Freezing. Let’s see what’s brave.
At ten past six, a Warbling Vireo begins its song from a tree near the confluence. Three minutes later, the Osprey appears in the clear sky. The regular dawn chorus is well underway; I didn’t expect robins to be audibly affected by the cold, and they’re not. Nor House Sparrows, nor cardinals, though the Song Sparrows seem a bit muffled today.
The neighborhood Fish Crow lands on a nearby power pole and calls volubly, again and again; I can see its breath in little clouds. Then it’s off downtown.
A question about cold: with no insects in the air, how do the Chimney Swifts fare? Huddle? 6:18 and the question is answered: a few are already out and about. Perhaps they’re trying to keep warm.
My favorite dead ash snag briefly becomes the property of a singing Northern Cardinal:
At the half hour, a male and two female Common Mergansers speed north out of the Gap, hugging Bald Eagle Mountain.
Nemesis Vanquished
Activity is picking up in the brushy sycamore woods between the confluence and the interstate, a patch of messy ground behind the bank and this side of the junkyard. A Worm-eating Warbler shows up, and though I can never see it through the thickening foliage, its dry trill is unmistakable as it moves from tree to tree. I believe it’s a balcony first, and where one warbler goes, others are sure to follow. Nevertheless, it’s hard to hear much of anything under the roar of trucks at peak commute, with a foreground of Common Grackles, all through the trees, along with House Sparrows and starlings.
At 6:38, I finally hear it: Yellow-throated Warbler! I’d know that song anywhere, even muffled as it is by all the cacophony. It’s back behind the confluence somewhere, and try as I might I can never see it. Certainly the habitat for it, and perhaps the only detection I’ll have this year. I hope it’s heading upriver to one of the several promising riparian breeding spots in less disturbed forest between here and Altoona.
Pecking Disorder
A gutter in a nearby apartment has become quite a feeding frenzy. Mourning Doves, American Robins, European Starlings, and House Sparrows are all showing up and rummaging around in it. I wonder whether it has dead bugs from the frost. Hard to know, and I don’t spend much time looking, and no photos, to avoid intruding on neighbors. Meanwhile, here’s a Northern Rough-winged Swallow that’s become quite familiar:
The roughies are chasing each other now, I think getting ready to breed. Later, Barn Swallows, now the latest risers, show up. The day never gets that warm, but by the afternoon, clouds of Chimney Swifts are over the confluence, scrounging what they can.