Even 35 years later, small details about the one and only time Don Torino saw an Anhinga — a unique kind of water bird — peek through his memory.
The president of the Bergen County Audubon Society remembers the early summer trip to Worthington State Forest with his little brother.
On that cloudy and fateful day, the pair sought small-mouth bass in the Delaware River but were in for a surprise.
“We were wading in the river, fishing and all of a sudden this bird comes down the river with just his head sticking out and his wings under the water and I thought it was drowning,” said Torino, who is 67.
The Anhinga — also known as the “devil bird” or “snake bird” because where the word derives from in the Tupi Indian language of Brazil — was simply scavenging for food.
Among the best freshwater diving birds, the Anhinga is distinctive because of its long neck, long tail and dagger-like beak which helps it spear its prey. Their fully wettable plumage and bone density, experts said, help the bird swiftly and quietly slip into waterways for food like fish, frogs, eggs and even small alligators.
But the species is a year-round resident of most of South America and can be found in southeastern swamps in the U.S. Torino seeing it in New Jersey three decades ago, a tour guide told the conservationist at the time, was peculiar.
That Anhinga presence appears to have only grown with multiple reported sightings in New Jersey in recent years.
While vetted sightings of individual birds that fit the Anhinga characteristics have only been recorded in our state about 20 times ever, there were more than 100 recorded glimpses of the bird submitted to eBird — an online tracking tool — this spring and summer and dozens in 2021, experts said. Those numbers can vary and the same birds are often reported to the tool by more than one bird watcher.
“This species as reported in the northeast United States is out of range, and up until very recently was a very rare vagrant occurrence,” said Andrew Farnsworth, a researcher at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, which focuses on the scientific study of birds.
For some, the telltale signs of climate change in New Jersey have been stark this year: an orange sky caused by a wildfire hundreds of miles away or more dolphins seen closer to the Jersey Shore. In the world of birders, symptoms of an ever-warming Earth have been more subtle. And while multiple sightings of the rare Anhinga are not known to be problematic for a particular reason, environmentalists said a lesson about humans’ impact on the planet can be taken from them and we should be wary of how we interact with the birds.
Where are they?
Larry Hajna, a spokesperson for the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection, said the state’s Fish & Wildlife division has heard of recent Anhinga sightings.
However, he noted, the birds are “rare visitors” to the Garden State.
While the department does not track the species, the Anhinga was spotted in New Jersey as far back as September 1971, according to eBird, a database of bird observations overseen by Cornell.
According to the lab’s data and Farnsworth, the bird has also been recently seen various times.
A review of the online tool — which tracks over 10,000 bird species — showed more than 260 reported Anhinga sightings in New Jersey in the past decade including 120 reports this spring and summer.
The bird was seen just eight times between 2017 and 2020 and either zero or a handful of times in prior years, the data showed.
Scott Barnes, senior naturalist for the local NJ Audubon which is separate from the national organization, said those figures should be taken with a grain of salt.
The group’s NJ Bird Records Committee has only vetted and verified just over 20 Anhinga sightings in New Jersey since the early 1970s. The hundreds of sightings that show up on eBird over the years point to the same bird or flock seen multiple times in different areas.
He emphasized that researchers and climate advocates typically don’t take the data at face value because — among other reasons — Anhingas are often mistaken for double-crested cormorants.
The majority of the recent Jersey sightings took place in different parts of Cape May County like the Higbee Beach Wildlife Management Area and near the Cape May Lighthouse. But also as far north as Sandy Hook and the Montclair Hawkwatch in Essex County.
The bird has been seen in ten New Jersey counties over the decades.
Barnes, who has seen Anhingas on four occasions in 1997 and then in the early 2000s, said sightings in our region tend to take place in coastal areas between April and June.
That, various experts said, is likely due to the warmer weather.
“More recently, especially this year, there is an increasingly apparent pattern of birds occurring north of the previously typical range,” Farnsworth said while explaining the latest reports. “It’s likely the bird is expanding its range north with climate changes like increasingly warmer winter and spring temperatures, and perhaps increasingly wet conditions in some areas of the southeast leading to increases in population that can then expand.”
