Week 12 (Mar 18-24 2024)
Highlights
Last Friday night, a Chipping Sparrow’s night call marked a FOY
A Merlin (Mon)
Common Loon overhead (Wed), earliest ever and first for March
Bald Eagles turning somersaults over the field (Fri at dusk)
Peak Fox Sparrow, but not quite a record (Sun)
For 2024, 86 species so far
Log
Mar 18 (Mon). AM: 19 spp. (balcony, 24 min)
Mar 19 (Tues). AM: 17 spp. (balcony, 40 min)
Mar 20 (Wed). AM: 28 spp. (balcony, 1 hr. 40 min). PM: 15 spp. (1-mi. hike, 1 hr.)
Mar 21 (Thurs). AM: 31 spp. (balcony, 1 hr. 20 min). PM: 17 spp. (First Field stationary, 20 min.)
Mar 22 (Fri). AM: 19 spp. (balcony, 34 min.)
Mar 24 (Sun). AM: 35 spp. (7-mi. hike, 5 hrs.)
The equinox took us briefly backward to January, and the week then took a cold turn from which it still hasn’t recovered. As a result, numbers of species and individuals dwindled a bit, and few new arrivals appeared.
The Downward Plunge Begins
Monday, the last full day of winter, starts at freezing under clear blue skies and spotty clouds, with wind. European Starlings and House Sparrows fly about, pushed low by the air, well before seven, and at nine minutes ‘til, the inimitable Eastern Phoebe, who never seems to heed to weather, starts a new day. A minute later, a House Finch and a Northern Cardinal call, an American Crow caws faintly, and a Mourning Dove flees eastward out of town.
A Merlin flies west, directly overhead, a rare sighting for March. At the same moment, a Fox Sparrow sings from the confluence somewhere, spill-over from what must be large numbers of them in their prime habitat up on Sapsucker Ridge, massing and bulking up for their next move.
As an occasional snowflake flutters down, the Carolina Wren starts up, and I wrap the count at 7:09 AM to go fetch Paola from the graveyard shift. Already, the morning’s list stands at 19 species.
On Tuesday, winter doesn’t let us forget that it still has us in its clutches until 11:06 PM tonight. As if making up for lost time, the weather turns raw and blustery, with snow squalls and deep gray much of the day.
Ahead of the first squall, the clouds turn increasingly threatening with the dawn, and as often happens, the birds move frenetically ahead of it. Well before seen, a Belted Kingfisher rattles a few times from downriver, but I never see it, as I’ve not actually seen one yet this year. The regulars fly about town, but everything’s late today thanks to the low light, and it’s nearly silent. Except, needless to say, for the Eastern Phoebe, who screams on and on, oblivious.
At 7:17 AM the squall comes in from three sides to embrace us, but the Black-capped Chickadees and White-breasted Nuthatches call all the louder. They’re not saying it’s going to lay, but still, it definitely feels more like the last solstice today.
First Days of Spring
This morning it’s in the 40s, but there’s no warm-up promised. Just the opposite, actually: this is likely the warmest it will be until next week.
After the regulars wake up, I am able to distinguish the cry of a Killdeer from off toward Grazierville. It has taken me quite awhile to differentiate this plover’s call from its starling imitators, who do a decent rendition.
By 7:40 it is getting darker again, and two rays of sunlight describe a V over Bald Eagle Mountain. A crowd of starlings and Common Grackles is acting more frenetic than usual, erupting from the tall sycamore, circling, settling, erupting.
I happen to turn around backward to look at the roof line, having caught a glimpse of something, and I’m just quick enough to spot a Common Loon disappearing westward. This seems too early for a true migrant, but a few do stay about the area through the winter, or move through. I’d love to know which local water body this one took off from.
Much later, at 8:20 AM, House Finches show up to court in the nearest sycamore. I’m scanning the sky for more rarities so I’m not really sure what they’re up to, but next thing I know, one is chasing the other excitedly across the balcony. The chased one, I think the male, drops a green ball maybe a centimeter in diameter, and it hits the edge of the roof and clatters into the balcony at my feet. At first it seems like an acorn, but I think it’s actually a sycamore seed cluster from last year that didn’t fully develop.
