July 2017

Images recorded at White Memorial Conservation Center Bird Blind, unless stated otherwise on the White Memorial Foundation Property.  Time stamped is Eastern Standard Time, daylight savings time is not used.

Mammals

Bobcat at Plunge Pool

Eastern Chipmunk at Plunge Pool

 Southern Flying Squirrel at Plunge Pool

Southern Flying Squirrel at Plunge Pool

Eastern Gray Squirrel at Plunge Pool

White-tailed Deer Fawn at Ice House Marsh

Eastern Chipmunk at Cathedral 

Black Bear at Cranberry Pond

Bobcat at Cranberry Pond

Bobcat at Cranberry Pond

Cottontail Rabbit at Ice House Marsh

White-Tailed Deer at Old Camp Townshend

White-tailed Deer at Cranberry Pond

White-Tailed Deer at Ice House Marsh

White-tailed Deer at Old Camp Townshend

White-Tailed Deer at Cathedral

White-tailed Deer Buck at Ice House Marsh

Eastern Gray-Squirrel at Cranberry Pond

Raccoon at Ice House Marsh

Birds

Red-bellied Woodpecker at Cranberry Pond

Gray Catbird at Ice House Marsh

Juvenile American Robin at Duck Pond

Common Grackle at Old Camp Townshend 

Gray Catbird at Duck Pond

Flycatcher species at Ice House Marsh

Blue Jay at Cranberry Pond-West

Veery at Ice House Marsh

Summary of Results of the 2011 Warren Breeding Bird Survey Route

American Bittern photo by Sallie Gentry

from www.fws.gov

Black-throated Green Warbler photo by

Jacob Spendelow from www.tringa.org

Veery photo by Darlene Knox

Pileated Woodpecker photo by Leo Kulinski

from www.whalesandwolves.com

Gray Catbird photo by Leo Kulinski from

www.whalesandwolves.com

Downy Woodpecker photo from

www.wikimedia.org

Cedar Waxwing photo by Bob Stanowski

The U.S. Geological Survey's Breeding Bird Survey of the Warren-to-Northfield route was conducted by Dave Rosgen on Sunday, June 19, 2011. This is an annual event that is always undertaken in June or early July on a day with sunny skies and little or no wind. White Memorial has assisted with this survey and the one that runs from Woodbury to Goshen every year since 1965. I've been doing it since 1998. So, why did I wait until December 8th to post the results on this blog? Simple. Even though I sent the field data sheets to the U.S.G.S. in late September, I haven't had time until now to tally-up all the numbers for our analysis purposes. Nicole Morin was an invaluable assistant with this effort. The photos above illustrate some of the species that highlighted this year's survey. Tops among them was our first-ever American Bittern at Hart Pond Wildlife Management Area in Cornwall. Otherwise, this year's survey produced an average total of 75 species and an above-average total of 2,081 individual birds. More species were found in higher numbers this year than in lower numbers. Since this standardized survey involves spending only 3 minutes at each of 50 stops, it is actually very hard to compare the numbers of birds found from one year to the next due to the variables of weather and other things that affect the detectablity of birds. However, it is interesting to note that almost all of the birds found in higher-than-average or lower-than-average numbers on this survey were also found in similar situations on the Litchfield Hills Summer Bird Count and on White Memorial's Breeding Bird Censuses. Species which were found to be much more numerous this year than last year included Red-bellied, Downy, and Pileated Woodpeckers, Eastern Phoebe, Veery, Wood Thrush, Gray Catbird, Cedar Waxwing, Yellow, Black-throated Green, and Black & White Warblers, Ovenbird, Red-winged Blackbird, and American Goldfinch. Less numerous species included Eastern Kingbird, Red-eyed Vireo, American Crow, Barn Swallow, Black-capped Chickadee, Tufted Titmouse, and Common Yellowthroat. The top 5 most abundant species this year were Veery, Gray Catbird, Cedar Waxwing, Red-eyed Vireo, and American Goldfinch.

Litchfield Hills Summer Bird Count - An Explanation of Some of the Numbers

Yellow-bellied Sapsucker by Leo Kulinski

from whalesandwolves.com

Veery by Darlene Knox

Gray Catbird by Charles Tysinger from

carolinabirdclub.org

American Redstart adult male from tringa.org

As a followup to the posting that we did just a little while ago with the totals from White Memorial for the 2011 Litchfield Hills Summer Bird Count I wanted to clarify the reasons for some of the high numbers. No, we aren't imagining birds or counting the same ones several times over. Numbers like these do occur in some places at the height of the breeding season when there is a flood of new babies into the population. In many years this occurs after the Summer Bird Count. This year birds got started earlier than usual with their breeding activity so rather than incubating eggs during the SBC period they were mostly feeding nestlings. Some even had fledglings already! A dead giveaway to the presence of young is an adult carrying food or a fecal sac. That's why this type of observation is perfectly good as a means of confirming nesting for Breeding Bird Atlases or ebird. When we observe this behavior we take a few extra minutes to watch and listen for young birds. They are usually pretty quick to give away their presence with food calls when they are hungry. We then count the babies that we can see or estimate the number that we think that we can hear. It also helps to have excellent hearing like I have. If we can't see or hear babies we just add 1 more to the tally for the species of bird that is carrying the food item because we know that it is destined for a baby. The photos above show a few examples of the species of birds that were found in much higher-than-average numbers on the SBC this year, largely due to the inclusion of nestlings.