Saturday, In the Park

What with all the Earth Day activities going on, the beginning of garage sale season and everyone being out of town (Pittsburgh, southern Maryland, Costa Rico!) and the very cold early temperatures (around 25 degrees before the sun got above the yardarm), turnout for the weekly Saturday bird walk at Hills Creek State Park was pretty light--as in just five of us with one having to leave early to go to work.

No matter. Those of us who were there had a good time and spotted some great birds! There were the Ruddy Duck and and Horned Grebe as well as several Common Loons on the lake, the several (!) pairs of Ospreys, a Barred Owl in the woods, and what we believe to be a Lincoln's Sparrow on the edge of one of the fields. The last is a real rarity in the area and will probably lead to some questions from eBird. But we got a pretty good look at it, got to hear it sing a couple of times and, between my Merlin App and Sibley's guidebook, I'm fairly confident with the ID.

From: ebird-checklist@cornell.edu
To: joated@aol.com
Sent: 4/21/2018 12:41:54 PM Eastern Standard Time
Subject: eBird Report - Hills Creek SP, Apr 21, 2018

Hills Creek SP, Tioga, Pennsylvania, US
Apr 21, 2018 8:00 AM - 11:00 AM
Protocol: Traveling
1.5 mile(s)
Comments: Beautiful morning, but started a bit chilly at around 25 degrees. [It was in the upper 40's when we finished.]  Walked the usual route for a Park bird walk.
46 species

Canada Goose
Wood Duck
Mallard
Ring-necked Duck
Lesser Scaup
Bufflehead
Common Merganser
Ruddy Duck
Common Loon
Pied-billed Grebe
Horned Grebe
Double-crested Cormorant
Great Blue Heron
Osprey
Bald Eagle
Barred Owl: In the woods along the Mid-State Trail between the campground and the lake.
Belted Kingfisher
Yellow-bellied Sapsucker
Downy Woodpecker
Northern Flicker
Eastern Phoebe
Blue Jay
American Crow
Common Raven
Tree Swallow
Barn Swallow
Black-capped Chickadee
Tufted Titmouse
Ruby-crowned Kinglet
Eastern Bluebird
Hermit Thrush
American Robin
Gray Catbird
Brown Thrasher
European Starling
Dark-eyed Junco
White-throated Sparrow
Song Sparrow
Lincoln's Sparrow: One bird. Viewed out in the open. Distinctive song, yellowish mutton-chop whisker markings, thinnish bill. No yellow above the eye visible as in a Savannah Sparrow.
Eastern Towhee
Northern Cardinal
Red-winged Blackbird
Brown-headed Cowbird
Common Grackle
Purple Finch
American Goldfinch

Wednesday Birding around Wellsboro, PA

  

I took advantage of a relatively nice day on Wednesday (I won't call it a spring day as it was still a bit chilly for April 18th) to do some birding over around Wellsboro. I visited Hills Creek State Park, Darling Run on Pine Creek and the blind at The Muck off route 287. I only spent about an hour at each yet got to see some real nice birds. HCSP afforded some close up views of Horned Grebes and Common Loons as well as a Pine Warbler and Sharp-shinned Hawk. Being quite overcast, the lighting wasn't the best.

Horned Grebe

Common Loon

Pine Warbler

Sharp-shinned Hawk

The are of Darling Run (from the parking lot up to Pine Creek's confluence with Marsh Creek) allowed plenty of sightings of Ruby-Crowned Kinglets but those little buggers were way to quick for me to get a picture. The Belted Kingfisher always had its head turned the wrong way! And the Common Mergansers were j-u-s-t too far for a good shot.

The Muck provided pretty good views of Bufflehead and Green-winged Teal, but the use of autofocus with my camera gave me mixed success with other birds that hid behind and among the cattails. I had a Harrier fly past, too.

Bufflehead, four males and one female (on the left)

Green-winged Teal

I tried to get a picture of the Swamp Sparrow right outside the blind, but the camera kept focusing on the reeds. Then the bird took flight just as I pushed the button compounding the problem.

Swamp Sparrow

 Even a relatively cooperative Red-winged Blackbird sitting on a nesting box got messed up by the reeds.

Red-wing behind the reeds.

 I had to be careful to shoot between the reeds with a point focus setting.

Red-winged Blackbird.

I might have to go back to using my (heavy) Sony Alpha with the 600mm lens and manual focus.

