Small City Park

I spent a little time today at Roosevelt Park, a wonderful small park in South Philadelphia that is part of Fairmount Park. The park is an excellent location to find wintering Rusty Blackbirds and see waterfowl relatively close. I soon found the rusties amongst Red-winged Blackbirds resting in a tree beside the large lake. Periodically they would fly down and forage amongst the short grass and leaf litter. There was a nice mix of different plumaged males and females with their bright pale eyes and thinner bills easily separating them from the red-wings.

Though most of the small lakes were covered with ice, the Canada Geese and one Snow Goose have kept a small section of the main lake open which attracts a nice variety of ducks. American Coots, though duck-like they are actually in the rail family, and Mallards being the most common along with a few Northern Shovelers, Gadwalls, Bufflehead, American Wigeon, Ring-necked Ducks and two pairs of Redheads.