The day eventually clears, but then a cold front shows up, dumping lake-effect snow squalls on us off and on throughout the afternoon, as the wind shrieks and things clatter down Pennsylvania Avenue. At 6 PM, to celebrate the equinox, I head off for a hike, with just enough outerwear to fend off whatever gale might come next.
At first, it’s brilliantly sunny, and Turkey Vultures are tilting this way and that over the Gap. But snow quickly comes up from behind, enveloping the harshly scolding chickadees in the scrub between the tracks and the river. The wind pushes at my back all the way to the pond, where there’s nothing, and then I turn around and face it. With the speed above 30 miles an hour, only American Robins and vultures can take it. Indeed, the vultures make a show of it, getting right up along the knife-edge of Laurel Ridge and describing what can only be defined as death-defying maneuvers within inches of the treetops, like surfers on the gnarliest waves. This activity can’t be about finding food; I have to wonder if it’s simply enjoyable to them.
Three Red-winged Blackbirds opt to fly into the teeth, westward, and are battered this way and that, eventually giving up and swooping over and down into Bald Eagle Mountain. The rest is silence, save for a Carolina Wren that sings a total of once.
On Thursday, it’s even colder, but at least it’s clear-ish. At 25, it seems a lot more frigid, and once again, the birds have taken the hint and quieted down (save the phoebe). There’s a bit of a breeze in the first gloom before 7, and a “drink-your-tea” signals a seldom-heard Eastern Towhee.
At 6:52, a Cooper’s Hawk flutters directly over the balcony and not far up, gaining elevation as it circles and flaps eastward toward the first attempt at prey. A couple minutes later, a Wood Duck ejects from the river somewhere downstream of the confluence, and heads out of sight upriver. By seven, with the clear, repetitive fee-bee of a chickadee,16 species are already in the tally.
At 7:06, just like clockwork, the nearest White-breasted Nuthatch starts yammering. Tufted Titmouse, Common Grackle: 20 species by 7:12.
A few minutes after 7:30, corvid activity over by the towers draws my attention, and I spot a tiny shape heading resolutely south along the ridgeline. It bridges the Gap, showing itself as a Sharp-shinned Hawk, and continues down Sapsucker Ridge below treeline, out of sight. Minutes later, a solitary male Common Merganser whizzes by, and what sounds like the squeal of a Wood Duck issues from upriver near the train station—perhaps it’s the same one I saw earlier.
What I’ve been waiting for since winter, the sunrise, finally happens at 8:04 AM. The sun’s already climbing the toe of Bald Eagle Mountain again, heading north.
In the evening, I go up to get the week’s NFCs, in time to see a Red-tailed Hawk settle to roost above the field. Then, two Bald Eagles, both immatures, appear from the direction of the interstate, and start a lengthy ballet over the field and ridgetop, not more than a couple hundred feet up. In silence, they flap languidly, in no hurry, silhouetted against the darkening sky. One floats steadily up while the other turns somersaults next to it, and I almost think they’re going to lock talons. I can’t come unglued from the scene: after they reach a certain height they separate, and describe their own pirouettes, circling about and looking like it’s over. Then they rejoin, and the same bird as before repeats the somersaults as they dive, then climb. This goes on for close to 20 minutes.
Back in Winter’s Talons
No matter what the calendar says, Friday morning is pure January again. It’s clear and our skin is cracking and falling off in huge slabs (a slight exaggeration). Before 7 AM, it’s already 20 degrees and still dropping. Nevertheless, an unusual Northern Mockingbird makes some noise, and then not one, but two Winter Wrens start duetting up- and downriver of the confluence. I’m not actually sure they can hear each other, but from my vantagepoint I can hear both.
Mourning Dove, White-throated Sparrow, House Sparrow. Then, emerging from the trees at the point of Sapsucker Ridge, two immature Bald Eagles—last evening’s performers?—take off and head around the bend of the hill, going south.
With no wind today, species are down, but at least the nuthatch is still on schedule. At 7:10 AM, Bald Eagle #3, a full adult, cruises up the river and close over the balcony. Immediately prior to heading off to get Paola, I see what I suspect are the same dozen Rock Pigeons I see every morning around this time (light permitting). They’re the first commuter flock, off east to the morning feed, wherever that may be. At the other end, I suppose there’s a farmer setting his clock by their arrival to his silo, wondering where they come from.
