Highlights
NFC review - FOY Virginia Rail, American Pipit, and Barn Owl NFC flyovers on Apr 1
FOY Savannah Sparrow (Mon AM NFC) - 100 species for the hotspot in 2024
FOY Blue-headed Vireo (Mon PM)
Rail Flight - Thurs 4-5 AM NFCs: Virginia Rail, Sora (FOY), Common Gallinule (FOY), and hotspot-first American Coot
FOY American Bittern and Wilson’s Snipe (Thurs AM NFCs)
Purple Finch at the feeder
FOY Ruby-crowned Kinglet (Thurs) and Blue-gray Gnatcatcher (Sat)
FOY Whip-poor-will, House Wren (earliest ever), and Barn Swallow (Sun)
Log
Apr 8 (Mon). In Ohio for the total solar eclipse
Apr 9 (Tues). AM: 19 spp. (1-mi. hike, 1 hr.)
Apr 11 (Thurs). AM: 29 spp. (balcony, 50 min.)
Apr 12 (Fri). AM: 28 spp. (balcony, 1 hr.)
Apr 13 (Sat). AM: 54 spp. (6-mi. hike, 5 hr. 15 min.)
Apr 14 (Sun). AM: 53 spp. (6-mi. hike, 4 hr. 15 min.)
Wild weather again this week - the eclipse was followed by a warm spell and then a rainy one, finally warming to around 80 by Sunday, which ended with a line of violent thunderstorms. The migrant trickle is becoming a pour, day and night, even though the first tropical bird wave isn’t due for at least another week.
We drove to North Ridgeville, Ohio to witness totality, the first time I’ve seen the phenomenon. Paola remembered 1991 totality in Mexico City; I always regretted not having gone to see that one when I was a Peace Corps Trainee in Honduras. This time, we saw it from a sprawling Cleveland suburb, during a raucous party with a couple hundred pounds of crawdads.
To say that the remainder of the week was anti-climatic would be an understatement.
After a 3-AM drive back from Ohio on Tuesday, I ditched work after 3 PM and hit the tracks for the balmy weather. It’s been quite the rainy April, with the rest of the week looking like more storms, so today is the only chance I’ll get to stretch my legs.
The idea is to find an Orange-crowned Warbler in the same privet jungle I found one last year, but it’s a long shot, and today ain’t the day. Indeed, the birds are quiet, as if gasping for breath, reminding me why I don’t often make the effort to look for anything after 12 PM.
I’m glad to know that the spring is on schedule, though. Eric has installed a listening station at his place (you can listen live at https://app.birdweather.com/data : Eric’s PUC) which, though it gives false positives, it also has plenty of spot-on IDs.
In addition to this beautiful White-crowned Sparrow around 1 PM on Tuesday, a song we rarely hear, it also picks up the first Ruby-crowned Kinglet in the morning as well as the first Blue-headed Vireo yesterday afternoon just before the eclipse.
Meanwhile, when I finally have time to look through the NFCs from last week, I find one decent night—March 31 through April 1—with many flocks of Long-tailed Ducks after 11 PM as well as the year’s first American Pipit, Barn Owl, and Virginia Rail. This is the second year in a row I’ve recorded non-stop in the spring, and the second year I’ve picked up Barn Owl moving through.
Merganser Morn
Wednesday is the first balcony morning in a while, and not unlike last week, the rain before 6 AM doesn’t deter the four stalwarts: American Robin, who sings much of the night now, House Sparrow, Northern Cardinal, and Song Sparrow, all up by 5 and all light-triggered (the true earliest riser of the diurnal species this time of year is the cardinal, which is rousing out before 5:45 AM in even the darkest forests).
This morning it’s in the 50s, and the insistent chirping of House Sparrows sounds almost musical. As the rain comes down harder, Mourning Doves swoop about in tandem, and not long after 7 AM, seven Common Mergansers fly west and north, high up, probably long-distance migrants. An earlier pair went over much lower and along the typical flight path of the locals, hugging Sapsucker Ridge through the Gap.
At 7:19, another pair of mergansers goes by, then a single, and then at 7:27 the final group of three heads east and scatters, making 15 for the morning, one of the higher totals I’ve seen from this spot. Almost all the individuals today have been males.
Coot Night
Thursday’s balcony is cloudy and cool, and I am surprised to hear a Belted Kingfisher rattle loudly out of the semi-darkness. With all the flooding, this one’s been as scarce as trout fishermen along our stretch of river.
