All, I did some atlasing early this morning and I heard my first singing SWAINSON'S THRUSH on my atlas block which encompasses a good portion of New Michigan State Forest. In the past I usually got there by mid morning or sometimes birded in the evening. I decided to try getting there before sunrise which for me meant an early start. I left my house at 4 am and got there around 450 am. Wow, what a dawn chorus! I checked all locations with intact deep spruce forest and got all the usual warblers that I have mentioned before and had VEERY, HERMIT THRUSH and WOOD THRUSHES singing loudly, sometimes all within earshot. This was very nice except no SWAINSON's. Later in the morning around 7 to 730 am I was on the CCC truck trail driving through the beginning of the tornado ravaged area and I heard a SWAINSON'S THRUSH in full song! The bird was singing outside the main contiguous NORWAY SPRUCE stand in a patch of regrown spruce and aspen that probably was about 20-25 feet high or so. It was very thick in there. I didn't expect this but referring to Cornell's Lab of Ornithology's Birds of the World on SWTH "*Described as a bird of mature forests (86, 87), but other studies show equal or higher densities in early-successional habitat, particularly closed-canopy plantations (80, 81, 88)..." *I didn't know this. This is such a great resource by the way. Anyway, I managed a poor quality recording with my cell phone. Bird was singing close but my phone's audio recording abilities are pretty bad. See https://ebird.org/atlasny/checklist/S70663930 I certainly hope this species will persist up here...
Dave Nicosia -- Cayugabirds-L List Info: http://www.NortheastBirding.com/CayugabirdsWELCOME http://www.NortheastBirding.com/CayugabirdsRULES http://www.NortheastBirding.com/CayugabirdsSubscribeConfigurationLeave.htm ARCHIVES: 1) http://www.mail-archive.com/cayugabirds-l@cornell.edu/maillist.html 2) http://www.surfbirds.com/birdingmail/Group/Cayugabirds 3) http://birdingonthe.net/mailinglists/CAYU.html Please submit your observations to eBird: http://ebird.org/content/ebird/ --
