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6 September 2010
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Rockport, Maine, USA
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Posts Tagged ‘tufted titmouse’
Friday, September 3rd, 2010
 Veery. Ack! Slept late. Up and dressed in a hurry, to Beech Hill by 7:45 a.m. Hazy sun, warm and muggy still, with just a taste of strangeness in the breeze—strangeness, perhaps, because Hurricane Earl is on the way? Who knows. But chickadees were chatting and chittering in the distance, so I had hopes of seeing a few silent bird species chowing down before the storm. Because they must know change is coming. If only fall migration.
 Chestnut-sided warbler (juvenile). After our first few hundred paces, Jack’s and mine, we’d counted some typical species, then stopped in a sunny part of the trail when I heard an unfamiliar chip! call from the undergrowth. I never did see the source of the chip!, but I did spot a young chestnut-sided warbler that zipped up into a tree in front of us. They sure are fast flyers—or sure can be.
Soon after, I heard another chip! This one sounded sort of like a white-throat, but a little different. We stopped again, and again another bird flitted silently up near us—a red-eyed vireo this time, and a great photo-op, but I passed it up, silly me. Instead, I got a ghostly shot of what was sure enough a white-throated sparrow peeping at us from beyond a thicket of old summer leaves.
 Northern harrier. Entering the open fields, I scanned the distance, as I always do. A golden haze hung in the east over the bay. And there not far off, a marsh hawk—a northern harrier—dipped and veered over a grassy slope, its white rump flashing.
Before long, reaching the summit, I was watching another hawk—a sparrow hawk, a kestrel—flapping up and over Beech Nut. It soon disappeared, but then looking out to sea again, again I spotted the harrier (or another one) dipping and hovering over the same far eastern field.
 White-throated sparrow. Although most birds I listed today were silent, toward Beech Hill Road I heard the distinctive alarm notes of a rose-breasted grosbeak and a northern cardinal. Marauding bands of chickadees were sweeping through that area also—but nothing else too interesting showed up. In fact, it took until we’d already crested the summit again and plunged into the trees for the next bird to pop up. Also silent. Flitted up into a twig very near the trail. We froze, it froze. At first I thought it an ovenbird, but I quickly saw it was a thrush. Specifically, a veery. I bet we watched each other for a good three minutes, if not more.
Nothing but a single vireo down the lower wooded trail—quite the contrast to yesterday—until we made the turn onto the last leg before the parking lot. I thought I caught sight of another silent, mouse-like bird jumping off the trail and into the brush. We stopped. Waited. A small movement. Sure enough, a quiet little bird. An ovenbird, ironically. When it moved, it seemed so subtle as hardly to influence the universe at all.
But I got a ghostly photo.
 Ovenbird. Beech Hill List
Beginning at 7:45 a.m., I hiked all trails.
1. Black-capped chickadee
2. Common yellowthroat
3. Gray catbird
4. Black-billed cuckoo (voice)
5. Eastern towhee (voice)
6. Blue jay (voice)
7. American robin (voice)
8. Chestnut-sided warbler
9. Cedar waxwing
10. White-throated sparrow
11. Red-eyed vireo
12. Northern harrier
13. Song sparrow
14. Kestrel
15. American crow (voice)
16. American goldfinch (voice)
17. Common raven (voice)
18. Rose-breasted grosbeak (voice)
19. Northern cardinal (voice)
20. Mourning dove
21. Veery
22. Ovenbird
Elsewhere
23. Herring gull
24. Tufted titmouse
25. Rock pigeon
 The bay.
Tags: American crow, American goldfinch, American robin, black-billed cuckoo, black-capped chickadee, blue jay, Cedar waxwing, chestnut-sided warbler, common raven, common yellowthroat, eastern towhee, gray catbird, herring gull, kestrel, mourning dove, Northern cardinal, Northern harrier, ovenbird, red-eyed vireo, rock pigeon, rose-breasted grosbeak, song sparrow, tufted titmouse, veery, white-throated sparrow
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Monday, August 30th, 2010
 Black-throated blue warbler. Jack and I got to Beech Hill about 7 this morning, and already the temperature had risen well into the 70s (F). The sun blazed from the eastern sky, warming the forested side of the hill—which, of course, is where we begin our hike each morning.
