Yellow Warbler Arrived!

Yellow Warbler

What a gorgeous Easter morning. 60 degrees at 8:00 a.m. and sunny! How badly did we need this?

Tree swallows are nesting in one of the boxes at the entrance to the lower gardens. Lots of robins, jays, song sparrows, goldfinches. Then I heard the "sweet, sweet, sweet"… and there he was - singing his heart out and flitting all around the gardens. He looks really happy to be back!

Robin

In the upper gardens I heard the red bellied woodpecker. Saw lots of swallows, titmice and chickadees. The cardinal couple was out and about and we still, surprisingly have some juncos left. Towards the back of the upper gardens I was looking for the jay nest that Haynes told me about. I couldn't see it (although there is a couple hanging out there alot) but I did see some ruby crowned kinglets which made my day!

Turtles Sunning

I took the shortcut through the woods to the soccer field and saw a thrush again, only this one looked different than the veery as it was darker and not so red. I'm thinking it may have been a wood thrush, but heard no song and can't confirm one way or the other. It was a very brief glance, but it had dark brown spots on its breast.

The pond was duckless, but I did spy two turtles out for a sunning on an old log. They obviously are loving this warm day, just like the rest of us. The bloodroot colony is starting to bloom down there by the pond's edge. It's so beautiful.

Eastern Phoebe

The river was fairly quiet. The eastern phoebes were hanging out near the Nature Center and then I saw my chestnut brown friend the muskrat - cruising down the river on the opposite bank. It really moves quite quickly. It always seems like it's late for a very important date.

Some white throated sparrows of the brown striped variety were poking around in the leaves at the edge of the soccer field path on my way back.