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Archive for August, 2010
Wednesday, August 25th, 2010
 Savannah sparrow. Overcast and breezy this early morning—much like the day before yesterday, except somehow chillier, somehow damper, somehow nearer to fall. Jack and I got to the hill a little late, as we have the past few days, but we found ourselves alone. Not many birds calling along the wooded trails. Widely intermittent bird calls. And most of them mere chip notes.
 Black-capped chickadee. Then, about two-thirds of the way along the upper wooded trail I heard the call of a veery. Veeries as a nesting species are not at all uncommon on Beech Hill. They’re vocal in spring, their fountainy songs lending a lovely, ethereal backdrop to the blooming woodland. But once they’ve nested, they go suddenly silent. Today’s bird was the first I’d heard in weeks. Peering into the greenery, I saw it. Lovely.
Crickets sang. The wind rushed through the boughs of trees. Rain was forecast for later in day.
No birds at all in the summit spruces, oddly. But I did hear robins at several points on the hill. That made two thrushes today. And there were plenty of sparrows—white-throateds, songs, and savannahs.
Wait, savannahs?
I hadn’t seen a savannah sparrow in three days, an observation that had me convinced they’d moved on to some great savannah sparrow staging area, from which they’d migrate south in a week or two or three. But today, as Jack and I came around the first curve in the open trail, one flew swiftly up ahead of us low to the ground, as is their habit. Then another sent it’s staccato chip note our way from behind a bush. Then it and one or two others flitted up the hill and dipped quickly into clumps of grass. Perhaps a family of stragglers? Perhaps birds traveling from some other hill up north?
As it happens, the savannahs were the last species I saw until we’d nearly returned to the Rockville Street trailhead when, passing through the brambles near the vernal pool, I heard familiar warbler-style chipping from a blackberry thicket: a family of chestnut-sideds stocking up on grub.
The rain came, sure enough. And it was a big one, an extended downpour—in fact, the hardest rain I can remember since last year.
 Beech Nut. Beech Hill List
Beginning at 7:15 a.m., I hiked all trails.
1. Cedar waxwing (voice)
2. Blue jay (voice)
3. Black-capped chickadee
4. Gray catbird
5. American crow (voice)
6. Veery
7. American robin (voice)
8. White-throated sparrow
9. Song sparrow (voice)
10. American goldfinch (voice)
11. Common yellowthroat
12. Eastern towhee
13. Savannah sparrow
14. Chestnut-sided warbler
Elsewhere
15. Northern cardinal
16. Herring gull
17. House sparrow
18. Rock pigeon
 Blackberries.
Tags: American crow, American goldfinch, American robin, blue jay, Cedar waxwing, chestnut-sided warbler, common yellowthroat, eastern towhee, herring gull, house sparrow, northern cardinal, ray catbird, rock pigeon, savannah sparrow, song sparrow, veery, white-throated sparrow
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Tuesday, August 24th, 2010
 Ovenbird. Today dawned pretty much the spittin’ image of yesterday—except for one prominent difference. Chilly? Check. Windy? Check. A hint of autumn?Check. Overcast? Mm, not so much. More like utter cloudlessness.
 Tweety didn't make it. But the Beech Hill birds nonetheless remained mostly silent. And I couldn’t hear the vocal ones from much of a distance, thanks to the rush of the wind up in the still-summery boughs of trees. The long calls of crickets. The remnant feathers of a small bird kill down toward Beech Hill Road. The solitary squawking of a wood frog along a forested trail.
Most engaging were the unpredictable little groups of secretive-yet-antic wood-warblers dodging about in the greenery at various points of the hill. Right away, along the wooded trail, I did hear a black-and-white warbler. Then a small dark shape flitting low through a sparser section of undergrowth seemed suggestive of an ovenbird—and an ovenbird it was, standing there on a bare branch maybe twenty feet away, turning its body this way, then that. A few yellowthroats, as usual.
Toward the summit, among a flurry of white-throated sparrows and chickadees, I spotted a couple yellow warblers—and the second Tennessee of the year up there. Then, amid the spruces, a family of three or four yellow-rumps. Aside from the black-and-white and the yellowthroats’ chips, none made any sound at all.
Not much happening otherwise. I did go out cycling this afternoon—and therefore am pronouncing my treatment for the tick bite (or whatever it is (I’m still not entirely sold)) a qualified success. Saw a turkey vulture taking off from behind some trees. Flap-flap, soar. Flap-flap, soar. Soar.
 White-throated sparrow. Beech Hill List
Beginning at 7:15 a.m., I hiked all trails.
