March 10 - Wild Weekend
Finding a good bird with a group of birders is a lot like being in an elevator. Everyone is really silent and faces the same way. That's why there are no really good pictures of people birding. They all look the same.
That happened to our program groups a few times this weekend. On Friday morning, we followed the tips of a couple of birders who had visited Marshfield earlier in the week and tracked down a yellow-bellied sapsucker. He almost eluded us - almost. As soon as we walked into the Cherry Hill Reservation, on Daniel Webster's old land, an accipiter, or small hawk, flew out of the trees in front of us. While the sighting of a Cooper's or a sharp-shinned hawk is always a good one, it usually means there won't be much else around for a few minutes. Coops and sharpies are bird-eaters, and the smaller birds know it. Therefore, they go into intense hiding until the all-clear is sounded. But, the yellow-bellied sapsucker could not out wait us.
We found him working on a sugar maple. We then did what we always do. We all stood and stared, admiring him for the fact that he's different form all of our usual suspects, and we moved onto the next bird. We all thought about the last yellow-belly we'd seen, and most of us remembered the first yellow-belly we'd ever seen. They're quite rare in this part of the state, but this guy seems to have found a home here, as we've located him in the same general plot of trees for two winters in a row now.
Saturday, of course, was a monumental washout. I did have a program to run in the evening, but out of necessity we moved it to Sunday afternoon. Problem was, I already had a program on Sunday afternoon.
At 1:30, Tim O'Neil, our volunteer co-leader, and I picked up fifteen teachers and drove them the length of Duxbury Beach, talking about snowy owls, ospreys, scoter ducks - all the things we were hoping to see, but didn't. The birders' worst enemy, the wind, was in full force. Our best bird sighting, three horned larks, was lost on most of the teachers I fear, but at least Tim had the enjoyment of seeing them, his first for the year. Not quite as rare as a yellow-belly, they're still a nice find.
At 3, we hustled back to the North River Wildlife Sanctuary to drop the teachers off, and I then turned and kept going down to the Daniel Webster Wildlife Sanctuary. I met Kathy Clayton, my second co-leader of the day, and someone whom I had not seen since September 15, 2007, the day we returned form Block Island together. We had barely met before that trip started, but not only had fun with our dozen attendees, but had become fast friends by the end of it. We'll be leading a trip up into the White Mountains this summer together. But I digress.
Our goal today was a four hour walk around Daniel Webster to look for birds of prey, and, despite the wind, they did not disappoint in the slightest. We had northern harriers, both male and female, hunting for voles in the grasslands. We had red-tailed hawks coming from many directions, and a solitary rough-legged hawk soaring above the treetops to the northeast (on the way between sanctuaries I'd also seen a red-shouldered hawk). Just before dusk we heard, and then saw a northern shrike atop a shrub, a little monster known as the "butcher bird" for the way it massacres its prey. It kills cardinal-sized birds, impales them on spikes (barbed wire, or a snapped off branch of a tree) and eats until its full. It then leaves the remains impaled and comes back later for other meals until it's done with that particular food source. Finally, after the sun went down, we had a short-eared owl flying at high speeds over those grasstops evaucated moments earlier by the harriers.
The surprise of the night , though, was the first full "peent" of an American woodcock, the notice that the breeding display was about to begin. Woodcocks put on an amazing show, with whistling wings, a climb to dizzying heights, and then a tumble to the earth. We'd seen them performing their act before, but weren't expecting it for about another two or three weeks. Yet there they were, a dozen male woodcocks, some going right into their full act. Trust me, folks, that is a true sign that spring is on the way.
I left Daniel Webster at 7:45 and headed for home. Over the weekend, I'd added four more birds to the year list (115 - killdeer, 116 - yellow-bellied sapsucker, 117 - American woodcock, 118 - short-eared owl), but nothing new for the life list (sigh). Still waiting for 303.
