Why bird? I can think of many answers to the question. But here’s one…

Jack, my birding dog, and I had been hiking around Beech Hill for about an hour and a half. The morning was chilly enough to make me think perhaps I should’ve worn more than a T-shirt—but after a few hundred yards in sunny, dewy conditions I found myself plenty warm enough. Silent birds for the most part, still, aside from occasional chickadees and mewing catbirds.

One oddity was the female purple finch that I heard maybe half-way up emitting a curious, quiet warble. I spotted it in the bare upper branches of a small dead tree. Then, a few minutes later, it appeared again (I feel sure it was the same bird) among a little grouping of chickadees, a red-eyed vireo, a white-throated sparrow, and a yellow-rumped warbler. The vireo had some kind of winged insect that it had stepped on with one foot and was pulling at with its formidable beak.

Coming up over the summit, we’d seen a phoebe and mourning dove in the little spruce grove near Beech Nut—not unusual sightings for that area—and coming down the open trail, I actually counted three savannah sparrows this morning. That’s three times the number I’ve seen in recent days, and I don’t know if they’re residents or simply migrants moving through, but I love those little guys.

Nearing the Beech Hill Road parking lot, I heard the loud laughter of a pileated woodpecker, and so I said to Jack, “Slow.” We crept down and as we reached the lot, I looked up at the tops of hardwoods—and before I could bring my camera up, the woodpecker took off from the tip of a tall birch and flapped away to the northwest.

We hiked back up over and entered the wooded trail and heard more chickadees and saw a black-throated green warbler and more vireos. Then, coming around a familiar turn at the lower edge of a grove of tall oaks, I heard—simultaneously—the faint honks of a white-breasted nuthatch and the high-pitched see! notes of brown creepers. (I watched a particular brown creeper for a good five minutes, I bet, but the light was so dim I managed no decent photos despite probably two dozen shutter releases.) What a day.

We’d nearly reached our startint point, and I figured that was it. Not bad. Twenty species, some nice ones.

Then I caught sight of a smallish, slim hawk alighting on the branch of a tree just up ahead. I stopped, Jack stopped. Still dim beneath the canopy, but I snapped off a bunch of photos. Then I thought I should kneel down and try to still my camera—and suddenly I heard the loud, wispy sound of wingbeats in the crowns of the hardwoods directly above us. Being focused on the hawk, I snapped off several more photos before checking on the wing-beat sound. Jack was looking upward. I finally turned and looked myself—just as a common raven took wing from a limb overhead.

Perhaps the raven saw the hawk. (Perhaps also vice versa.) Perhaps it was just checking on the bird. Or on the dog and man. But I’d never been so close to a raven—maybe thirty feet away. Compared to the cooper’s hawk, the raven was huge. Maybe three times as big.

Ravens are enormous birds.

And the acute thrill I felt on seeing the raven? Well, that’s today’s answer to the question, “Why bird?”

Beech Hill List
Beginning at 8 a.m., I hiked all trails.

1. Black-capped chickadee
2. American crow (voice)
3. Red-eyed vireo
4. American robin (voice)
5. Gray catbird (voice)
6. Eastern towhee (voice)
7. Cedar waxwing
8. Purple finch
9. Yellow-rumped warbler
10. White-throated sparrow (voice)
11. Common yellowthroat (voice)
12. Song sparrow (voice)
13. Eastern phoebe
14. Savannah sparrow
15. Pileated woodpecker
16. Blue jay (voice)
17. Mourning dove
18. Black-throated green warbler
19. Brown creeper
20. White-breasted nuthatch (voice)
21. Cooper’s hawk
22. Common raven

Elsewhere

23. Herring gull