Recent Anhinga, or "devil bird," sightings have been reported in the northern part of the U.S. including New Jersey and New York. Pictured: The water bird in April 2019 in Florida (taken by a Jersey Shore photographer).Photo by Susan Allen
‘Time will tell’
In the U.S., the Anhinga — which you can listen to here — is known to reside throughout the year in southern states like Florida, Texas and Louisiana as well as parts of the Carolinas during the summer, species migration data from the National Audubon Society outlines.
A map of that flight migration, necessary for the birds to find food or ideal places to nest, shows large swaths of South America taken up by the bird’s travels.
And yet, in April the “devil bird” was seen in New York City for the second time ever since 1992.
Echoing researchers, Farnsworth said the latest Prospect Park sighting — not shocking as the bird has been seen spottily in Pennsylvania and New York over the years too — pointed to the bird seeking a hospitable habitat given increasingly hot temperatures.
New Jersey’s biodiversity and that the bird species is built to travel is also notable, researchers explained.
A study published by the Cornell Lab of Ornithology notes: “Anhingas are strong fliers, often soaring at great altitude above their wetland habitats with wings held flat and neck out, presenting a distinct cross.”
For bird watchers — and other New Jerseyans — seeing an Anhinga out in the wild can be stirring.
Susan Allen, a Jersey Shore photographer who captured an Anhinga on her camera in Florida four years ago, said she is at the ready to see one here.
“They remind me of the cormorants we see here in New Jersey because they too dive for fish,” Allen said. “I often visit Forsythe National Wildlife Refuge and occasionally I’ll see a species that is far from home after getting blown off course. I’ve seen a roseate spoonbill and black-necked stilts in the past. No Anhingas for me yet.”
Torino, who did have luck seeing one in the late 1980s but did not have eBird at the time to report it to, says sightings are happening more and more with other bird species as well.
In 2022, flocks of white ibis, evident by their milky bodies and bright orange bills, were discovered establishing nests at the Jersey Shore. The years-long resurgence of the bald eagle population here is also positive news.
But threats — tied to human-caused climate change — to our residential birds exist as well. In the form of less land for seagulls to lay eggs or not ideal temperatures for the movements of American Goldfinch — the state bird of New Jersey.
Even grimmer, a report released in 2019 by the National Audubon Society found two-thirds of America’s birds are threatened with extinction due to climate change.
“We have white ibis that are breeding down in Ocean City. Is that (them) changing their range?” Torino wondered. “In the 1950s somebody saw a mockingbird ... and birders would come from all over. Now, mockingbirds are common.”
Barnes, who goes bird watching for NJ Audubon three times a week in the spring and fall, said he doesn’t expect Anhinga to be seen nesting here anytime soon.
“More time and observations will probably tell us whether or not we’re going to start to see them more frequently or it’s just this low level event that happens on a somewhat regular basis — where we get these sort of stray birds that are north of where their normal range is,” he said. “So time will tell.”
Torino said while seeing more Anhinga right now is by no means bad news, “it could be a sign of things to come” when considering the longterm ramifications of climate change which may be hard to fathom right now.
The bird is not a danger to people but may present competition to native species looking for prey, for instance.
For Torino, tree swallows might provide a lesson.
“When I see tree swallows come back two weeks early,” he said of the bird that commonly migrates in our area and feeds on insects, “that’s kind of scary. When arriving early, the food sources may not be there. I’m not a scientist but things are happening really fast.”
If you see an Anhinga, Torino said it’s important to keep one’s distance in case the bird is nesting. You should also avoid playing bird calls on your phone because that can distract a bird from its migration or from finding a mate.
He and other experts said reporting the sighting on eBird helps for data gathering purposes.
And there’s still plenty we have to learn about Anhinga.
“I am interested in their patterns of occurrence relative to changing climate, and so monitoring the leading waves of these occurrences when they are out of typical range is fascinating to me in terms of local weather, regional and national climate,” said Farnsworth, “and the ways birds move in space and time.”
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Steven Rodas may be reached at srodas@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @stevenrodasnj.