Jeff Ellerbusch reports 34 Common Goldeneye, 28 Bufflehead, 22 Common Mergansers, 1 Lesser Scaup, and 4 Pied-billed Grebe seen while biking the D&R Towpath between Landing Lane and the I-287 bridge the evening of January 18. All the waterfowl are in Somerset waters starting from a few hundred yards up river from Landing Lane.
Also interesting was a completly yellow-billed, female Common Goldeneye, which was structurally perfect for Common Goldeneye, unfortunately.
mocosocoBirds 
As far as Counties go…
The Raritan River, between a few hundred yards up river of Landing Lane and about a mile and a half north of the 287 bridge, is technically split down the middle…the east side being Middlesex County waters, the west side being Somerset County waters. The reason I’m saying this is cause there were quite a bit more birds between these two points than my counts show. Only birds I felt were on the Somerset side of the river were put in the counts.
This isn’t too bad with Divers as the river isn’t very wide, and with patience, a group will usually move from one side of the river to the other while feeding. Dabblers are a different story as they usualy stick to the banks and don’t stray far.
As for the yellow billed Goldeneye – the bird was in with a group of 16 COGO mostly consisting of females. Besides the yellow bill this bird felt good for COGO, which it was in direct comparison with.
Jeff