Sapsucker Woods continues to host various birds that exemplify this brief window of late mid-April, and also one surprising early arrival. Here are some highlights, mostly shared with Bill Baker's SFO group.
* 1 silent VEERY just north of the Sherwood Platform. Several others and I plainly saw light tawny-rufous upperparts, reddest around the head, with faint breast spots. Recognizing the variability of Hermit Thrushes and their greater abundance at this time in our area, I am still certain about the ID. (According to data on the Cayuga Bird Club website, the average first-arrival date of Veery in our area is around May 1, with a standard deviation of about four days.) * 20+ RUSTY BLACKBIRDS, including a few small flocks flying over and alighting in trees, plus nine foraging on the ground by the Podell Boardwalk * 3 HERMIT THRUSHES, including two countersinging, at the Hermit Thrush spot just east of the north end of the Woodleton Boardwalk * 2 NORTHERN WATERTHRUSHES countersinging by the Woodleton Boardwalk * 2 AMERICAN TREE SPARROWS lingering in the feeder garden * 1 SPOTTED SANDPIPER first spotted by Chris Pelkie in the SFO group, in the back of the main pond plus Purple Finches, Yellow-rumped Warblers, Ruby-crowned Kinglets, Swamp Sparrows, Wood Ducks, a flyover Common Merganser, a Pied-billed Grebe, a distant southbound Sharp-shinned Hawk, and others. I also spent part of the morning with Linda Orkin. We decided spontaneously to visit the initial straightaway of Monkey Run North in search of Pine Warblers. We heard only one, which sang just once, but we did get nice views of three Hermit Thrushes together. Mark Chao -- Cayugabirds-L List Info: http://www.NortheastBirding.com/CayugabirdsWELCOME http://www.NortheastBirding.com/CayugabirdsRULES ARCHIVES: 1) http://www.mail-archive.com/cayugabirds-l@cornell.edu/maillist.html 2) http://birdingonthe.net/mailinglists/CAYU.html 3) http://www.surfbirds.com/birdingmail/Group/Cayugabirds Please submit your observations to eBird: http://ebird.org/content/ebird/ --
