Hi Cayuga Birders, Nancy Chen, Alberto Lopez and I set out to find as many birds in Tompkins County as we could yesterday. This turned into a breeding bird round up, as we only saw two species that we think of as verifiable migrants.
We started the day with the barking BARRED OWL on Hunt Hill Rd, enjoyed a dawn chorus that included several CANADA WARBLERS, 1 MOURNING WARBLER, and 2 AMERICAN WOODCOCKS at Hammond Hill (also a fly by performance by the International Space Station at sunrise), were pleasantly surprised to hear a SORA at close range at Goetchius (giving the whinny call from cattails on Flat Iron Road past the house on the right), enjoyed a bright morning at Lindsay Parsons with HOODED WARBLER, PRAIRIE WARBLER, INDIGO BUNTING, BLUE-WINGED WARBLER and both YELLOW-BILLED CUCKOO and BLACK-BILLED CUCKOO (the latter seen copulating near the beaver dam), missed the Yellow-throated Warbler at Stewart, saw a beautiful male ORCHARD ORIOLE (but little else) at Salt Point, were entertained by the pitzewing ACADIAN FLYCATCHER at Ford Hill (after narrowly avoiding a negative interaction with swarming bees there as well), found GREEN HERON (and little else) at the Lab of O, enjoyed high-flying NORTHERN ROUGH-WINGED SWALLOWS and BANK SWALLOWS at Monkey Run South, enjoyed the views from Mt Pleasant with HORNED LARK song as accompaniment, bumped into BLUE-HEADED VIREO and HERMIT THRUSH again in Hammond Hill, heard PURPLE FINCH and saw SOLITARY SANDPIPER at Goetchius again in the afternoon, were serenaded by a NORTHERN BOBWHITE and BROWN THRASHER on Taft Rd in Caroline, and ended the day watching Turkey Vultures and swallows climb to astronomic heights while enjoying our first HOODED MERGANSER of the day in Stewart Park. A fly by AMERICAN KESTREL at Hawthron Orchard ended the day. 16 hours of birding and 119 species, most of which breed in the county.A lovely way to appreciate the remarkable diversity of this one area of upstate New York. Best, Chris -- Cayugabirds-L List Info: http://www.NortheastBirding.com/CayugabirdsWELCOME http://www.NortheastBirding.com/CayugabirdsRULES http://www.NortheastBirding.com/CayugabirdsSubscribeConfigurationLeave.htm ARCHIVES: 1) http://www.mail-archive.com/cayugabirds-l@cornell.edu/maillist.html 2) http://www.surfbirds.com/birdingmail/Group/Cayugabirds 3) http://birdingonthe.net/mailinglists/CAYU.html Please submit your observations to eBird: http://ebird.org/content/ebird/ --
