Bird tour a success for visiting West Coast nature organization

Well, I could tell you that it rained last week, but I guess you already knew that. I was camping out near the Crown Point Banding Station all week and after five days of rain things got a little damp around the edges.

It’s different when you are able to go home each night and dry out.

None of the thunderstorms were too close to us, however the rain was very steady at times.

We never took down the nets but we did a lot of checking with the aid of umbrellas and raincoats.

I did go home for a day and a night to go out with the group from Victor Emanuel Nature Tours (VENT) in search of spring warblers and other birds.

VENT is the largest company in the world specializing in birding tours.

The group travels from the east coast to the west coast, spending three days in the Adirondacks.

I tried to show them as many warblers and other boreal birds as possible in two days.

The day we went out happened to be the only day of the week it didn’t rain.

We got 17 warblers and several other good birds that day.

We met at the Inlet Firehall and started the day by seeing a Bay-breasted Warbler.

First we went to Browns Tract Stream where we got several warblers including Parula, Blackburnian, Magnolia, Black-throated Green, Black-throated Blue, Common Yellow throat, Northern Waterthrush, Swamp Sparrow and a Gray Jay.

We then went up the Sagamore Road and got nice looks at Magnolia, Canada and Black and White Warblers.

While we were looking at them a big cow Moose walked right out in the road on the other side of the bridge from us.

This made the trip for me, though I didn’t take any pictures.

We also got Least Flycatcher, Golden Crowed Kinglet, Phoebe, Chestnut-sided and Nashville Warbler and a Redstart.

We had lunch in Arrowhead Park where we got a Pine Warbler.

We went on to Ferd’s Bog where a Broad-winged Hawk scared away most of the birds. We got nice looks at a Lincoln’s Sparrow, Yellow-Rumped Warblers, Ovenbird and Winter Wren. We also saw Yellow-bellied Sapsucker and Brown Tree Creeper.

At Moss Lake we watched an Osprey on the nest and one soaring over the ridge.

The group’s tour started in Albany the day before they came here.

From here they go to North Dakota for a couple days, then on to the West Coast to get migrating warblers and song birds.

This is the fourth time they have visited this area. It’s so popular that they come every year instead of every other year as they have done in the past.

Then it was back to soggy Crown Point where some T-storms dumped heavy on us and made the net lanes a muddy mess.

The storms knocked lots birds down our way to get a snack out of the rain and we got a shot at many of them.

Saturday (5/21) was the best day with a variety of Warblers including Parula, Chestnut-sided, Black-throated Green, Black-throated Blue, Yellow, Magnolia, Northern Waterthrush, Common Yellowthroat, Nashville and Tennesee.

We also had many song birds including Robin, Gray Catbird, Song sparrow, White Crowned Sparrow, Blue Jay, Black-capped Chickadee, Veery, Wood Thrush, Brown Thrasher, Baltimore Oriole, Least Flycatcher and Trails Flycatcher (which was either a Willow or Alder, only identified by call).

We picked birds from daylight to dark that day. We saw and heard many others which we didn’t catch.

There are many other things around the area of the old fort worth watching. There are two families of foxes-one has two kits and the other has four.

The Gray Tree Frogs are calling most of the time.

They are hard to find as they look just like the tree bark. Two took up residence in one of the Bluebird boxes.

I believe one was the same one I found in there last year but they aren’t banded. It came right up in the entrance hole just like a bird waiting to jump out, but never did.

Last night I went for a short walk to check on a Bluebird family but they had already fledged. On the way back I nearly stepped on a mother Woodcock. She gave me a broken wing act before flying so I knew something was nearby. I took another step and two little babies that were just big enough to fly went onto the bushes. Neat!

The flowers know it’s spring, but that’s another story. See ya.