A long way from home: Rare bird makes stop in area, draws crowds

DONIPHAN — A routine trip to the Current River last weekend turned out to be anything but routine for a Poplar Bluff woman and her family after they found a rare bird perched on a limb near the water.

“Me and my husband and my granddaughter … that’s what we do. Every weekend we go to the river,” said Debbie Prance-Orosz.

But Saturday turned out differently.

“We got to a spot where we’re normally at a lot, and this odd looking bird-duck was just sitting there observing and watching everybody go by,” recalled Prance-Orosz.

The family maneuvered their boat within 10 feet of the bird and, still, it didn’t move.

“It wouldn’t budge and didn’t care how close I got to it,” Prance-Orosz said.

She took several photos with her iPhone, and intrigued by the odd bird, she made a post on Facebook asking for help identifying it.

And suddenly, Doniphan became the center of attention for Missouri’s birding enthusiasts.

The bird, a brown booby, has never before been recorded in Missouri and is a pantropical species, typically seen along the southern coastlines, into South America and the west coast of Africa.

“Once I started researching it, I realized this is a big deal, and now that I know a little more about it, I’m glad I was there at the right time and right place and was able to post it,” Prance-Orosz said.

“It’s extremely unusual,” said Poplar Bluff birder Bruce Beck. “I’ve seen it in Central America several times, but getting it up here is really strange.”

Beck suspects the bird moved into the region on the winds of a storm.

“Usually, when birds come here from so far away, it’s because a hurricane blows them off course,” Beck said.

Avid Ripley County birder Steve Paes saw Prance-Orosz’s Facebook post and, along with his friend and fellow birder Cindy Bridges, went to see it themselves on Monday.

“I made inquiries and talked to somebody who saw it, and that gave us a starting point,” Paes said.

The pair eventually found the bird, and Bridges posted photographs and information on the popular online birding website www.ebird.org.

At that point, Paes said, people from all over began making the trip to Doniphan to see such a rarity.

“We’ve had people from Kirksville, Kansas City, St. Louis … people are driving half a day for a chance to see it,” Paes said.

“Knowledgeable birders have told me, on a scale of one to 10, that this is a 10,” Paes added.

On Tuesday, Prance-Orosz’s husband, Tom, took a mother and son from Licking, Missouri out to see the bird.

The son, she said, was doing a school project and “the overwhelming thankfulness they gave me just brought me joy.

“This is people’s passion. This right here is something rare they’re able to experience. That made it all worthwhile for me.”

Since the ebird posting, Paes and others have been shuttling people on the river to see the bird.

“I arranged for two or three volunteers who had boats, and I started being the go-between for people who needed boat rides to see it,” he said.

On Friday morning, Paes said, there were 15 people lined up at the boat ramp waiting for their chance to see the bird.

However, its presence may have been just a small sliver in time. As of mid-morning Friday, it had yet to be located again.

“This is the first day since it was found that we’ve not been able to find it,” Paes said. “Hopefully someday it finds the ocean.”