Birding Notes

One warm mid morning in late September, the trees in our front yard seemed lively with little birds. A Pine Warbler sang, an Eastern Phoebe hunted from low branches, a pair of Eastern Bluebirds swept down to the grass for insects and back up into an oak, and an Eastern Wood-Pewee repeatedly flew off and returned to a high bare branch in a pecan tree. A Carolina Wren fussed and trilled and came to the birdbath for a drink. Two Chipping Sparrows chased each other through the wax myrtles and river birches. Downy and Red-bellied Woodpeckers called.

With a flash of bright yellow, a small bird flew down from the branches of a water oak onto the ground a few yards away from where I stood. It snapped up something from the mulch, took a quick look around and flew back up into the tree – a female Hooded Warbler, with brilliant yellow face, throat and breast, dramatically framed by a smooth, dark-olive hood and back.

This brief, colorful view of a Hooded Warbler was one of the few migrants I’ve seen this fall season, mainly because of traveling and other commitments. I know I’ve missed a lot. But despite being often away or distracted, there still have been some other nice highlights.

Chestnut-sided, Magnolia and Black-and-white Warblers, American Redstart, and Eastern Wood-Pewees have passed through. The Eastern Wood-Pewees stayed around for two weeks or more, hunting from high open perches and giving soft puh-wee calls. I’ve come across a good number of Red-eyed Vireos, Scarlet and Summer Tanagers, and Yellow-billed Cuckoos – some probably migrants, as well as those that spent the summer here. But so far I haven’t seen a single spotted thrush – Wood Thrush, Swainson’s, Gray-cheeked, Hermit – one September not so long ago, I found all four in one big dogwood tree at the edge of the woods, eating red berries.

But each year is different, and the habitat around the neighborhood and around our own yard changes from year to year. We’ve lost a good many pines near the edge of the woods, opening up some new scrubby habitat, although there still are some large pines and plenty of oaks, tulip poplars, sweet gums, dogwoods and other hardwoods.

Acorns shower down from the white oaks all day and all night – sounding like hailstones as they land on the deck outside our bedroom windows. The pecans don’t fall because the squirrels get most of them first. Almost every day we see several white-tailed deer grazing in the yard – does, young fawns, and young bucks, and I hope they’re mostly eating acorns, though they also munch on just about anything green along the way.

One female Ruby-throated Hummingbird was still visiting our feeder toward the end of last week, but I haven’t seen her in two or three days now, and I haven’t heard a White-eyed Vireo sing or a Gray Catbird mew in the old field for about a week, so I think they’ve gone. Most active in the field are dozens of Northern Mockingbirds. Fiery orange Gulf Fritillary butterflies flicker like tiny flames over the grasses and dense stands of yellow goldenrod and ragweed. The Red-tailed Hawks that used to sit on the utility poles have drifted away to spend most of their days in some other territory. Instead, two or three Black Vultures often are perched on the poles or soaring.

In more wooded areas, the cries of Red-shouldered Hawks have become more common, I’m not sure why. One morning recently, a Red-shouldered Hawk flew low across the road in front of me as I walked through a wooded section, out of pecan trees scattered around a large grassy yard and into deeper woods. The kleer! calls of Northern Flickers also have become more common, as more Flickers drift in here for the season.

And very welcome cooler weather has arrived. Temperatures dipped into the 40s last night for the first time, and all day today has been beautifully chilly and breezy. Barred Owls called several times during the night.

Late this afternoon a little bird came flitting through water oak branches and into a Savannah holly beside our front porch where I was standing – our first-of-the-season Ruby-crowned Kinglet. The sunny afternoon had become windy and cool, and there were few other birds around. The kinglet moved quickly among the tossing limbs and leaves in the holly and back into the water oaks, gleaning from leaves, a stubby, roundish little bird with quick flitting movements, gray back and head with a distinctly greenish tint, a round white eye-ring, and neat shape of white wing bars on darker wings. The ruby crown was not visible, and the kinglet was quiet. After several minutes, I heard just a couple of stuttering little jdit-jdits, a piece of its usual chatter.

As I watched, I wondered if it was here to stay for the winter, or just passing through on its way further south. And has it been here before, returning to a familiar place, or is this the first time? How many summers and winters has it seen, and what was it like to fly so far, from the deep evergreen forests in the far north where it lives and nests in spring and summer – and come here, where the habitat is so different and more open to spend the fall and winter.