Not long before 7 AM, a Yellow-throated Warbler is calling over in the sycamores by the confluence, and at one point it flies agitatedly into the air and back down, vocalizing so loudly that even the Merlin on my phone picks it up over the dull roar of traffic and ebbing water.
I find out on the weekend that the unsettled weather after storms brought an extraordinary spate of migrants last night, starting around midnight. Wilson’s Snipes winnowed and screeched overhead, while Hermit Thrush seers accumulated in what may have been all-time high numbers since I’ve started recording NFCs, at least during the springtime. Gulls, probably mostly Ring-billeds, cried now and again, and the first American Bittern squawked over among the early cardinals at just before 6 AM. Sparrows went through in hordes, mostly Chipping Sparrows but also Savannahs, Songs, White-throateds, Swamps, and probably others.
The big story of the night—and the year, so far—was an unusual flight of rails, all or most between 4;15 and 5 AM. As expected, Virginia Rails were the most common, emitting downward trills, their most often heard flight calls, on several occasions. At one point, the antenna captured one of these immediately followed by the ooit of a Sora, the second year in a row for this species and an expected regular, though this one was a tad early.
More unusual, though also probably regular, was the whinny of a Common Gallinule at 4:57 AM, also the second year in a row. And to cap it off, Plummer’s Hollow finally logged an American Coot, which emitted a couple wails at 4:25 AM. It’s not an extraordinary species for any other area, including the nearby wetland at the I-99 Tipton/Grazierville exit, but one we’ve never seen on any our tiny water bodies inside the hotspot.
What I’ve listed above are the best and most obvious records; like other banner nights, the 11th is filled with mysterious calls, doubtless from these and other species, which I’ll comb back over when I have the time. The selected checklist is here.
After more storms, the river isn’t cresting as high on Friday as it did last week. Despite the conditions, the robins seem to sing louder every day, unfazed. A Mallard drake, one of the locals, is tilting over the downtown, rocking from side to side, barely able to fly in the gale, and drops abruptly into the river to my right. At around 6:30, as often happens on windy dawns, a Cooper’s Hawk comes swooping and swirling from the west, over the peak of the roof, fighting its way past the interstate and off into the Gap.
The first three Common Mergansers stream north, flattened by the air, silver and white flashes against the steel gray of the mountain slopes. All I can do myself is pace up and down on the balcony and scoot onto the porch when the rain gets harder; I plot tomorrow’s jaunt.
Waterthrush Bonanza
The wind is even harder today, but the rain has ended. As I pass by the bank and junkyard after five, the flood lights have already activated a Song Sparrow, a cardinal, and a shrub filled with House Sparrows. The whole town is engulfed in robin chorus, which follows me beyond the interstate until finally dying away around the bend of the mountain. I imagine every lighted patch of town and city from here to California filled with the same splotch of night music.
This morning, I hunker down in a rail-side niche of privet, well before the rural music begins. If any Orange-crowned Warbler is around, I’ll know about it. As the wind howls, the first cardinal sings from across the way in terra nullius at a few minutes before 6, but the next bird, an Eastern Towhee, doesn’t reep until 6:08, and the first rural robin comes to life two minutes later, exclaiming a few times and then launching directly into song. A windy White-throated Sparrow begins: “Oh, Sweet…”
A long train passes, its roar obliterating the swelling chorus, but as it disappears westward, I can tell that the birds never stopped singing. A Golden-crowned Kinglet seems unfazed, and the white-throats have gotten more boisterous. Overhead, as often happens on windy days, Turkey Vultures are already on the move, and it’s not even 6:30.
As westbound # 3 comes into sight, five Common Mergansers scatter through the flight path of a Wild Turkey who’s flapping clunkily across from Plummer’s Hollow to Bald Eagle Mountain.
At 20 until seven, a Hermit Thrush calls softly and then breaks into song from a few feet away, deep in the privet; it’s met with the rollicking phrases of a new arrival, a Ruby-crowned Kinglet. Then a Winter Wren and a Brown Creeper, two species soon to be overwhelmed and overshadowed by the oncoming tropical wave, and like the kinglets, mostly moving on to the far north or the high forests.
At the pond, a Mallard and a Wood Duck, both males, swim about agitatedly and, seeing me clearly, zoom off in different directions. A pair of Canada Geese has taken up residence—I suspect, since this species forms long-term pair bonds, that this is the same pair that nests here every year. They watch me warily, heads and necks flattened onto the water, never moving.
Back at the gate, the slow phrases of a Blue-headed Vireo, two weeks ahead of the next of its genus.