 Blue jay. Little frogs calling in the periphery. The usual common species as we ascended. Coming around the little stand of popple where chestnut-sideds sing in spring, I suddenly heard the clear four- or five-note call of a redstart. Then a sharp chip from above: a warbler there, a black-throated blue. It flitted close—but directly above us, where it proceeded to pick a spider out of its web up there. It chipped, eyed us below, robbed the web of whatever morsel the spider had wrapped up. Just as I imagined that if this bird defecated, it’d come pretty close to my head—it pooped. The poop landed on a berry leaf about a foot away.
Soon after, a couple of ruffed grouse rose loudly at our approach through thick undergrowth.
At the summit, a breeze whispered through the boughs of the spruces. I heard sparrows and a single yellow-rump. That’s all.
 Common yellowthroat (female). Coming down the open trail, I heard jays and crows. At the hardwood thickets along Beech Hill Road, a family of jays pecked at acorns in the shadows. A titmouse carried some morsel or other. Another titmouse hung around nearby. Yellowthroats and catbirds sent out their subtle alarm calls and made very brief, shady appearances. From somewhere, a cicada sang.
Sweat soaked my T-shirt as we climbed back up and over. A solitary savannah sparrow flitted down the open slope—a migrating bird, I figure. And in the lower wooded trail, I heard only chickadees, nuthatches, a wood-pewee, and a single vireo.
* * *
This afternoon, while out cycling in the summery heat, I saw a good-sized flock of starlings circling above the commercial strip of Route 1. The sighting gave me a premonition of fall.
 Tufted titmouse. Beech Hill List
Beginning at 7 a.m., I hiked all trails.
1. Red-eyed vireo (voice)
2. Black-capped chickadee
3. White-breasted nuthatch (voice)
4. Common yellowthroat
5. Hairy woodpecker
6. American redstart (voice)
7. Black-throated blue warbler
8. American robin (voice)
9. Ruffed grouse (flushed)
10. Cedar waxwing
11. American goldfinch
12. White-throated sparrow
13. Song sparrow (voice)
14. Yellow-rumped warbler
15. Northern flicker (voice)
16. American crow (voice)
17. Blue jay
18. Mourning dove
19. Gray catbird
20. Tufted titmouse
21. Savannah sparrow
22. Eastern wood-pewee (voice)
Elsewhere
22. Herring gull
23. Osprey
24. House sparrow
25. Northern cardinal
26. European starling
 Cedar waxwing.
Tags: American crow, American goldfinch, American redstart, American robin, black-capped chickadee, black-throated blue warbler, blue jay, Cedar waxwing, common yellowthroat, eastern wood-pewee, European starling, gray catbird, hairy woodpecker, herring gull, house sparrow, mourning dove, Northern cardinal, northern flicker, osprey, red-eyed vireo, ruffed grouse, savannah sparrow, song sparrow, tufted titmouse, white-breasted nuthatch, white-throated sparrow, yellow-rumped warbler
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Saturday, August 28th, 2010
 Red-tailed hawk (Weskeag Marsh). Jack and I slept late. It’s Saturday, after all, and I’m fighting off the Lyme disease bacterium. OK, so the meds have pretty much fought it off already—but still. A man’s gotta sleep sometime.
 Blue-headed vireo (Beech Hill). But hit the hill we did, just a little late. Sun was out. A little breezy. Crickets singing, and cicadas. A couple monarchs and other butterflies. Just a hint of fall ion the air, along with a few red leaves. And birds. Pretty many birds.
First to call was a hairy woodpecker, and then a few of the usual suspects, and then a black-billed cuckoo, and then we startled a partridge. As the trail opened up, where we came upon alder flycatchers yesterday, today we came upon phoebes. My friend Kristen says flycatchers migrate together, so maybe this is what’s going on.
Then, surprisingly, a field sparrow hopped over to harangue us for a while. It’s funny. You hear their musical song in spring and early summer, but you can’t get near enough for a photo. Then, once they nest and (presumably) have young to defend, they seek you out and get close. This is the second such bird I’ve photographed on these terms of his, not mine.
 Field sparrow (Beech Hill). Down toward Beech Hill Road, I heard some chickadees and so began to scan the hardwoods—chickadees often being the indicator of other, quieter species flitting about, I’ve learned. Sure enough, I spotted a parula among them, along with a chestnut-sided warbler and a couple I couldn’t identify.
Then I heard the strange, very soft warbling sound I’d heard down there before without seeing its source. But this time I did: a blue-headed vireo. I still sort of shake my head at how different the soft warble is from its typical call, but there you go.