Friday evening and all Saturday are occupied with a family health emergency (all good), but the weather doesn’t mess around, with a messy set of southern storms hitting the area. You would think this would bring warm air and some real spring again, but instead, on Sunday morning, it’s still well below freezing.
Day of the Fox
Today, I finally manage a real hike. I’m off before 6 AM from the apartment, to the fanfare of light-triggered robins. Passing the junkyard, I startle a cardinal, who sings once from a bush. Then, all silence as the interstate flood lights fade around the bend of the mountain.
The goal is to make it to Dogwood Knoll before the first real cardinal starts up. I’m a bit off my game and unsure precisely what time that will be, so I don’t spend much effort calling for owls (nothing). Still in silence, I pick gingerly through the mush of the trail that heads up from the road to get to the first sit spot on the knoll. Reaching my location at 6:30 AM, I set up the chair, and right on schedule, a cardinal goes off.
Hearing more noise in the distance, I decide to move down and across Greenbriar to get to better thickets before the concert begins; the good seats, as it were. It’s 28 degrees and crystal clear.
The cardinal ticks turn into calls and songs—all of them, from what I can tell, as males hop up onto snags all around. I think I’m in the thick of it, with some dozen cardinals at—yes—the cardinal points. Not far behind are the White-throated Sparrows, first rustles and chips, then flight calls as they zoom about, and finally, at 6:39, the first full Sweet Canada. An Eastern Towhee sings as well, but it’s not them I’m here for today.
A Hermit Thrush clucks, a Golden-crowned Kinglet makes some high-pitched noise, and then the first Fox Sparrow sings, right around 6:55. A few more sing, and the crescendo happens at 7 but almost abruptly ceases by two minutes past, as if hours had gone by. The whole thing lasted less than 30 minutes.
Next is sunrise. I hear, to my surprise, that Pine Siskins are still about in numbers, but it’s hard to gauge how many, as their wild calls echo across the sky, mixed in with American Goldfinches. More Golden-crowned Kinglets call and sing from the treetops, scouring the birches for food—I wonder if we’re approaching peaking GCKI?
Here and there, a Fox Sparrow can be coaxed out; they’re easy to detect with a bit of pishing, with their Hermit Thrush-like clucks. They’re not as shy or skittish as the White-throats, either, which thankfully seem to be a bit down in numbers. But I wonder if I’ve missed the peak; no flocks of Foxes are in the usual places.
At the last likely spot in this part of the woods, I stop to pish, and the bramble-barberry-privet patch, coated in an interwoven mat of desiccated mile-a-minute, erupts with Fox Sparrows, some 20 in all. Most pose for me for a few seconds before moving on, upslope.
Later, more siskins and goldfinches go over, and as I approach the edge of the field, the noise of American Crows accompanies a fleeing adult Bald Eagle, who might have been roosting in a snag that raptors love.
The Fox Sparrows keep popping out along the upper edge of First Field, in smaller groups, along with Song Sparrows, which are probably at their migration peak as well.
I’m keeping a careful count of Fox Sparrows as numbers approach the record of 59, but even with a group at the Far Field, the count ends at 52. Today, March 24, is the same date as four years ago, when I had the record tally.
In an odd occurrence at the edge of the field, I come across the remains of what looks like a Gray Fox.
How sad. I wonder if this is the same one I saw nearby last year? Later, I come across a more typical corpse:
Winter’s bone, indeed. Meanwhile, Dark-eyed Junco (163) and Song Sparrow (92) counts soar, with White-throats at 146—nowhere near the 755 they topped out at last October, but still impressive.
Beyond the Far Field, I find a trio of buzzards lined up at the ridgetop. They let me get surprisingly close.
I garnered about what I expected today, but no new species for the year, and relatively few species—35—overall. Back at the garage, I watch one and then the other Red-tailed Hawk fly out from near where I think they may be nesting; it’s amazing how white and translucent they are when seen from underneath in the brilliant spring sunlight.