Purple Swamphen: Easy 606 for the ABA List

I haven't done a heck of a lot of chasing this year, but a trip to Florida gave me the chance to find a Purple Swamphen, a bird that was added this year to the official ABA list.  Turns out, if you know exactly where to go, the Purple Swamphens are pretty easy to find.  Of course, if the last reporter on E-bird put in the wrong coordinates you end up in a residential community looking at a pair of Green Herons, instead of Swamphens.  It was worth the trip, though, to see the baby Muscovy Ducks.  Soooo Cute!

However, once I had a better report, I was headed over to the Dolphin Mall in Miami and at the edge of the marsh, at the edge of the parking lot, 4 very cooperative Purple Swamphens frolicked for me and my camera.  Never expected to get a Lifer at a shopping Mall.  

I was also able to get some nice photos of Miami's famous Spot-breasted Oriole, which is found in A.D. Barnes Park, if you know exactly where to look, in the woods by the swimming pools.

Best of all, I was finally able to get myself some great photos of White-cowned Pigeons.  I didn't see one, and it was only in flight, until the 30th of December last year.  It was my last bird of my Big Year, but no photo.  This morning, on my last day in Florida, down in Key West at Fort Zachary, I saw several of them in flight, then one alighted atop a tree and just stayed for about 5 minutes, so I could get my photo.

Oh, and as a bonus, up in Orlando, at Lake Eola Park, in the heart of downtown, where they have a swan 

pond, I got a chance to see Whooper Swans.  Of course, they are not countable anywhere but in places like Attu, where they are rare indeed.  But I can put it on the list with the Black Swan, of which, Lake Eola also has plenty.