The Group’s Steve Biasetti Shares His Love of Birds

Group director of environmental education Steve Biasetti has had an interest in wildlife for as long as he can remember, though he is perhaps most known for his love of birds to his fellow Groupies and environmentalists. He says it was predictable that his wildlife-watching interests would settle eventually on birds, as they are among the most easily observable groups of animals. Joining scores of other ornithophiles who started the year off with a goal of observing as many bird species as possible, Steve offers insight into his own birdwatching experience…

How many species have you spotted so far this year?

I’m not overly concerned about the number of bird species I encounter each month. 100 species per month is a nice target, and I’ve reached the goal for the month of January several times in past years. For me, tracking the number of species observed each month is a gentle reminder to pay attention to all observable birds (and—more broadly—all wildlife) rather than to get caught up chasing the various rarities that are reported.

Tracking one’s bird observations has become quite easy with eBird, just as tracking one’s broad nature observations has become easier with iNaturalist.

For this January, I’ve observed about 75 bird species in Suffolk County thus far, and I’ll probably end up seeing around 80 to 85 species for the month. January 2024 will be a little light in overall numbers because I probably won’t be able to fit a Montauk visit into my schedule.

Any species you were particularly excited about?

If I am to choose a favorite sighting for this month, I will go with harlequin ducks. The males are strikingly patterned in steel blues and rusty oranges, with slashes of white. They are one of my favorite birds, and show up in small numbers in Long Island waters between November and March. Occasionally birdwatchers are rewarded with great looks of these birds under calm conditions and great light. Of course, that’s rarely the case, and it wasn’t the case when I saw three harlequins earlier this month bobbing in the rough surf near the Shinnecock Inlet rocks. Still exciting to see nonetheless.

This month I also saw two different uncommon “white-winged” gulls, the Iceland gull and glaucous gull, along Dune Road in Hampton Bays. Recently I was able to find the “needle in the haystack” at Eastport Pond — a cackling goose in among hundreds of Canada geese. Cackling geese are smaller versions of Canada geese with shorter necks and shorter bills. I can also report seeing good numbers of bald eagles in Riverhead, Eastport, Quogue, and East Quogue—sightings that never get old.

Which species do you hope to see this year?

I have been keeping track of my bird observations (and other wildlife) for more than three decades. Seeing a bird that I haven’t seen before is an extremely infrequent occurrence these days. Each year, I observe roughly 240 to 260 bird species in Suffolk County. So the birds I hope to see on Long Island in 2024 are birds that I have seen in previous years. There are plenty of regularly-occurring local birds that fit this category.

In an effort to shorten the list at least a little, here’s a baker’s dozen of Long Island species I look forward to finding each year: sooty shearwater, American bittern, American woodcock, parasitic jaeger, razorbill, snowy owl, red-headed woodpecker, Blackburnian warbler, indigo bunting, fox sparrow, orchard oriole, scarlet tanager, and red crossbill.

Do you remember the first bird(s) you saw that may have inspired you to become a birder?

I’ve had an interest in wildlife for as long as I can remember, although there was a marine slant in my early years (e.g., fish, mollusks, crustaceans). It was predictable that my wildlife-watching interests would settle eventually on birds, as they are among the most easily observable groups of animals. My earliest recollections of watching birds include viewing a white-breasted nuthatch at a neighbor’s bird feeder in East Setauket when I was a pre-teen; seeing wood ducks in the Sea Pines Forest Preserve on Hilton Head Island, South Carolina as a teenager; and catching the spring songbird migration, with its parade of brightly-colored warblers, in my backyard while living in Boston, Massachusetts in the mid-1980s.

By May 1988, I was interning at the Group (for the South Fork at the time), settling in on eastern Long Island, and establishing roots for my general wildlife-watching interest to morph into the lifelong hobby (obsession?) that it has become.