 Bobolink (Weskeag Marsh). Nothing much else on Beech Hill, but at high tide this early afternoon I met my friends Kristen and Paul at Weskeag Marsh in south Thomaston, the idea being that shorebirds would be moving through. Well, rather oddly, we saw very few shorebirds moving through. There were some least sandpipers and yellowlegs. There were snowy and great egrets. There were a pair or three red-tailed hawks. A great-blue heron. And—curiously, to me—a bobolink way out in the pannes. But no great clouds of shorebirds. A lonesome merlin flew over, even, looking similarly baffled at the dearth of wheeling flocks birds.
It was beautiful down there, though. Photogenic clouds in a summer-blue sky, and a red-tail up there soaring.
 Least sandpiper (Weskeag Marsh). Beech Hill List
Beginning at 8:45 a.m., I hiked all trails.
1. Hairy woodpecker (voice)
2. Red-eyed vireo (voice)
3. Black-capped chickadee
4. Eastern towhee (voice)
5. Common yellowthroat
6. Black-billed cuckoo (voice)
7. White-throated sparrow
8. Ruffed grouse (flushed, voice)
9. Eastern phoebe
10. Field sparrow
11. Gray catbird
12. American crow
13. Cedar waxwing
14. Song sparrow
15. Mourning dove
16. Savannah sparrow
17. Blue jay
18. American goldfinch
19. White-breasted nuthatch (voice)
20. Blue-headed vireo
21. Tufted titmouse
22. Northern parula
23. Chestnut-sided warbler
 Greater yellowlegs (Weskeag Marsh). Weskeag Marsh List
Arrived at 2:15 p.m., walked the pannes.
24. Northern shoveler
25. Herring gull
26. Snowy egret
27. Red-tailed hawk
28. Great egret
29. Merlin
30. Least sandpiper
31. Bobolink
32. Greater yellowlegs
33. Lesser yellowlegs
34. Great blue heron
35. Double-crested cormorant
Elsewhere
36. House sparrow
 Weskeag Marsh.
Tags: American crow, American goldfinch, black-billed cuckoo, black-capped chickadee, blue jay, blue-headed vireo, bobolink, Cedar waxwing, chestnut-sided warbler, common yellowthroat, double-crested cormorant, Eastern phoebe, eastern towhee, field sparrow, gray catbird, great blue heron, great egret, greater yellowlegs, hairy woodpecker, herring gull, house sparrow, least sandpiper, lesser yellowlegs, merlin, mourning dove, northern parula, northern shoveler, red-eyed vireo, red-tailed hawk, ruffed grouse, savannah sparrow, snowy egret, song sparrow, tufted titmouse, white-breasted nuthatch, white-throated sparrow
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Saturday, August 21st, 2010
 Yellow warbler. Slept hard, awoke lightheaded. It’s the meds. Must be.
 Black-and-white warbler (female). It was a sunny morning. Still. A little on the cool side. But otherwise, not a particularly memorable hike at Beech Hill. I simply couldn’t concentrate. I do recall a singing alder flycatcher—they’ve been pretty quiet for the last few weeks—and the northern harrier teetering low over the summit. I remember all the little birds, sparrows and warblers and vireos, flitting silently in small groups here or there in the trees.
There were two redstarts, one calling down by the Beech Hill Road, and another hunting for insects and caterpillars along with black-and-whites, yellows, and red-eyed vireos just down from the summit on the wooded trail.
Oddly, there were no savannah sparrows that I saw. And I was looking for them.
Kept feeling lightheaded. On Jack’s and my return, we both took naps.
 Blurry northern harrier. Beech Hill List
Beginning at 7:30 a.m., I hiked all trails.
1. Red-eyed vireo
2. Black-capped chickadee
3. White-breasted nuthatch
4. Blue jay
5. Black-and-white warbler
6. Gray catbird
7. American crow
8. Cedar waxwing
9. Alder flycatcher
10. American goldfinch
11. Eastern towhee
12.Common yellowthroat
13. Yellow warbler
14. Song sparrow
15. White-throated sparrow
16. Eastern phoebe
17. Red-breasted nuthatch
18. Northern harrier
19. Eastern wood-pewee
20. American redstart
21. Black-throated green warbler
22. Tufted titmouse
23. Hairy woodpecker
24. Chestnut-sided warbler
Elsewhere
25. Herring gull
Tags: alder flycatcher, American crow, American goldfinch, black-and-white warbler, black-capped chickadee, black-throated green warbler, blue jay, Cedar waxwing, chestnut-sided warbler, common yellowthroat, Eastern phoebe, eastern towhee, eastern wood-pewee, gray catbird, hairy woodpecker, herring gull, mourning dove, Northern harrier, red-breasted nuthatch, red-eyed vireo, song sparrow, tufted titmouse, white-breasted nuthatch, white-throated sparrow, yellow warbler
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Thursday, August 19th, 2010
 Eastern towhee (young male). On awakening, I heard fog horns, but sunlight was illuminating the back sides of the blinds. On our drive up Powerhouse Hill, Jack’s and mine, I saw nothing but blue above, but a great fog bank cloaked the bay. As we started up the trail, the air felt cool, with maybe just a nip of fall—the kind of nip at the heels that’ll cause a tiny songbird to want to stock up on food all day.
