Following Mark Chao's email about the birds he found at the Park Preserve yesterday, I decided to make my first visit there last evening. Unfortunately, perhaps due to the terrible weather, the woods were extremely quiet, with most of the birds he reported neither to be seen nor heard. Until I caught some movement from the corner of my eye and watched a tail disappear into some brush. Half-expecting to see a catbird as a I trained my camera on the dark blob, I was quite delighted to discover it was in fact a black-billed cuckoo -- a bird I've only ever heard and never seen. It was pretty clear that the bird was not going to move out into the open to give me any kind of clear shot, so I embraced the chaos and took a picture of the bird deep within the brush. The result is a picture that is not your typical bird portrait with the perfect perch and nice creamy background, but one that I feel is much more representative of the nature of this elusive bird. I'd love to hear people's thoughts about this one... :)
http://rramanujan.smugmug.com/Birds/Miscellaneous/7412295_hXy4Y#865099624_9abqA Now for more regular fare -- first up, a wild turkey hen. There has been a flock that I've seen several times foraging in the fields at the intersection of Hanshaw and Freese Rd. Typically they're gone by the time I open my car door and step out. This time, I walked from my house and crawled the last few yards at a snail's pace, commando-style, to creep up on the birds. Even so, most of the birds took off, save for this intrepid female. http://rramanujan.smugmug.com/Birds/Miscellaneous/7412295_hXy4Y#865099480_p6Pvm And finally, a rough-winged swallow. Thanks to Drew Fulton for the tip-off regarding this location. http://rramanujan.smugmug.com/Birds/Larks-Swallows/8245552_LKRN8#865105305_Lqskr Raghu -- Cayugabirds-L List Info: http://www.NortheastBirding.com/CayugabirdsWELCOME http://www.NortheastBirding.com/CayugabirdsRULES ARCHIVES: 1) http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]/maillist.html 2) http://birdingonthe.net/mailinglists/CAYU.html 3) http://www.surfbirds.com/birdingmail/Group/Cayugabirds Please submit your observations to eBird: http://ebird.org/content/ebird/ --
