Greetings. We spent 3 days at our place in the upper Cedar Creek
valley this past weekend. Like most of the region, it was cold,
windy, and rained a good bit, making for pretty disappointing
birding. The end of September-beginning of October usually provides
rather good birding there, but weather (presumably) worked against us
this time. We tallied only 23 species--perhaps half of what might
have been in other years. The only passage migrants were a Tennessee
Warbler and a Magnolia Warbler, and only one winter visitor showed up--
a single White-throated Sparrow. Otherwise, the species on the list
were either full-time residents or local breeders. There were no
vireos, thrushes, tanagers, orioles, waxwings, and others that usually
can be found at this season. The bright spot, upon reflection, is
that this is a fairly unique point in the birding calendar when all
the major groups overlap: summer residents (e.g., catbirds and
Chipping Sparrows), full-time residents (e.g., chickadees, titmice,
Am. Crows), passage migrants (the warblers named above), and winter
visitors (the white-throat). We plan to be back there this weekend
and hope that the shifting jet stream allows a return of normal early
October weather.
With regard to the recent discussion on late hummingbirds, we did have
2 ruby-throats (both female-plumaged, but one probably a first-year
male) at our feeder. They will likely disappear this week as we have
to take down the feeder because of bears, and there are few suitable
flowers left. At our primary home in Arlington, we still have a
female present today. She arrived the day of the hurricane and has
been here ever since, feeding mainly on our large, healthy patch of
orange jewelweed. This bird is especially noteworthy in being the
first hummingbird we have seen here in the 37 years that I have lived
in the house. This is the first year that we have had such a large,
luxurious patch of jewelweed, so that probably made the difference,
thought he hurricane may be to thank for bringing the bird here in the
first place. While watching her through the window just before typing
this, I was also treated to almost arms-length views of a Tennessee
and a Magnolia Warbler both feeding among the jewelweed and other
flowers and shrubs (and, no, it isn't a typo that these are the same
two species mentioned above; it's just an interesting coincidence.)
Keeping fingers crossed for improving weather,
Dave Davis
