The Mall

 Loggerhead shrikes - Fleming Island mall, FL

When I lived in NJ I had several favorite birding spots - Rifle Camp Park/Garrett Mountain in Passiac County, Branch Brook Park in Essex County, the Great Swamp National Wildlife Refuge in Morris County, but especially Richard W. DeKorte Park in the Meadowlands of Bergen County, NJ. DeKorte had everything I wanted in a great birding site - located along the Hackensack River, with lots of water views, excellent walking trails and boardwalks - plenty of gulls, songbirds, raptors, herons and egrets, ducks of every sort - and it was very close to my home! And I especially loved that the Audubon Society had walks there on Tuesday mornings - a great day of the week for me! Unlike Saturday and Sunday which are both bad days for me to get out with birding groups.

 Tuesday morning birding at the Meadowlands, Lyndhurst, NJ

I have a special fondness for ducks and wading birds, and adored the boardwalk trails with their great sightings of herons, egrets, and ducks, as well as swallows, swans, gulls, and many other birds. But their wooded trails were memorable as well.

belted kingfisher, from the boardwalk trails, Meadowlands, Lyndhurst, NJ

When I moved to Clay County, Florida, my hope was to find an amazing birding spot nearby that I could love as much as I did DeKorte. But alas, after two years now it seems my quest for that is hopeless. There are birding spots close to where I live - but they don't offer the great variety and open water vistas that DeKorte offered. There *are* wonderful birding spots in FL that offer those things, but none of them are close to where I live. None of them are places that I can visit on a daily or even a weekly basis.

And no local places that are great for car birding in the way that Rife Camp/Garrett Mountain or Branch Brook Park were. I was pretty bummed as I explored, and didn't find what I was seeking. But not far from my house is a shopping area. We've got a Public and a Winn-Dixie, a Walmart, a Target, a Home Depot, a Petco, a Kohl's, a Michael's craft store, a movie theater ... and various restaurants and hair salons and stores of other sorts, so that most everything I need can be found over at the shopping mall. But as I discovered the place I also discovered it was very different from shopping malls in NJ.

double-crested cormorants in a retention pond, Fleming Island mall, FL

The *backs* of the stores were ringed with wooded areas and retention ponds. Retention ponds seem to be all over the place. I live on one as previously mentioned. They are all around the mall. The first time I noticed an egret at one of these ponds I was intrigued. I took to paying more attention. Soon I began allowing myself extra time when I went shopping to take time to check out the ponds and the woods. Pretty soon it was becoming a regular routine. I found myself going to check out the ponds and woods even when I *didn't* have any shopping to do!

Wood stork, Fleming Island mall, FL

And before I knew it the Mall had become my premiere birding spot close to home. I don't love it like the Meadowlands. There are no wonderful boardwalk trails. It's a car birding site, with various places to stop and look and listen.

Most of the time I see the same birds over and over - the Canada geese, the Muscovy ducks, the great egrets, the crows both American and fish, the house sparrows and boat-tailed grackles and starlings. But every now and then you can go to the mall and see a green heron, a worm-eating warbler, a blue-gray gnatcatcher, indigo buntings...

Green heron, Fleming Island mall, FL

indigo bunting, Fleming Island mall, FL

I'm passionate about logging my bird sighting on eBird.org. eBird has a facilty that lets you define favorite "patches" - places you like to bird regularly. It keeps track of the statistics for you of the species you see, and lets you know how many you have seen in your life, the past year, the past month. And lo and behold, the Mall is now my Number One Patch as far as the number of species I have seen. I look at stats for my old favorite in NJ, DeKorte Park, and my total species count there is 81. For Rifle Camp/Garrett  Mountain it's 65, for Branch Brook Park it's 57. But my count for the mall is 86! Of course I have submitted over 300 reports submitted in the past two years! That's averaging around 3 times a week which sounds about right. The more often you go the more likely you are to see new and interesting birds - the tree swallows and/or barn swallows who are only there for a few days, among others.

And after many trips you get to know where birds will be found - the ospreys who have nested for the past two years on top of a light fixture in the parking lot in front of Target, the Eurasian collared doves who are always found on the east side of Home Depot, the fish crows who hang out behind the small strip of stores to the west of Home Depot, the black vultures who love to roost in the trees behind the soon-to-be defunct La-Z Boy store. I've seen belted kingfishers and anhingas and double-crested cormorants, ring-necked ducks, lesser scaups, curiously blown off course birds like least terns and a semipalmated plover.

osprey nesting on light in Target parking lot, Fleming Island mall, FL

So after two years I still have not found a local birding place I *love*. Crawling along behind stores and their loading docks and dumpsters just doesn't give me the same thrill as a more natural environment does, but the mall somehow seems to have become my birding muse.

Yes, there are days I wished I lived closer to Guana River or Merritt Island - two places that both thrill me in the same way the Meadowlands does. But I don't.  Guana River is 50 miles away, Merritt Island a whopping 165 miles away. I can't go there several times a week, or even weekly really. So right now I have the Mall, 2 miles from home. It's a good day for a drive.

eastern phoebe, Fleming Island mall, FL