The following is a personal account of a Crested Caracara sighting by Ed McGowan, the Director of Science and the Trailside Museums and Zoo for the Palisades Interstate Park Commission:
Bear Mountain State Park, Doodletown – Jan 5, 2015 – Normally a time of year when New Yorkers head south, on this blustery winter day a Floridian made a rare visit to the skies over Bear Mountain State Park. Fellow League of Naturalists volunteers Gerhard Patsch, Dave Baker, Mike Adamovic, and I watched in amazement as a Crested Caracara soared overhead in the late morning sun. The bird circled several times, drifted north out of view but then returned overhead before heading east towards the Hudson. The field markings and overall gestalt of the bird were unmistakable. To our knowledge, this is the first record of a Caracara in New York State. We later learned that one of these southern raptors was photographed in Berks County, PA just a week earlier, so perhaps our sighting was the same bird blown north by the previous day’s violent winds. Wherever it came from, it was a sight to behold, a tropical apparition on a brisk winter’s day.
Read about the Crested Caracara sighting in Berks County, Pennsylvania.
New York State Parks and Historic Sites Blog 