Chasing 1000 - #998

I could see that my wife needed a break from work/school, so on Saturday I took her down to Cape May for the day. After a late lunch, she dropped me back at the Lighthouse and went into town for some shopping. I knew it had been a slow day around the lighthouse, but upwards of 20 Cave Swallows were mixed in with the Tree Swallows flying overhead and 3-4 Eurasian Widgens were on the Gull Pond. When I arrived, the swallows were working over the parking lot and I was quickly able to pick out a couple of Cave Swallows. I then started on the birding trail out to Gull Pond seeking an Eurasian Widgeon. Since I had been following the Cape May Reports, I knew that these Eurasian Widgeons weren't mature males and would not be that easy to identify. Since I had never spent much time observing female American Windgeons before, this was the perfect opportunity for me to study them. So I took my time to carefully work my way through the "females" in the American Widgeon flock before I was able to locate one that definately looked different. At that point, I continued down the trail looking for an opportunity to upgrade my duck photographs. Suddenly a small black bird flushed from along the side of the boardwalk, less then 2 feet in front of me and flew only about 10 feet before diving into heavy cover. As I stood staring at the point where the bird had disappeared, I couldn't believe my eyes, it was a Black Rail (#998 on my Life List). Some days you just get lucky! Just wish I could have gotten a photograph.