To Bird or Not To Bird?

Plan A — After supper, grab my binoculars and head to a local park to see what migration was doing.

Why Plan A didn’t work — Just as I was about to leave the house, a thunderstorm rumbled through.

Plan B — Walk on the treadmill while watching the Cubs/Mets game.

Why Plan B didn’t work — I got down to the basement and turned on the TV. I discovered it was raining in New York and the game was on rain delay. I flipped through the channels to find something else I might be interested in watching. No luck. But then I noticed it had stopped raining.

Plan C — Grab my binoculars and head to the park anyway, even though it was a lot later than I’d like it to be. I left the house at 6:05, got to the park at 6:30 and had a fantastic 20 minutes of birding until another bank of clouds pushed a wall of damp, cold air through the area. I walked home, logging 4.5 miles total. Here’s what I saw:

Hickory Grove Bird List

For those of you (all of you) who can’t read my birding shorthand, it says: American Robin, European Starling, Mallard, American Goldfinch, Cooper’s Hawk, Brown-headed Cowbird, White-breasted Nuthatch, Indigo Bunting, Mourning Dove, Eastern Kingbird, Baltimore Oriole, Scarlet Tanager, Eastern Meadowlark, Eastern Bluebird, Song Sparrow, House Sparrow, Northern Cardinal, Chimney Swift, Swainson’s Thrush, Great-crested Flycatcher, Magnolia Warbler, Chestnut-sided Warbler, White-crowned Sparrow, Barn Swallow, Tennessee Warbler, Red-winged Blackbird, Field Sparrow, Tree Swallow, Savannah Sparrow, Northern Flicker, Blue Jay, Great Blue Heron, Common Yellowthroat, Sedge Wren, Yellow Warbler, Common Grackle, Red-tailed Hawk, Great Egret, Red-bellied Woodpecker, Eastern Phoebe.

I also saw a house with an unusual weather vane.

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1 Response to To Bird or Not To Bird?

  1. That’s a fine list of species for a birding trip that was almost aborted!

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