It looked young, fresh and a little tentative or uncertain in new surroundings, a little stunned, without the bold, inquisitive air of most Ruby-crowned Kinglets – but that was probably in the eye of the beholder.

In these last days of summer, one of my favorite places has been the weed-choked old field that stretches along one side of a dead-end road just outside our neighborhood, blocking the view (though not the sounds) of Highway 441 beyond it. For the past two or three weeks the field and roadside have been glorious with furry foxtails, tall red-top grasses gone to seed, pokeweed, yellow bitterweed and camphor weed, lush yellow-green ragweed, and – best of all – a profusion of white, purple and pink morning glories and tiny tubular red morning glories blooming on vines that tumbled over the ditches and climbed up the stalks of rough weeds.

I know many of these are invasive species, “aliens,” weeds, not generally considered desirable plants. But they’re also part of a community that has colonized an abused and abandoned field of poor red soil and helped to bring it back to life over the past two decades or more.

Persimmon trees, chinaberries, and other trees and shrubs hang full of fruit and berries. Pines, sweet gums and water oaks have grown tall and formed a small, dense woodland at one end of the field. Kudzu vines spread all over, but have not completely covered more than a small tree here and there, and now they’ve begun to wither from the summer’s heat, though still in bloom with shabby purple, grape-scented flowers. Blackberry, wild grape and honeysuckle vines crowd the privet and other shrubs.

Grasshoppers sing and snap and fly, and butterflies animate the browning, thorny, tangled mess with flutters of yellow and orange – Cloudless Sulphur, Sleepy Orange, Gulf Fritillary – with its bright orange wings and silver-white shimmer of spots underneath, Buckeye, Tiger Swallowtail, Black Swallowtail, Red-spotted Purple – and these are only the ones that I know, the most common and familiar and fairly large ones, not counting all the skippers and tiny little hairstreaks and blues.

A White-eyed Vireo continues to sing in the field. A Gray Catbird mews. Brown Thrashers lurk in the thickets. Mockingbirds chase each other and flash their white wing-patches. Mourning Doves, House Finches and Eastern Bluebirds perch on the wires. Eastern Towhees sing. Eastern Phoebes hunt among the bushes. Now and then a Ruby-throated Hummingbird zips by. One early morning recently, three white-spotted fawns fed together along the edge of the field in the damp, cool air, and two Black Vultures crowded on the top of one pole, while a third perched on another.

The young Red-tailed Hawk that sat on a utility pole somewhere over the field every morning since mid summer hasn’t been around the past few mornings. I still see and hear a Red-tailed Hawk or two in the neighborhood or soaring most days – but the young one’s habit of hanging out here daily seems to have changed.

Among my favorite memories of the field this summer are the two female Orchard Orioles that I watched many days, feeding among the weeds and thickets, their round, olive heads bobbing up on long necks like otters in a river, bright yellow throats and breasts glowing, and always so animated and fun to watch. I haven’t seen them since late August. The Blue Grosbeaks and Indigo Buntings have been gone for even longer, though I wouldn’t be surprised to find some migrants passing through.

This morning I walked out of the entrance to our subdivision and found that the roadside along the field was mowed yesterday in a big wide swathe – it was bound to happen soon, I know. But all the foxtails now are gone, and the big tall red-top grasses, and – oh, the morning glories! Gone. Or almost. Only a couple of wilted purple blooms lay flat in the ditch.

I can’t help wishing the mowing could have been put off until a little later in the season, but nothing lasts forever, and for a while the roadside was beautiful in a rough, wild, messy way – the kind of beauty you probably have to be walking to appreciate. From a passing car – as most people see it – I guess it just looked neglected and not neat.

On the bright side, the field itself remains happily neglected, untamed and thick with the most disreputable and rampant weeds, and fall is just beginning. There still are many butterflies – just further away from the edge – though right now, there are fewer flowers in sight, especially the tiny roadside white and yellow and pink ones, and I especially miss the morning glories. But I don’t think many of the birds were inconvenienced by the mowing, and it won’t be long before White-throated Sparrows arrive for the winter, and Song Sparrows, Dark-eyed Juncos, Ruby-crowned Kinglets, Cedar Waxwings – and you never know what else might show up here.

Near noon on a late summer day, temperatures back up in the sweltering mid 90s after a few days of slightly less hot weather, and a general quiet settled over most of the woods and fields, I heard the alarm calls of Carolina Chickadees and Tufted Titmice around a spot near the edge of the woods. The Titmice, especially, were giving harsh, raspy alarm calls and gathering in agitation around a brushpile of fallen limbs and logs. There might have been a snake there, somewhere among the debris, though I could not see it.

