Date: Saturday, May 10 — 8:00 am – 12:00 pm
Leader: Chris Bennett
Group photo by Karen Bennett
Ten participants met at the Headquarters area of Redden State Forest on a crisp, clear spring morning. Before heading out on the trail system we spent a few minutes watching birds from the open lawn area next to the parking lot. We heard Northern Waterthrush singing from the woods behind the small fishing pond. A pair of Eastern Phoebes hunted for insects along the woods edge and flew off to a suspected nest under the eaves of the education building. We got great looks at a beautiful male Summer Tanager. We walked the Education Trail and then the trail/forest road to the planted white pine stand and then down the road to the south for a short distance and then back to the road to the east which we also walked down a short distance.
We had great looks at many of the breeding birds of the area, but unfortunately transient migrants were few and far between. Of the former we saw and/or heard Yellow-billed Cuckoo (heard/only), Pileated Woodpecker, Acadian (h/o), Eastern Wood Pewee and Great Crested Flycatcher, White-eyed, Red-eyed and Yellow-throated Vireo, Wood Thrush, Ovenbird, Louisiana Waterthrush (h/o), Worm-eating, Kentucky, Black-and-white, Pine, and Yellow-throated Warblers and Scarlet Tanager (h/o). Transient migrants heard and/or seen included Northern Parula, Blackpoll (h/o) and Yellow-rumped Warbler.
We ended the trip by checking the two ponds out near the entrance to look for a Solitary Sandpiper that was reported to our group by another birder out on the trails. We eventually spotted the sandpiper, but not before first spotting a Spotted Sandpiper and two Green Herons. At one point the two sandpipers were within a few feet of each other providing a great opportunity to differentiate these two common “puddle” sandpipers.
We birded for a total of four hours, walked 2.81 miles and recorded 170 individuals of 47 species.
The eBird checklist for the trip can be found here: https://ebird.org/checklist/S235603076