1. Red-eyed vireo (voice)
2. Black-capped chickadee
3. Cedar waxwing (voice)
4. White-breasted nuthatch (voice)
5. Black-and-white warbler (voice)
6. Ovenbird
7. Common yellowthroat
8. Eastern towhee
9. White-throated sparrow
10. Gray catbird
11. Tennessee warbler
12. Yellow warbler
13. Song sparrow
14. Eastern phoebe
15. Mourning dove
16. Yellow-rumped warbler
17. Gray catbird
18. American goldfinch
19. Hairy woodpecker (voice)
Elsewhere
20. Northern cardinal
21. Herring gull
22. House sparrow
23. Turkey vulture
Tags: American goldfinch, black-and-white warbler, black-capped chickadee, Cedar waxwing, common yellowthroat, eastern phoebe, eastern towhee, gray catbird, hairy woodpecker, herring gull, house sparrow, mourning dove, northern cardinal, ovenbird, red-eyed vireo, song sparrow, Tennessee warbler, turkey vulture, white-breasted nuthatch, white-throated sparrow, yellow warbler, yellow-rumped warbler
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Monday, August 23rd, 2010
 Plastic pellet on the trail. An overcast morning. A chilly morning. A blustery morning. Frankly, a rather fall-like morning—with the long voices of crickets, deep red leaves on the maple, and a portentous silence among birds.
 Eastern phoebe. The leafy canopy above the wooded Beech Hill trail rocked and swayed as Jack and I began our daily hike. I neither heard nor saw a bird for a good few minutes, and then I heard a waxwing. Over time, I counted a smattering of other birds, but nothing outlandish or extraoridinary. I did see quite a few white-throated sparrows flitting about the trailside undergrowth.
But some other things I saw, as they usually do, gave me pause: bright plastic pellets. Colorful BBs. Orange and green and white they are. Or yellow. Or gray or blue.
For two or three years I’ve seen them—three years, I’m pretty sure—littering the wooded trails. Not littering in a profuse sense, but in an occasional-yet-dependable sense. I’ve found them all over the hill. And every time I see one, I pick it up and put it in my left front pocket. Because they’re plastic, after all. They don’t belong out there. And although I’ve heard allegations that they’re biodegradable, I don’t buy it, pal. The hundred or so I’ve pocketed, at least, look like plain ol’ plastic.
 Morning bay. OK, I’ve just stopped to count all those I’ve collected on the trails over the past few years: 127.5. (One day I found half a green one that’d split right down the middle.) I don’t know who brings the Airsoft replica firearms—or whatever they are—up the hill and fires off pellets. Or why. Gaming? Target practice? Potshots at birds? But the whole idea of recreational plastic-BB-shooting strikes me as a conspiracy to take a heavy container of thousands of tiny plastic spheres and, capitalizing on human beings’ peculiar concept of “fun,” distribute them widely out in the far reaches of Nature. Do they actually cause problems? Do birds think the red ones are berries, eat them, and die? I have no idea. But they sure don’t seem biodegradable to me.
Today I picked up only three of the pellets—two orange, one green. Some days I pick up many, many more.
At three separate points on the open trail, I saw herring gulls flying. I also spotted a solitary phoebe and heard a single alder flycatcher. Heard a single catbird, a single robin, and a single (!) red-eyed vireo. And saw one black-and-white warbler.
Lots of white-throats, though. And at least a half-dozen yellowthroats.
And three plastic pellets on the trails.
Beech Hill List
Beginning at 7:15 a.m., I hiked all trails.
1. Cedar waxwing
2. Black-capped chickadee
3. American crow
4. Eastern towhee
5. Common yellowthroat
6. White-throated sparrow
7. Herring gull
8. American goldfinch
9. Song sparrow
10. Blue jay
11. Eastern phoebe
12. Gray catbird
13. Hairy woodpecker
14. Alder flycatcher
15. American robin
16. Black-and-white warbler
17. Red-eyed vireo
Elsewhere
18. Northern cardinal
Tags: alder flycatcher, American crow, American goldfinch, American robin, black-and-white warbler, black-capped chickadee, blue jay, Cedar waxwing, common yellowthroat, eastern phoebe, eastern towhee, gray catbird, hairy woodpecker, herring gull, red-eyed vireo, song sparrow, white-throated sparrow
Posted in Lists, Observations | No Comments »
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| Bird Report is a (sometimes intermittent) record of the birds I encounter while hiking, see while driving, or spy outside my window. —Brian Willson |
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