Hope these tempt you to come out this weekend. 7:30 Saturday and Sunday. Led by bird club members. Sponsored by the Cayuga Bird Club and the Lab of Ornithology. Linda Orkin
Lisa Wood's 9/5 walk 20 attendees.. Had a great three-hour walk around the Wilson Trail this morning. Thanks to Paul Anderson for coming along to be the point person for an Ithaca Times journalist who is writing an article about the Cayuga Bird Club. Bill Chaisson, managing editor of the Times and a former/returning bird walk leader, was also there and helped out with our fairly big, enthusiastic group (which included my daughter and sister, both visiting from out of town). On the main pond we had a Green Heron and a couple of Wood Ducks. There were a few small migrant flocks, with Magnolia, Chestnut-sided, and Wilson’s warblers IDed, as well as a close, eye-level (though brief) look at two Wood Thrushes, probably an adult and a juvenile. Paul found a Cooper’s Hawk and offered us all nice views through his scope. A Great Blue Heron at the back of the pond was beautiful through the scope as well (the bird's eye was stunning). We also watched several Eastern Phoebes hawking over the water. Noted absences were Red-winged Blackbirds and Eastern Kingbirds—perhaps owing to the Cooper’s keeping a keen eye on things about the pond. Unfortunately, the walk ended on a sad note back at the Visitors Center, where we found a dead Ovenbird that had flown into the glass near the entrance. Suan Hsi Yong's 9/6 walk 21 attendees.... We were greeted immediately at the footbridge by a small mixed warbler flock -- black-and-white, black-throated-green, and tennessee warblers -- en route to the pergola with three interacting GBHs (two looking juvenile) and a green heron, while grackles and waxwings gathered on treetops and various woodpecker family groups moved about. Our group eventually grew to 21 people, almost all out-of-towners, from Cincinnati, Connecticut, DC, two from New Mexico. We eventually made it to the parking lot where there were a few more warblers, from which I only definitively identified one as bay-breasted, showing reddish stains on its sides. A grosbeak chipped but flew away when we approached. A sapsucker worked a tree right by the trail for close if obscured looks by all. Fuller's three wood ducks flushed, but later everyone got scope views of two other young wood ducks at Sherwood. There was warbler activity near the feeder blind, of which I only clearly saw one magnolia, but their movement was too fleeting for this group of mostly casual birders. Continuing activity from great blue and green herons kept everyone happy, though. A final highlight in the woods was a pileated woodpecker working on one spot in a nearby tree for scope views by all. -- Veganism is simply the acknowledgment that a replaceable and fleeting pleasure isn't more valuable than someone's life and liberty. ~ Unknown If you permit this evil, what is the good of the good of your life? -Stanley Kunitz... -- 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/ --