The alarm calls attracted other small birds to see what was going on – including a Downy Woodpecker, Blue-gray Gnatcatcher, Carolina Wren, a Black-and-white Warbler that crept along the branches in the brushpile, near the Titmice, and a young American Redstart that came to low, overhanging branches of trees nearby. The Redstart had me puzzled for a moment, because its back and wings and head looked smooth gray and olive, no sign of any markings in the wings, but it fanned its tail several times, flashing neon-yellow panels. So I think it was a first-year Redstart and maybe the dappled light and shadows obscured the yellow in the wings and on the sides. It fluttered around and flashed its tail in typical Redstart fashion.

After a few minutes, the Titmice and Chickadees and all the other small birds drifted away. Wish I knew what they had seen.

But just about that time, I heard the whistled cry of a Broad-winged Hawk very nearby, just up the hill in the same patch of woods – which surprised me, because I thought they were gone for the season. Almost immediately, one Broad-winged Hawk flew out of the trees and passed directly over me, wings outstretched and tail fanned, showing the wide bands of white and dark, and whistling. At the same time, I could hear the cries of a second Broad-winged Hawk coming from a perch somewhere in the trees. The one that had flown disappeared from view, over the trees, but the other one kept crying. I walked up the hill and tried to find it, but it stayed well screened and high in the foliage.

I don’t know if these were migrants passing through – or if they might be two of the same Broad-winged Hawks that nested here this summer, still hanging around, not yet on their way South.

Earlier in the morning, the songs of an Eastern Phoebe and a Pine Warbler greeted the day, a mostly cloudy early morning and very warm, though the clouds had lifted by the time the sun was fully up. A Red-shouldered Hawk flew around our house for a few minutes, mid-morning, crying kee-yer several times – I heard its calls while I was still inside.

By the time I was able to get out for a walk, things had gotten pretty quiet, and there seemed to be very little bird activity around – but it was almost noon by then. A White-eyed Vireo continues to sing in the field, and a Gray Catbird gives loud, complaining mews. A few young Mockingbirds practice their songs – sounding rather sweet and carefree, with a light, clear quality that’s different from the full-throated virtuosity of a Mockingbird song in spring and summer. Phoebes hunt and Bluebird families chase each other around. One Eastern Wood-Pewee hunted quietly for a few minutes from the stub of a tall dead pine. A Ruby-throated Hummingbird came zipping past me, tiny green back shimmering, and disappeared into the leaves of a tree.

Hummingbirds are the most active and noticeable birds around – two or three females or juveniles zip and zoom and twitter around the feeder and red flowers on the deck all day long, and perch in branches nearby when they’re not feeding. Big yellow and black Tiger Swallowtails float and feed among the purple blooms of the butterfly bush, almost always at least four or five or more.

The past several days I haven’t seen or heard a Broad-winged Hawk around the wooded area where they used to be, and where I think they nested. Some days I haven’t seen them at all, on other days I’ve found them in other parts of the neighborhood.

Almost a week ago, a juvenile Broad-winged Hawk dropped down from a tree along the side of the road as I walked past, captured something on the ground, and flew across the road in front of me and up onto the stub of a pine at the edge of the woods. It sat there and ate whatever it had captured, holding it with its talons on the branch and leaning down to tear up pieces. It was something fairly small, maybe a frog or toad, maybe even a large insect. After eating, the young hawk stayed perched on the stub for maybe ten or fifteen minutes, looking around. Twice it scratched one side of its head with a foot. Dark, clean streaks marked a cream-white breast. Its back and wings were chocolate brown, mottled with pale speckles. Its eyes and bill looked dark, the head very streaked, and paler in color than the back, and the back of the neck was especially streaked. It looked as if the hawk sort of sat back, with legs folded, so that its rear end rested on the branch – but I’m not sure that was accurate. It might have been an illusion from my point of view.

More days passed when I didn’t see or hear the Broad-winged Hawks at all. Then on August 30, I heard their whistled call as I walked down the road not far from our house, and also could hear the agitated cawing of a bunch of crows. As I rounded a corner and headed down toward where all the noise was coming from, two Broad-winged Hawks, one close behind the other, flew together out of some trees, low across a large shady yard, and across a road, into another wooded area, with several cawing crows in pursuit. I think they stopped there in the trees, because the crows continued to caw.

