Stoney Creek (Wintergreen) 11/18/10


Armed, or should I say footed, with my new waterproof hiking boots (4th pair, 3rd brand), I set out to try them out and see what might be around here. The ground leaves were still wet from Tuesday's 2+ inches of rain, and this morning's frost had melted, making my walking on the leaves much less noisy than when the leaves are dry. In 1-1/2 hours and about 4 miles, I saw 19 species here.

The highlight was a pair of Golden-crowned Kinglets just down the street from my house. There were a few of them in the same place all of last winter, so I am hoping that they like the habitat and will stick around. They were a hard species for me to find around here prior to last winter.

Here's the list of what I saw this morning:

Pileated Woodpecker
Red-bellied Woodpecker
Song Sparrow
White-throated Sparrow
Dark-eyed Junco

Golden-crowned Kinglet
Tufted Titmouse
Carolina Chickadee
Carolina Wren
Northern Cardinal

Eastern Bluebird
Brown Cowbird
Catbird
Cedar Waxwing
American Goldfinch

Kingfisher
Turkey Vulture
American Crow
Northern Mockingbird


Golden-crowned Kinglet


Song Sparrow

Early afternoon I went outside to see if the mail were there, and the postal carrier was headed the other direction, so I had about a ten minute wait, and decided to wait by the mail box. After about five minutes, a female Sharp-shinned Hawk landed in a tree almost directly above me. Drats! No camera with me. After watching it for a minute or two, I thought to hurry inside to get my camera, hoping that it would still be there, and knowing that the mail carrier vehicle would show up just as soon as I got back, and scare the hawk away. Well, I was right about the mail carrier arriving as I did, but was wrong about the hawk leaving. It just watched the activities below, let me take a lot of photos, and then I went inside to get Alice, and the hawk stayed around for her to see it for a while before it decided that it was time to leave.


female Sharp-shinned Hawk


female Sharp-shinned Hawk


female Sharp-shinned Hawk


female Sharp-shinned Hawk


female Sharp-shinned Hawk



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