I only heard one Louisiana Waterthrush below the tracks, due probably to the adverse conditions creating by so much high water. The Hollow is a different story, though: there’s a pair around every curve, it seems, five pairs in all, and the total number for the hotspot, 11, is the highest ever, matching a high count for the county.
Brown Creepers are still abundant, more than I ever remember (or maybe I’m just getting better at recognizing their calls). Closer to the houses, around 8:30, an energetic mixed flock has a couple of them along with kinglets, Black-capped Chickadees, White-breasted Nuthatches, Tufted Titmice, an Eastern Phoebe, two Blue-headed Vireos, a Downy Woodpecker, and a Blue-gray Gnatcatcher, another new one. Wagging its tail, the tiny mimic stares briefly at me, or so it seems, and flits away.
Bird Count Trail is still active at nine, and when I pish, a cloud of over 100 twittering, ticking, trilling, buzzing Dark-eyed Juncos boils up from under the dead strings of mile-a-minute.
An Eastern Screech-Owl is already trilling from far off, and turkeys are gobbling from the nearby tangles, when I reach the powerline sit spot around 5:40 AM on Sunday. An American Crow caws briefly, and then, another iconic sound of spring erupts from an open space among the mountain laurel a bit to the south. Whip-poor-will! Whip-poor-will! Whip-poor-will!
It’s one day later than the first Eastern Whip-poor-will reported in Pennsylvania (at Scotia Barrens in Centre County, just to the north), and a few days later than last year’s state-first bird here in Plummer’s Hollow. Over the last few years, this goatsucker’s preferred first arrival location—and prime breeding spot—has been just to the north of the powerline cut on Laurel Ridge. One pair always breeds here, and a few more claim spots among the laurel elsewhere in the hotspot. April is also a good chance to see them during the day: a couple years on a blistering hot April morning I came across a pair on the mossy trail just a few feet away from here.
By 6:09 AM, after the Whip-poor-will falls silent, an ocean of song wafts up from Sinking Valley, louder and louder until the quarter hour then dying down before the half hour. Northern Flickers, Northern Mockingbirds, Brown Thrashers, Northern Cardinals, Tufted Titmice, Carolina Wrens, White-throated Sparrows, and others, muffled by the dominant melodies of robins.
A distinct mew sounds from my left, signaling a Yellow-bellied Sapsucker, which flutters across the cut and alights on a near tree, working it while it mews. It disappears as the sun crests Tussey Mountain at 6:37 AM, with 30 species already on the list.
Arrivals and Departures
The sun is my sign to head out. I head off toward the spruce grove in the 45-degree warmth, where a faint series of chips materializes into a gorgeous male Yellow-rumped Warbler, first of the season. The grove is echoing with calls from the nesting Sharp-shinned Hawks, so I give it a berth and head down the field neck.
Pausing at one of the hotspot richer patches of field edge habitats, just before the powerline cut, I hear a Hermit Thrush singing softly from the same place it, or one, has been since November, even when I can’t the species anywhere else. Like the sapsucker and juncos, this species almost seems like it will breed here, but then inevitably goes a thousand feet higher up and mostly to the north for the summer.
A gnatcatcher sheers feebly, Ruby-crowned Kinglets sing, and Field Sparrows chip from seemingly every bush. I swear there are more of these every year; at some point our field is going to run out of space. The males never seem to be satisfied—the antenna is already picking them up at night as they sing to try to attract more females, a clandestine activity they’ll carry on through July.
Just after 7 AM and the 40-species mark, I hear a familiar whine from a favored haunt, and feet from me, a House Wren, weeks early, pops out of a tangle. It flies this way and that, almost tame, zigzagging from bush to tree to bush. I suppose it already knew about this place, the #1 breeding location for the species in the hotspot, and a great place to get a head start on the season.
While Field Sparrows seem to rule the roost out here in the open, Song Sparrows have passed their migratory peak, leaving breeding pairs behind. Towhee numbers have ebbed slightly as territories fill, and though White-throated Sparrows are still numerous, they’ve also dropped from hundreds last month; a more northern breeder, they’ll leave none behind here.
While yesterday I detected eight Winter Wrens in the hotspot, today I hear none. They appear to have moved out overnight, though I’m sure a few are left in the Hollow somewhere. At the same time, Blue-headed Vireos are seemingly everywhere; nowhere seems out of earshot of their slow phrases.
I pish again where, 24 hours ago, a hundred juncos or more buzzed up from the undergrowth. Today, only one is left.
In the evening, our planned walk is cut short by a line of severe thunderstorms coming directly from the north, a rather strange occurrence and a dramatic end to an amazing week.