 Common yellowthroat (female). Nuthatch, vireo, blue jay, crow, robin, black-billed cuckoo. That last one was unusual. Catbird, veery—veery? I’d neither seen nor heard a veery in weeks. How come I heard one calling this morning all of a sudden? I suppose I’ll never know.
Towhee, yellowthroat, hairy woodpecker. Plenty of birds out this morning. Then about half-way up we heard the panting of Greta behind us, and so we let Chuck and his German shepherd dog pass. After all, we pause for pictures.
At the summit, the spruces were busy with birds, as usual lately. More ruby-throats (what is it they like about spruces?), a red-breasted nuthatch, some warblers I couldn’t identify. Also the obligatory phoebe and mourning dove. And the sparrows—white-throat and song and savannah.
 Eastern phoebe. Descending the open trail, I heard the pewee that’s been singing down the slope toward South Street. And for the third straight day, winding through the last brushy stretch to Beech Hill Road, I came upon a celebration of small birds. Vireos, sparrows, wood-warblers—yellow, chestnut-sided, black-and-white, yellow-rump—and a lone least flycatcher singing it’s chi-bek! up in the crown of a hardwood tree. I caught sight of the flycatcher. And got a distant photo.
(Why would a least flycatcher show up all of a sudden today?)
On the return trip up and over, nothing much stood out. No large, overflying bird—no hawk or raven. But nearing our starting point, I heard the loud, long call of a pileated woodpecker not a hundred feet away. And a titmouse sang too-too-too-too! just as we reached the truck.
Later, while cycling up Powerhouse Hill, I couldn’t help but notice a large wheel of laughing gulls circling overhead. “What’s up with all the laughing gulls?” I thought to myself.
Some questions have no answers.
 Chestnut-sided warbler (juvenile). Beech Hill List
Beginning at 6:45 a.m., I hiked all trails.
1. White-breasted nuthatch (voice)
2. Red-eyed vireo (voice)
3. American crow (voice)
4. Blue jay
5. American robin (voice)
6. Black-billed cuckoo (voice)
7. Gray catbird
8. Veery (voice)
9. Eastern towhee
10. Common yellowthroat
11. Hairy woodpecker
12. Cedar waxwing
13. American goldfinch (voice)
14. White-throated sparrow
15. Eastern phoebe
16. Yellow warbler
17. Eastern flicker (voice)
18. Song sparrow
19. Mourning dove
20. Ruby-throated hummingbird
21. Red-breasted nuthatch
22. Savannah sparrow
23. Eastern wood-pewee (voice)
24. Chestnut-sided warbler
25. Rose-breasted grosbeak (voice)
26. Least flycatcher
27. Black-and-white warbler
28. Blue-headed vireo (voice)
29. Yellow-rumped warbler
30. Pileated woodpecker (voice)
31. Tufted titmouse (voice)
Elsewhere
32. Herring gull
33. Northern cardinal
34. Rock pigeon
35. Laughing gull
36. European starling
 Least flycatcher.
Tags: American crow, American goldfinch, American robin, black-and-white warbler, black-billed cuckoo, blue jay, blue-headed vireo, Cedar waxwing, chestnut-sided warbler, common yellowthroat, eastern flicker, Eastern phoebe, eastern towhee, eastern wood-pewee, gray catbird, hairy woodpecker, herring gull, least flycatcher, mourning dove, Northern cardinal, pileated woodpecker, red-breasted nuthatch, red-eyed vireo, rose-breasted grosbeak, ruby throated hummingbird, savannah sparrow, song sparrow, tufted titmouse, veery, white-breasted nuthatch, white-throated sparrow, yellow warbler, yellow-rumped warbler
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| Bird Report is an intermittent record of what's outside my window in Rockport, Maine, USA (44°08'N latitude, 69°06'W longitude), and vicinity. —Brian Willson |
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