The Stroud Preserve, 25 January 2013

Today’s walk, like every other walk this week was cold. However, the wind was not blowing at all, so it was a pretty enjoyable walk. My first impression starting out was that it was going to be a really slow day because the landscape as such a dead silence to it. Nonetheless, it wasn’t that bad. The birds mostly occurred in bunches. I would walk for 5 or 10 minutes and not see very much at all, then all of the sudden the ground would be crawling with sparrows. Most of which were White-throated. The old pond bed was pretty active with sparrows as well.

Last spring I found a pair of Red-tailed Hawks with a nest in a large tree on the north side of the preserve near the high tension power lines. I thought  to myself when I saw “that will probably be were I’ll get a Great Horned Owl. All winter when I walk past it I have checked to see if I could see a Great Horned peeking over the side. Today when I looked up I did indeed see a pair of eyes looking back at me! My guess is that this is a female on eggs. I is kind of hard to think about incubating eggs in these temperatures!

Also was interest today were 6 American Pipits that worked their way through the grass nearly at my feet. Actually, they were about 8 feet away as they were at the edge of the near focus of my binoculars. The foraged as if I were not there.

Stat time: 8:50
End time: 11:10
Temp: 16-18
Wind: none
Skies: overcast
Species Total: 32
 

• Great Blue Heron – 1

• Black Vulture – 6

• Turkey Vulture – approximately 20

• Canada Goose – approximately 250

• Mallard – 10

• Common Merganser – 6

• Red-tailed Hawk – 4, 3 adults, 1 immature

• Mourning Dove – approximately 12

• Great Horned Owl – 1, Bird of the Day! A new bird for the preserve for my list!

• Red-bellied Woodpecker – 5

• Downy Woodpecker – approximately 12

• Blue Jay – approximately 15

• American Crow – approximately 100

• Carolina Chickadee – 1

• Tufted Titmouse – approximately 12

• White-breasted Nuthatch – approximately 10

• Brown Creeper – 3

• Carolina Wren – 5

• Golden-crowned Kinglet – 1

• Eastern Bluebird – 4

• Northern Mockingbird – 3

• European Starling – approximately 12

• American Pipit – 6

• Eastern Towhee – 1

• American Tree Sparrow – 5

• Song Sparrow – approximately 75

• Swamp Sparrow – 3

• White-throated Sparrow – approximately 350

• Dark-eyed Junco – approximately 20

• Northern Cardinal – approximately 20

• Common Grackle – 2

• American Goldfinch – 12