The Ides of March
Raw and blustery defines today’s weather. Thawing is at a slow pace. Most Morris lakes remain frozen without any immediate melting of the ice in sight. As an example for today, ice fishing remains a popular activity on Lake Hopatcong.
Gulls in Hillsborough Twp.
Five species of gulls are reported today from the Norz farm fields along River Road, south of South Branch Road in Hillsborough Township (Glenn Mahler via eBird). An Iceland Gull and Lesser Black-backed Gull joined a Herring and Great Black-backed Gull along with hundreds of Ring-billed Gulls. Glenn also reports a high-flying light morph Rough-legged Hawk from the same location.
Other field notes
Most species listed in the mocosocoBirds region the past few days remain.
Morris County’s first Wilson’s Snipe of 2015 was at rest at Melanie Lane Wetlands this morning.
Wilson’s Snipe, Melanie Lane, Hanover Twp., NJ, Mar. 15, 2015 (photo by Jonathan Klizas)
From Tim Vogel, Mar. 14:
“Vulture roost, Green Pond Rd.
Over 100 vultures, all Blacks except about 6 Turkeys.
Good laugh – watching many roosting on the local day care facility playground equipment.”
[Editor’s note: The Black Vulture in the following photo is standing on a piece of playground equipment Tim mentions. In this photo, the vulture perches atop the backboard of a basketball hoop in a rendition of Black Vulture March Madness.]
Black Vulture, Rockaway Twp., NJ, Mar. 15, 2015 (photo by Jonathan Klizas)
The Raptor Trust
Please read today’s post on the The Raptor Trust. The post is here.
eBird Checklists for the mocosocoBirds region may be viewed via eBird’s Region Explorer. Use the following links:
The eBird Hotspot Primer is here and can also be accessed via the Hotspot menu item on the mocosocoBirds.com website.
@mocosocoBirds at Twitter is another communications stream. Instant field reports and links of interest are tweeted throughout the day. The latest tweets appear on the sidebar of this page. One can follow mocosocoBirds at Twitter or link to @mocosocoBirds.
Finis
mocosocoBirds 
Hi John,
Just an FYI, Lake Musconetcong has started to open up where the feeder from Lake Hopatcong comes in (behind park in Port Morris.) This morning I counted (all approx) 30 common mergansers, 4 hooded mergansers, 25 ring necked ducks, 6 buffleheads, 13 mute swans and 27 ring billed gulls.
Don Beach