Mary and I drove three hours southeast to northern Massachusetts yesterday and it is like we became southerners. Not only have we changed stick season’s chilly rain and fog for mid-seventies and pretty foliage, I’m hearing and seeing birds that I thought I had seen the last of until spring. Seven Eastern Bluebirds this morning!
I have a walk from Jen’s house that I take nearly every morning I’m visiting — it’s a little over a mile down a busy road lined with oaks and often, very birdy. I got out yesterday morning early before the homeowners got their leaf blowers going, and before the traffic picked up. In spite of fog and a little drizzle, what a mix of bird noises greeted me.
We get a lot of Tufted Titmice here and I love their feistiness and constant chipping and singing. They are sparse in our Vermont woods but dozens were out and about, and a couple were pretty brassy, watching me at about eye level. I heard, and saw the whole woodpecker gang, missing only a Pileated. The other real noisy bird was a crew of White-breasted Nuthatches joined by a couple of Red-breasted cousins. Here’s the list from the hour-long walk:
Cooper’s Hawk 2
Red-bellied Woodpecker 2
Yellow-bellied Sapsucker 1
Downy Woodpecker 3
Hairy Woodpecker 1
Blue Jay 2
American Crow 1
Black-capped Chickadee 13
Tufted Titmouse 6
Red-breasted Nuthatch 3
White-breasted Nuthatch 6
Eastern Bluebird 6
American Robin 6
European Starling 12
Yellow-rumped Warbler 2
Dark-eyed Junco 6
Northern Cardinal 4
Later, Mary and I drove over to Cherry Hill Reservoir after doing some errands. There were lots of ducks on the water but the light was horrible. We did see a cooperative Northern Mockingbird who posed on a fence rail for quite some time, but flew off just as I got my digiscoping rig set up. We also saw a duck species I hadn’t seen since 2010 in Texas — Ruddy Duck. I took some photos through the scope but the light is not helpful other than for identification.
Ruddy Ducks are one of the “stiff-tailed” ducks.
We are going to be here for several more days so I hope to get out to Plum Island and up the Cape Ann to see what migration may be bringing in. Check back here for results.