26, calm and clear, clearer than it’s been all year. At 6:42 the junkyard raven is already honking. Seven minutes later into the typically noisy Monday dawn, a Song Sparrow sings, a full and robust song, the first time this has happened in 2023.
Also for the first time, starlings are back before 7 AM. Otherwise, freeway noise is so loud today that the first-wave locals can’t be heard properly. Except the raven, of course.
Apex
Just like yesterday, during a single minute, 7:07, several birds become vocal at once. An American Robin lands in a nearby tree and gives its alarm call: at me? The Song Sparrow carols some more, the first Rock Pigeon commuters lift off, a Black-capped Chickadee calls, and starlings are zooming all about up there in circles, pipping. Briefly thereafter, two Carolina Wrens set up a dialogue in the brush: one doing the cheeseburger while the other down-trills.
On these clear days, I always scan the distances. No wind today, so no raptors, but I do catch a Pileated Woodpecker swooping across from Laurel Ridge on shady side to Bald Eagle Mountain, sunny side. A Cooper’s Hawk calls from beyond the Burger King, faintly.
At 7:14, activity in the air reaches a climax, the first time I’ve seen this happen in 2023. All the common species are up at once, flying this way and that. I’m not really sure what it means, but it usually lasts no longer than a minute and quickly subsides. Last year, I came to anticipate the apex point and was rarely disappointed, though it can be quite a challenge to identify everything all at once.
The end of the apex is marked by the departure eastward of a sizeable icterid flock, this time to my right, against Sapsucker Ridge.
The Downy Woodpecker is up at 7:21 and it heads to the dead ash in front. As usual, it works its way to the top, calling, then flies north.
There’s been no break in the song today, another sign we’re in proto-spring already. Instead of vocalization: silence; vocalization: silence, species such as House Finches, Northern Cardinals, and Tufted Titmice are calling and singing nonstop.
Finally, at 7:31, three Canada Geese go over. A Mourning Dove dives into Bald Eagle Avenue at 7:37, and then, a bird I’ve been waiting for, the Great Blue Heron, finally makes an appearance, the first since February 2nd. This is a species that’s already migrating, at least on the coast. Here in the hotspot, the GBHE has some work to do to fill in a 5-week hole in the bar code sequence for the year. We’ve recorded it for 48 weeks of the year, now excluding only the period for February 15 to March 14.
Twenty-two species this dawn despite an absence of waterfowl and raptors on the wing due to the calm conditions. A windy, clear day would get the sit to 30 at this point, I think. It’s happening!
Blue
At 4:30, I am buffeted by 20mph winds that reach right into the cracks of the building and sweep up the remaining leaves from the parking lot. It’s crystal-blue and in the 50s, with a single, solitary cloud over Bald Eagle Mountain. I don’t believe I’ve seen it this blue all year.
The Rock Pigeons are having an absolute ball. As I commented back in February, they are the one species that truly seems to belong to the air. As they twirl and tumble, rocketing upward, sidewise, down, in singles or in flocks of 80, twisting and turning, the sun glinting off their backs, I wonder for the umpteenth time what they get out of all this activity, which they’ll keep up until the last bird is in.
The vultures are also having a ball. Twelve blacks and 20 turkeys in all, most eventually returning to the west. I think it’s clear: they are reconstituting a roost around the hospital somewhere, so their morning and afternoon flights over town have now begun. For now, they are tilting and turning over Bald Eagle Mountain, with a few ravens thrown in.
Eventually, an adult Bald Eagle comes into view out of the Gap, flying low against the trees, lit up by the gorgeous afternoon sun. Then a Red-tailed Hawk circles the towers for a while, and a Cooper’s Hawk lands in the tallest sycamore, its plumage almost on fire.
The wind keeps some of the returnees down: I catch only the briefest glimpse of icterids coming by low, eye level to the left, and can only count the Common Grackles with their anvil tails.
Return of the Robins
The bird I’m waiting for arrives in an impossibly large flock at 5:28. American Robins, around 90 of them again today, high and slow, taking their time as the wind has died down. No companion starling today, though.
Last week, it was a wrap by 5:30, but today, the activity continues. Mallards, starlings, pigeons, and ravens are still about until 5:40, when a House Finch, which has been at it since I stepped out, finally stops singing.
Later, close to 6 PM, I glance at the sunset out of the other side of the apartment on Pennsylvania Avenue, and Rock Pigeons are still up against the orange.
Judging from the timing, that's the very same bald eagle that flew over my head at the top of the field. It was heading for the gap.