Active Morning in Tioga County, PA

I had an interesting morning. It started with an early wake-up at 5 AM because today is Saturday and there was birding to be done at Hills Creek SP.

As I was feeding the cats, I heard a suspicious "thump!" out on the deck. Flicking on the outside lights my thoughts were confirmed. There were two bears out there raiding the feeders. The smaller was about my size (a shade over 200 pounds) while the larger was half again as big. I rapped on the windows and the large bear high-tailed it over the gate and into the woods. The smaller was too busy eating sunflower seeds and even ignored my second attempt to scare it away. It wasn't until I opened the front door and shouted at it that it reluctantly gave up its post and headed off after its partner in crime.

I decided NOT to feed the outdoor cats at that time...just in case.

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After a brief stop at the McDonald's in Mansfield for a couple of sausage egg McMuffins a cup of coffee, I headed to HCSP to eat breakfast and listen to the birds wake up. I didn't start counting species until 7 AM. (The bird walks start at 8 AM, but by then I had already listed 15 species just around the park headquarters. We were to see/hear all of them during the walk.)

We started our walk shortly after 8 AM with 15 participants, several of whom are expert birders and photographers. We had a young girl with us--with her grandmother, a science teacher from Wellsboro, several members of the Methodist Church of Wellsboro (Rich Hanlon is the pastor there and was a leader of the walk this week), seven were members of the Tiadaghton Audubon Society, and a few other folks dropped by for the birding. Being as such a large group tends to move more slowly, not everyone could stay for the entire hike, but I believe everyone had a good time.

Three of us were keeping the (more or less) official count and, while we didn't quite agree at the end, we were all pretty close to the 48 species I recorded.
Canada Goose
Wood Duck
Mallard
Ring-necked Duck
Bufflehead
Hooded Merganser
Common Merganser
Pied-billed Grebe
Double-crested Cormorant
Great Blue Heron
Osprey
Bald Eagle
Spotted Sandpiper
Bonaparte's Gull
Ring-billed Gull
Belted Kingfisher
Red-bellied Woodpecker
Yellow-bellied Sapsucker
Downy Woodpecker
Northern Flicker
Eastern Phoebe
Blue-headed Vireo
Blue Jay
American Crow
Tree Swallow
Black-capped Chickadee
Tufted Titmouse
Red-breasted Nuthatch
White-breasted Nuthatch
Brown Creeper
Golden-crowned Kinglet
Ruby-crowned Kinglet
Eastern Bluebird
American Robin
Pine Warbler
Yellow-rumped Warbler
Chipping Sparrow
Dark-eyed Junco
White-throated Sparrow
Song Sparrow
Eastern Towhee
Northern Cardinal
Eastern Meadowlark
Red-winged Blackbird
Brown-headed Cowbird
Common Grackle
Pine Siskin
American Goldfinch

All in all, not a bad day. This may have been the best morning I've had at HCSP in a long time.

PS: The outdoor cats did get fed when I got home at noon. The three of them were present.

Progress

On January 11th, the day of Terry's knee surgery, the temps around here were in the high 50s. The next day they reached 60+ with lots of rain. That changed quickly as the temps dropped with the rain on the night of the 12th. We ended with about 1/4 inch of ice covered by about six inches of snow that fell from Friday night through the day Saturday. Luckily, Terry was home already so there was no need to go rushing up to Corning Hospital for visiting. Instead, I spent three hours Sunday using the snowblower to clear the driveway. The ice stayed. And the temperatures remained below freezing for nearly a week.

During that week, we also had another snowfall broken into two three inch episodes--with a visiting therapists sandwiched in between. Of course, I had to shovel the first three inches to clear the drive for the PT. Three hours done by hand left my hobbling almost as badly as Terry! The next day, I went out and shoveled the second three inches--also by hand. So, all in all, I spent nine hours over four days in single to barely double digit temps shoveling snow that was, thankfully, light and fluffy.

Yesterday, Friday, the sun came out and started to melt some of the snow on the roof and deck. Today, it's also sunny with temps into the mid 40s. The driveway still has a thick layer of ice that even a little salt and a lot of ashes haven't helped melt but the predicted warm temps (more 40s) and rain may eventually make a dent in that ice.

