Sunday, May 15, 2011

Yet more new birds

This Sunday was definitely the nicer day of the weekend. It was sunny and 65º and it made for one of the nicest walks this year so far. The amount of Bird species one could see at the park seems to still be on the upswing. In this visit alone I will have positively identified 3 more species. This first one I've seen plenty of and become very familiar with. I've been seeing -and hearing- lots of Gray Catbirds for a few weeks already. They're not the most fun to look at but sure are fun to listen to. They mimic other Birds and I swear I can hear a Robin call in there among all the other noise they make. There were a pair of them just above me on the woodchip trail and I couldn't resist such a close shot. As I was making my way towards the baseball fields on the west side I noticed a bunch of small Warblers in the woods. I paused to watch and see if I could get any shots when I caught a glimpse of one with stunning colors. He, along with the others didn't sit still for very long and I caught only this very poor photo. Pretty sure it is a Chesnut sided Warbler! On the north side I spotted a larger, Robin sized Bird that did not look familiar at first glance. He was perched high up in a Willow Tree so I checked with my binoculars. It was a Red-Breasted Grosbeak, a fairly common Bird but the first one I've seen at the park. I went for my camera but I was about half a second too slow and caught him launching into flight. Between this and my next photo I saw all kinds of stuff including another Flicker, Brown-headed Cowbirds and a Green Heron. I'd walked up the edge of a pond to watch the Heron for a bit when I noticed a colorful, orange and black bird land just out to my right. I'd seen my first one only yesterday but managed to get a photo this time of an American Redstart! The Redstart is a member of the Warbler family and if you ever try to catch a photo of these types of birds, you'll understand why I'm so happy with this picture.

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