When I arrived at the trail at 12:40 this afternoon, I didn't expect to see very many birds because of the time of day, but I was wrong.
Within the first two minutes I was greeted by a Great Blue Heron, a Pileated Woodpecker, and two Red-tailed Hawks. Once the hawks left, all the little birds came out, and they were everywhere. Within one hour I had already logged 30 species, including 10 sparrow species.
As I turned the corner from the Glenthorne Loop trail onto the downstream trail as I headed back to my car, I was thinking that at this time of year it's the sparrows that are the headliners. At that moment I looked up, and there was a juvenile Northern Harrier circling 30 to 50 feet above my head trying to figure out what I was! It circled overhead several times, and I was able to get hundreds of photos of it. At times it was so close that the entire bird was larger than the frame on my camera. The hard part was deciding which photos to post on this blog page. When I got to my car by the main kiosk, I saw a Red-shouldered Hawk and a Yellow-bellied Sapsucker, bringing this afternoon's total to 33 species.
Great Blue Heron
Pileated Woodpecker
Pileated Woodpecker
Red-tailed Hawk
Red-shouldered Hawk
Ruby-crowned Kinglet
Yellow-bellied Sapsucker
Cedar Waxwings and Red-winged Blackbirds
Savannah Sparrow
Song Sparrow
Field Sparrow
Lincoln's Sparrow
White-crowned Sparrow
Fox Sparrow
Swamp Sparrow
Northern Harrier
Northern Harrier
Northern Harrier
Northern Harrier
Northern Harrier
Northern Harrier
Northern Harrier
Northern Harrier
Northern Harrier
Northern Harrier
Today's RV Trail list (33 species):
Savannah Sparrow Swamp Sparrow White-crowned Sparrow Field Sparrow Chipping Sparrow Lincoln's Sparrow Fox Sparrow White-throated Sparrow Dark-eyed Junco Great Blue Heron Pileated Woodpecker Yellow-bellied Sapsucker Blue Jay Northern Harrier Red-tailed Hawk Red-shouldered Hawk American Crow Carolina Chickadee Carolina Wren Eastern Bluebird Yellow-rumped Warbler Purple Finch American Goldfinch Cedar Waxwing Red-winged Blackbird Ruby-crowned Kinglet Turkey Vulture Black Vulture Northern Mockingbird Northern Cardinal |