Terry has been hobbling around the house with the help of a walker and is progressing nicely after having had a partial replacement of her left knee. She's taken over the first floor bedroom (our normally "cat free zone") with easy access to her sewing room and the bathroom. Julie cat won't let her go anywhere without her--including the "cat free" bedroom. She (Julie wants to cuddle and cleave to her mommy to the point that she will miss a meal if need be.

Terry has 24 staples along the main incision into her left knee and another four each at holes above and below that; holes that must have been made for the assisting robot to hold her leg in position. All 32 staples will be removed on Tuesday over in Wellsboro. The visiting PT has given her exercises to do and has monitored her activity around the house twice now and she also is impressed with Terry's progress. Still, Terry is complaining that the staples are limiting her motion as they pull when she bends her leg doing exercises.

I'm trying to remember what my own progress was like back in 2013, but our situations aren't very similar. I had both knees totally replaced and then spent four days in the old Corning Hospital before being moved over to St. Joe's in Elmira for rehab and introductory PT. Terry was in on Thursday and sent home on Friday having had only two sessions with a therapist to give her an idea of the exercises she should do at home.

Meanwhile, on top of my snow shoveling duties, I'm doing all the cooking and cleaning with plenty of verbal assistance either from the sewing room, bedroom or directly over my shoulder. (Cooking has been relatively easy. Terry roasted a turkey on Wednesday before her surgery so we had two-three days of left overs before I froze the rest of the bird. Spaghetti, venison steak, salmon fillet, scallops...nothing super fancy and most of it done easily enough in a frying pan on the stove top.)

January 10th. Winter. BAH! Humbug!

*sigh*

Almost a month since my last post. Christmas has come and gone. New Year's, too. We've had one--count it, ONE--snowfall that required shoveling. But we have had many, many days where the high temperature was under 20 degrees F and the low was below 0 degrees.

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I continue to feed three outdoor cats as well as the six indoor kitties. I've built two insulated shelters for the outdoor girls and on the real cold nights at least two of them make use of those shelters. Where the third goes, I have only have a few ideas--under the shed, under the hunting camp 150 yards down hill, or, perhaps, there's a hidden den on the hill somewhere among the branches and grape vines I've piled up.

****** 
I've also been feeding the fireplace during the cold weather. I may actually burn all the firewood I've had stacked behind the garage--some of which has been there for three years. That's a good thing as some of it is starting to get a little punky. Mostly the softer poplar. It's also okay because I've some wood left from the crew that cleaned the powerline right of way to harvest as well as several birch, ash and maple trees I want to fell. As soon as the wind drops and the weather warms a bit.

******
We didn't go into New Jersey on Christmas Eve because of weather forecasts of several inches of snow that we would have had to drive through on the way home. (That "storm" turned into a dud producing only an inch of snow at the Aerie.) We DID manage to get into NJ on January 7th for my grandniece's first birthday. NJ, of course, had a heck of a lot more snow than we did having just suffered the snowmagedon of the year.

******
Tiadaghton Audubon Society's Christmas Bird Count took place on January 1st. While the temperature was hovering between 5 and 6 degrees most of the morning, we did have very little wind and mostly sunny skies. We also got to see quite a few more birds than last year. Las year we may have spotted 15 BIRDS. This year we spotted 15 species and 270 birds. We did our birding from the car and covered 78 miles of back roads in central Tioga County--the southern edge of our club's circle. The club had a total of 52 species and 3670 birds within our circle.

******
Terry and I have decided upon--and booked--a cruise of the lower Mississippi for May. We'll be on the Mississippi Queen, a paddlewheeler of the American Cruise Lines. The boat leaves New Orleans on April 28 sailing up the Mississippi to Vicksburg and then returns to New Orleans on May 5th so we'll be on the water for Terry's birthday (May 3rd). We've also decided to drive down and back so as to add a possible side trip to either Lake of the Ozarks, Missouri (to see Doug and Lucille) or to Columbia, SC (to see Jim and Pat). At almost $900 per person round trip for a flight out of Philly to New Orleans, we may actually save money driving!

******
Terry will be getting a partial knee replacement tomorrow at the Corning Hospital. She's bone on bone and in significant pain that shots have not helped alleviate. She has the same doctor doing her knee as I had replace both my knees. This time, however, he'll be supervising a robot that will do the surgery. Maybe she'll have less leg bruising than I did. Both my legs were balck and blue after surgery.

******
Well, I guess that pretty much sums up the last month or so.