Later that afternoon, while I was outside talking with a landscaper about some work in the yard, I heard the high, repeated whistles of at least one Broad-winged Hawk. It was not visible from beneath the trees in our yard, but was somewhere fairly close and the whistled calls continued for at least half an hour. It may have been soaring or not. There may have been more than one, or not. It was frustrating not to be able to see – but on the other hand, exhilarating to hear those cries, so close, imagining that maybe the young hawks that were born here in our woods were soaring, getting ready to go on their long migration flights.

Walking this morning under a big, clear blue sky with only traces of white clouds here and there, feeling a hint of cool air in low, shady spots for the first time in weeks, and listening to the songs of Eastern Wood-Pewees all along the way – what better way could there be to celebrate the last day in the last full month of summer?

The Eastern Wood-Pewee’s sweet, lazy pee-a-wee – WHEE-ooo seems to me the essence of a late summer day, distilled into music. The smell of fresh-cut grass, the quiet ease of shady yards, the snap and whine and buzz of insects, vines and trees heavy with berries, the dry ripple of river birch leaves in a breeze, the flutter of a bluebird’s wings in shallow water, the warm feel of the sun. It’s still hot, but not so brutally hot as it was for so many days and weeks this year.

Eastern Wood-Pewees have been singing from three or four different spots in the neighborhood for the past several days, including one that sings often around the edges of our yard.

This morning one hunted from a skinny bare branch in a pecan tree near the roadside, and I watched for several minutes as it flew off to catch an insect and returned again and again to the same spot. It perched in the open, sitting quite still and erect, no tail bobbing, only turning its head one way and another. Its shape was slender and compact, with a gray head and back, whitish wing bars, and a notched, rounded tail. Grayish streaks on a pale breast formed a dusky vest. Its throat or chin was pale. Compared with an Eastern Phoebe – a very common flycatcher here in our neighborhood – the Wood-Pewee moves and hunts in a completely different way. While a Phoebe bobs its tail and always seems full of nervous and imaginative energy, swooping down or fluttering up to capture an insect, and traveling from spot to spot through a space as it hunts – an Eastern Wood-Pewee perches serenely, looking around – then darts off neatly, catches an insect and often returns to the same perch again and again.

As I watched this one hunt, it wasn’t singing, but another one sang from not far away.

Populations of Eastern Wood-Pewees are declining, but they’re not listed as threatened or of special concern at this time. In our own neighborhood, they’re noticeably less common today than they were ten years ago.

Meanwhile, as I walked along a road passing through a section with woods on both sides, two Yellow-billed Cuckoos called from opposite directions. One was giving its hollow, kind of echoing, one-syllable cawlp call, and the other gave the long, dry, percussive kek-kek-kek – cawp-cawp kind of call that’s more familiar to me. A Pileated Woodpecker rattled its traveling call. A Red-eyed Vireo whined nyanh, and a Northern Parula and Black-and-White Warbler sang.

The loud, ringing rattle of a Belted Kingfisher surprised me – and two Kingfishers flew from a treetop on the edge of the woods, flashing silver-blue and white in the sunlight. Although I hear a Kingfisher’s call now and then as one flies over, and sometimes hear them around one of the creeks, it’s unusual to see one here.

Back out in the open sunshine, Bluebirds sang and Chipping Sparrows chased each other through shrubs and grass. A fresh, bright orange and black Monarch butterfly fed in an orange lantana bush, the first one I’ve seen this season.

The old field looks a mess, choked and densely overgrown, a mix of worn-out withering summer weeds and vines, and the fresh green grasses and shrubs of early fall – and a good many small birds seem to love it. Foxtails wave along the roadside. Morning glories still spill color through the ditches. Persimmon, wild cherry and chinaberry trees, pokeweed and other plants and vines are loaded with fruit. Sulphur, Buckeye, and Sleepy Orange butterflies pass by, a Gulf Frittillary, Tiger Swallowtail, Red-spotted Purple; and one very pretty, pale, translucent green butterfly sits with folded wings on a kudzu leaf.

There were lots of active birds in the weeds and thickets, but most of them impossible to see. White-eyed Vireo and Eastern Towhee sang, and a Gray Catbird mewed. A Summer Tanager – more often found in our woods than out here in the field – called pik-a-tuk. A Pine Warbler sang in the taller trees. There were Chickadees, Titmice, Cardinals, Blue Jays and Mourning Doves. A Blue-gray Gnatcatcher flitted among thorny plants; Mockingbirds flashed their wings; a Brown Thrasher lurked in a bush. I think I caught a glimpse of an Orchard Oriole again but didn’t see it well.

