries photos this past week. I’ll post more photos soon. Thanks for checking out birdsofnewengland.com

For the Birds: A different kind of ‘feeder’ bird

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I walked across the living room toward the large window that offers a view of the bird-feeding station and birdbath. I stopped dead in my tracks as a bird much larger than I expected to see was perched on the side of the birdbath.

Wisely, all of the other birds were nowhere to be seen. 

It was a Copper’s hawk, one of the hawks in New England that commonly preys on small feeder birds. The large bird of prey had no interest in the birdbath’s water — either for drinking or cleaning. It was simply using the structure as a perch to get a better look at the feeders and nearby bushes. It hopped off the birdbath and onto a hemlock branch I had discarded to give the feeder birds a place to hide. After peering through the underbrush and finding nothing, the hawk flew off.

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For the Birds: Flickers everywhere up north

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My destination was the northern part of Maine. I’m talking way north. Get to Baxter State Park and keep going for several more hours.

I drove pretty much through the night to get there. I took a few half-hour breaks to sleep and then continued on my way. I have been to northern New Hampshire dozens of times, and I have been to the middle of Maine many times. I’ve always wanted to see what Aroostook County was all about so I took the opportunity to head up there and finally see for myself.

I settled at the border town of Fort Kent where only the St. John River separates the U.S. from Canada. 

Wildlife, of course, was the driving force behind the decision to drive up there. The boreal forest, to me anyway, is a magical place filled with so many interesting creatures. Moose are my favorite creatures, but things like lynx, loons, eagles, grouse, boreal chickadees, Canada jays, and other specialty species unique through the habitat are also a draw.

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For the Birds: Scarlet tanagers can be elusive

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Photo by Chris Bosak A Scarlet Tanager perches in a tree in Danbury, Conn., July 2016.
Photo by Chris Bosak A Scarlet Tanager perches in a tree in Danbury, Conn., July 2016.

This has been the first spring/summer since I can remember in which I have not seen a scarlet tanager. I was hot on the trail of a few in the spring, but I never did spot the birds.

Granted, my birding this year has been hampered by foot ailments, but I have still spent enough time out there that I feel I should have seen one or two of these beauties.

The scarlet tanager is one of the most sought-after species in New England in the spring. Their electric red bodies with contrasting black wings make it one of our most unique and beautiful birds. The problem with tanagers is that they mostly hang around the tops of tall trees. Even a bird as bright as a teenager can remain hidden in a full canopy of oak or maple leaves.

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For the Birds: Chipping sparrow the source of the chirping

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Photo by Chris Bosak A chipping sparrow perches on a garden stake in New England, July 2020. Merganser Lake.

The chirping was coming from the small tree right next to me. That much was clear. What wasn’t clear was where the bird was exactly or what type of bird it was. 

I looked among the leaves for a minute or two to no avail. Then the bird jumped down to a dead branch just above eye level. It was a chipping sparrow. If it had been singing instead of chirping/calling I would have recognized it without having to see it. I can recognize many calls or chips but apparently not the chipping sparrow’s.

I was glad the bird hopped down to offer a good look. Too many times to count I’ve zeroed in on a bird following its song or call only to have the bird eventually fly off with me never having seen it or identified it. It’s one of the more frustrating things when it comes to birdwatching. 

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