Thursday, March 19, 2009

Weekly Bird Walk, March 19, 2009

I woke up this morning at 6:15 AM to the sound of water dripping in the down spout outside the bedroom window and thought, "Crap! I guess there'll be no birding today." I rolled over to try and get back to sleep but then first Chester went off and then the radio/alarm so Terry and I got up anyway. That's when I noticed that the woods looked a wee bit whiter than they had been when we went to sleep. "Shit! It snowed!" I thought. Well, it had snowed but not much. The outside temperature was 36 degrees and there was no snow on the lawn where the sun had warmed the earth yesterday. The snow was confined to the leaf litter and the deck. It wasn't even raining, the water in the downspout was melt water from the snow on the roof.

Checking weather.com, the radar showed the front and the associated line of showers had cleared the area and things should improve quickly, especially in the area we were going birding. As a result, we got into our vehicles, dropped Terry's Aveo off at the service station for a checkup and headed west to rendezvous with whoever else was going to show up in Ansonia.

It turned out that the only other person who showed up was Gary. He arrived 15 minutes before we did (we stopped to pick up breakfast at Mickey-D's) and had already spotted 10 species. It didn't take me long to catch up. Although I never did see the kinglet he had seen, but then he never saw the meadowlark I just happened to catch as it landed in the field across from the parking area.

It was foggy and only 36 degrees when we started but there was very little wind. Within an hour, the sun had lifted above the ridge to the south and all the fog had burned off, the temperature rose to 45 degrees and there were scads of Turkey Vultures riding the thermals. But not one hawk...go figure. These were the first vultures I have seen this spring.

While we did not get to see any hawks, there was one glider that we were surprised and pleased to spot. A Golden Eagle passed directly over head at a low enough altitude for us to be sure of its identity.

As for the rest of our walk:
Location: Rails-to-trails Ansonia East
Observation date: 3/19/09
Notes: Cold front moved through the night before and the morning was still foggy with rain having just stopped. No wind. Sun burned off the fog and temperatures rose from 35-36 degrees to 42-43 degrees in just the two hours we were out.
Fairly large number of Turkey Vultures heading north.
One large mixed flight of Canada Geese and Tundra Swans.

Number of species: 28

Canada Goose X
Tundra Swan X
Wood Duck X
Bufflehead X
Common Merganser (North American) X
Turkey Vulture X
Golden Eagle X
Mourning Dove X
Belted Kingfisher X
Red-bellied Woodpecker X
Downy Woodpecker X
Blue Jay X
American Crow X
Common Raven X
Black-capped Chickadee X
Tufted Titmouse X
White-breasted Nuthatch X
Carolina Wren X
Eastern Bluebird X
American Robin X
European Starling X
Fox Sparrow X
Song Sparrow X
Dark-eyed Junco (Slate-colored) X
Northern Cardinal X
Red-winged Blackbird X
Eastern Meadowlark X
Common Grackle X

This report was generated automatically by eBird v2(http://ebird.org)

Oh, and there was no snow on the ground AT ALL below 2000 feet. (The Aerie is 2100 feet above sea level this week. If Al Gore is right it may be less next week.)

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