A flash of deep yellow-orange among the dark green foliage of trees on the edge of the woods this afternoon turned out to be a first-fall male Baltimore Oriole. Its color was striking, and seemed almost to burn – even though it was very different and not nearly as flamboyant as the contrasting orange and black colors of a mature Baltimore Oriole.

The intense color was the first thing that caught my eye. The young Oriole flew in, perched high on a branch, facing me, and preened for several minutes, raking its bill through the breast feathers and turning his head over his back, stretching out the wings. The throat and breast were warm yellow-orange, and the head appeared to be olive and smooth, with a very dark eye, maybe a faint dark streak, and dark wings tipped in white, with one thick, short white wing bar. The round head and posture, sharp bill, and the way it moved reminded me of the female Orchard Orioles I’ve seen several times recently in the field.

After several minutes of preening intently, it stretched out low on the branch, looked around quickly, and hopped back further into the foliage and out of sight.

Last Friday and again this morning, I’ve finally seen the Gray Catbird that’s been mewing in the old field for about three weeks now. This morning it perched out on the edge of bushes and on a red-stemmed pokeweed plant full of green berries. Dark gray with a jaunty black cap – I could even see the rusty-orange under the base of the tail.

Its mewing is sharp, plaintive and kind of raspy, and this morning it also gave a harsh chet-chet-chet-chet call several times from deep in the thickets, where it mostly stays hidden.

About 9:30 this morning – a sunny, warm and very pleasant day – a Black-and-white Warbler came through the oaks and pecans around our house. One of the most aptly-named birds, a Black-and-white Warbler is small and patterned in a neat, crisp blend of black and white stripes. Its way of creeping over the bark of trunks and branches, searching for insects, is so distinctive, you almost don’t need binoculars to know what it is – but with them I had a very clear view and watched it for five minutes or so before it got lost in the foliage of trees on the edge of the yard.

At the same time, an Eastern Wood-Pewee was singing its full summer song from the woods across the street, over and over again. Pee-a-wee – WHEE-ooo. A very sweet and summery song. But I haven’t heard one singing in the neighborhood this summer until now, so I think this is one more little bird on the move already, as fall migration gets underway.

Early yesterday morning (Monday morning) the grass, shrubs and pavement all were wet from unexpected overnight rain. In the northeast, through a screen of trees, a shimmering red round sun was rising through the remnants of rain clouds. As I walked, blue sky seemed to spread and open as the clouds drifted on, and by the time I got back home about an hour and a half later, the sky was completely clear with only high white wispy clouds, and still some lingering mist or fog in low places.

Birds seemed rather quiet, though, especially to begin with. The whreep of a Great Crested Flycatcher. The spee of a Blue-gray Gnatcatcher. Bluebirds, Chipping Sparrows and House Finches active just about everywhere. Robins scattered out in grassy yards.

When I began to climb the hill toward the area where the Broad-winged Hawks usually have been I didn’t hear their calls at first – then heard one high whistle from across the road and up the hill a little further. As I headed in that direction, one Broad-winged Hawk flew from a group of trees at the edge of a yard, across the road in front of me at about treetop level, and away toward the northwest. Though the morning light made its breast look red, the tail was not spread out and it was quickly gone, so I couldn’t tell for sure if it was an adult or a juvenile.

A minute later, I heard the whistles of one, then two more Broad-winged Hawks coming from the same cluster of trees, and found two there, moving restlessly from one treetop to another, as if disturbed by something. Before I could get a really close look, one – two – three Broad-winged Hawks flew out of the trees and across the road and away toward the northwest, whistling EEEE-yuurr as they flew. Even though I did not see them close enough to be sure, it seems likely that this had been two juveniles and two adults. All I could say was, Wow!

Later in the day, I emailed a good neighbor who lives close to that spot, and who is also interested in birds – and unfortunately found out that yes, he and his family have also seen the Broad-winged Hawks, especially the juveniles. Turns out the young hawks have been checking out the chickens in a pen in the back yard, and – needless to say – the chickens are not at all happy about their attentions.

So I guess that’s one good thing about the likelihood that the Broad-winged Hawks should be leaving on migration soon – and even before they’re finally gone, they’ll probably be spending more and more time soaring and ranging further from their nest area. I’m a little sad to see them go, but it’s been fun to watch them in these late days of summer, and I’ve been delighted to find that a pair successfully nested in these woods. Can’t ask for much more than that – and I’m sure the chickens will be much relieved once the hawks are on their way to Central or South America.