Submitted by Sylvia Halkin and Sally Rieger
A couple of miles before we reached the forest, under an overcast sky with the air temperature in the upper 50s F, a small group of low-circling turkey vultures rose and was joined by a few more from below. Perhaps the ground surface had warmed just enough to generate rising air that they could ride without flapping their wings. We drove on to the Beaver Brook Road entrance to the forest, where Sally was waiting to guide us in, and parked along the road and in the little lot by the picnic area. At 9:30, our group of 9 gathered for a round of introductions, and then walked slowly over the bridge and down the road, listening for birds. We heard Tufted Titmice, Black-capped Chickadees, White-breasted Nuthatches, Red-bellied Woodpeckers, and Blue Jays in the trees, but caught only quick glimpses of a few individuals. Many of us were making Merlin sound recordings and were pleasantly surprised when the short trills we were hearing were identified as Winter Wren calls; they were reminiscent of Carolina Wren trills, but shorter and quieter. We did not see the wrens, or the Dark-eyed Junco that Merlin picked up, and we were not sure whether to accept Merlin’s ID of a Pine Siskin based on a very brief recording. It felt a bit odd to be walking down the gravel road looking at our smartphones to see whether Merlin was hearing anything we were missing, so it was a relief when a clearly audible Pileated Woodpecker called down the road ahead of us; although we didn’t see it, rectangular holes in the trunks of dead trees provided evidence of their work along the road and along the long boardwalk we later took through a marsh. A bird gliding with backswept wings, perhaps a Merlin or American Kestrel, was briefly spotted high in the sky above us. After about half a mile on the road, we walked down a short flight of steps to a long boardwalk that took us over a wet area dominated by pale green sphagnum moss growing under and between dark green shiny three-leaved goldthread, short mountain laurel shrubs, taller red-leaved blueberry bushes, and American/winterberry holly bushes with numerous red berries among green leaves. The boardwalk itself was decorated by fallen shiny red oval leaves of black gum/tupelo trees, and scallop-edged leaves of chestnut oak trees. There and at the next, shorter boardwalk we heard and occasionally saw Blue Jays, a Red-bellied Woodpecker, and Black-capped Chickadees; we heard multiple calls of a Red-shouldered Hawk from a location near calling Blue Jays, and decided that since the hawk and jay calls were not interspersed, the hawk calls were likely given by a hawk itself, rather than hawk-like calls given by a jay. The short boardwalk ended at a platform over a pond; we heard American Crows calling in the distance, and saw a couple of Blue Jay flights out over the pond and back to land. One member of our group saw and heard a Swamp Sparrow at the platform while she was waiting for us to arrive. A Hairy or Downy Woodpecker was also heard from a boardwalk. A Turkey Vulture was spotted in flight as the sky cleared to blue with clouds, and the temperature warmed into the 60s F. There was no sign of the numerous Red-breasted Nuthatches and White-throated Sparrows that were spotted and heard on the same walk exactly a year ago, and the leaves of shrubs and trees along the road were generally still green; sassafras and young tuliptree leaves had not yet turned the bright yellow we saw last year, though the Hobblebush leaves were again peach-colored; red leaves of the black gums and a few red maples were a visual treat that had probably fallen before last year’s walk. We want to thank the great walk participants, who patiently and skillfully located and identified birds on this challenging day for detecting them, and to thank Julia for volunteering to file an e-bird report for our trip. Following Max’s lead from Saturday’s trip, with permission of the photographed, we’ve attached a group photo too!
Bird species seen and/or heard, with approximate numbers of individuals, leaving out a couple of shaky IDs mentioned above:
1 Turkey Vulture
1 Red-shouldered Hawk
1 Pileated Woodpecker
6 Red-bellied Woodpecker
1 Downy or Hairy Woodpecker
11 Blue Jay
2 American Crow
11 Black-capped Chickadee
3 Tufted Titmouse
4 White-breasted Nuthatch
2 Winter Wren
1 Dark-eyed Junco
1 Swamp Sparrow
