VA BIRDers,
Rich Rieger and I drove around the Nokesville area (a small section that is
in the Nokesville CBC circle, takes place this Sunday, contact Kim Hosen
khosen at comcast dot net for more info) to see if anything usual could be
spotted from the road. The snow was still relatively deep, and melting in
today's 40F sunshine. Nothing unusual noted, but the number of sparrows
along road edges were spectacular. Mostly Song, White-throated and Juncos,
each tallied in the 200-300 range for our 4 hour visit. Next were Savannahs
and White-crowneds, each about 30-40. A single Field Sparrow (seems odd,
maybe they don't like roadside edges?), a drive by Swamp, and a few towhees.
We also found 3 groups of Horned Larks with the largest number on Parkgate
Rd near the big dairy farm before the high school. In addition to the 50
larks near to Parkgate, we could occasionally see larks flitting in the back
fields here and there so a CBC team should get access to the land to
appreciate what may be out there. Other larks were seen on Hazelwood near
the cattle farm and Sowego Rd on the snow covered turf farm near the small
plane airport hangers. We passed an Eastern Phoebe on Aden Rd somewhere
between Joplin Rd and Cedar Run. A mixed group of about 1000 blackbirds
were on Old Church Rd by unharvested field corn near Parkgate, perhaps 90%
grackle the balance were Red-wingeds and starlings. We noted grackles and
red-wingeds in other places, too, yet in much reduced numbers. Groups of
Eastern Meadowlarks were encountered in many places and numbered in the
25-30 range. Raptors were reasonably represented with the following numbers
tallied:
Bald Eagle 5, 2 adults near a possible nest site on Parkgate and 3 subadults
at Cedar Run Wetlands (we did not stop at the landfill)
No. Harrier 3, 2 males and all were within a mile of Aden or Fleetwood Rds.
Sharpie - 1
Coopers - 2
Red-shouldered - 8
Red-tailed - 5
Am. Kestrel - 4
Kurt Gaskill
