Counting the Birds

Every year, the Cornell University Laboratory of Ornithology coordinates the Great Backyard Bird Count.  This year, it went from Friday the 14th through Monday the 17th.  You can record birds as little or as much as you wish, and in your backyard or anywhere else.  I did backyard counts, as well as counts in five other areas.  Although these all involved some hiking, I really only kept track of the mileage for my hiking records on the last hike, which was Monday at Dutch Gap Conservation Area.  I hiked 6.2 miles there, and I probably hiked close to another six miles or so at the other four sites.

I saw and/or heard 51 separate species, including this beautiful pileated woodpecker.  You can scroll down past the species list to see some more photos.  Count data is entered in eBird.

The six areas, and the species counts are:

Around home - 18 species
Ginter Botanical Gardens - 11 species
Three Lakes Park - 14 species
Gaines Mills Battlefield - 15 species
Malvern Hill Battlefield (Crewes Channel) - 27 species
Dutch Gap Conservation Area - 41 species

Here is a list of the 51 species of birds I saw and/or heard during the four days of the count:

Double-crested cormorant
Great blue heron
Canada goose
Wood duck
Mallard
Ring-Necked duck
Northern shoveler
Gadwall
Hooded merganser
Green-winged teal
Turkey vulture
Black vulture
Cooper's hawk
Red-shouldered hawk
Bald eagle
American kestrel
Killdeer
Mourning dove
Barred owl
Belted kingfisher
Red-bellied woodpecker
Downy woodpecker
Northern flicker
Pileated woodpecker
Eastern phoebe
Blue jay
American crow
Fish crow
Tree swallow
Tufted titmouse
Carolina chickadee
Carolina wren
Golden-crowned kinglet
Ruby-crowned kinglet
Eastern bluebird
American robin
Hermit thrush
Northern mockingbird
European starling
Yellow-rumped warbler
Pine warbler
Northern cardinal
Eastern towhee
Field sparrow
White-throated sparrow
Song sparrow
Eastern meadowlark
Red-winged blackbird
Common grackle
Dark-eyed junco
American goldfinch

Here are some pictures of some of the birds I saw, and some of the natural features on my birding hikes, starting with this great blue heron at Three Lakes Park:

Nearby, was this group of double-crested cormorants.

At Gaines Mill, it looks like spring is in the air.

At Crewes Channel at the Malvern Hill Battlefield, while I didn't see any beaver, they were surely in evidence, and seemingly had been very busy.

The rest of these are from Dutch Gap...

Canada goose

The trees are well into bud all over, even though it's just mid-February.

Dutch Gap has a wide variety of habitats, including seasonally flooded swamps like this one.

The ducks on the left are gadwalls.  I am not sure about the one on the right.

Northern cardinal

Northern mockingbird

A pair of northern shovelers.  The drakes are so beautiful!

Ring-necked ducks - I love the yellow eye!

Birds are in terrible trouble in North America and all over the world, unfortunately.  Participating in citizen science projects such as the Great Backyard Bird Count can help scientists gain valuable information about bird populations and trends.

Noland Trail

On March 18, two days after my latest hike into the Great Dismal Swamp, I led another trail club hike around Lake Maury in Newport News on the 5 mile Noland Trail.  Afterwords, we spent a couple of hours in the outstanding maritime museum there.  I recommend both of these highly.  Only two of us went.  I guess my hike description wasn't appealing enough.  But the two of us enjoyed the day to be sure!  And since we had both been on the Dismal Swamp hike, we kept our eyes pealed for green bears!

Here is a track of the hike, which we did in a clockwise direction.  The starting (and ending) point is at the Maritime Museum, which is indicated by the circle.  We had water views nearly half of the time.

The trail is extremely well maintained, and a pleasure to walk on.

Early in the hike, there is a good view back to the museum, and to the exact replica (on the outside) of the famous Civil War ironclad warship, the U.S.S. Monitor.

Here is an aerial view (arrow) of the Monitor replica.  The museum has an excellent exhibit on the Monitor and its famous foe, the C.S.S. Virginia (AKA Merrimack).

The path winds through forests,

over bridges,

and past lake shores.

At the halfway point, roughly, the bridge is guarded by four large lions.

Jeff and I weren't the only ones enjoying the decent spring weather.

By mid-March, spring is well underway in southeastern Virginia.

In the museum, I focused on the parts of the Monitor exhibition that I had not gotten to on my last visit.  It is amazing that they have recovered so many artifacts from the ship's graveyard off of Cape Hatteras, N.C. - including it's anchor:

Propeller:

and gun turret (shown here upside down in a tank where it is being treated for several decades before it can be put on display.)

The Monitor was perhaps the most revolutionary ship in military history, and probably the most revered - other than perhaps the U.S.S. Constitution - to US Navy vets.  I am glad that they have found its remains and are conserving many of the artifacts.

Where else can you get a hike and a visit to a world-class museum for a buck?  Yes, the Maritime Museum only costs a dollar admission.  It was a most enjoyable day of nature and history!

For the Birds!

With this post, I've caught up my four fairly recent hikes.  And actually, this hike is only a few days old, as I went back to Dutch Gap Conservation Area last Thursday for a mellow five miles and some birding.  Dutch Gap is one of my go to areas when I need a nature fix but can't spend all day getting there and back.  It's only about a 35 minute drive.  It's an old oxbow that used to be part of the main channel of the James River but is now cut off from the river itself.  It is a haven for various wildlife, as well as being next to a huge industrial site that pollutes the river.  There is a new plan underway to clean it up by removing an almost unimaginable amount of coal ash.

Here is the track of my hike, a kind of lollipop starting and ending at the upper right and hiking counter clockwise around the oxbow.

The focus of this hike was to go slowly and look for birds, and record them on eBird when I encountered them.  I accounted for 26 species and got photos of some of them.

Ring-billed gull:

Ring-necked duck:

Great blue heron:

Red-bellied woodpecker:

Red-headed woodpecker:

Canada goose:

Double-crested cormorants:

Northern mockingbird:

I also saw a rookery of great blue herons getting underway out on a small island.

And while I didn't see the masked bandit himself, these raccoon tracks show that they are here for sure:

I had not been here in a while, but plan to return soon, and often.  It's a great place to explore and observe nature.

Day Hiking at Powhattan

Late last week, my friend Doug and I decided to go for a short hike Friday in Powhatan State Park, southwest of Richmond.  Doug had Friday off from work, and I, well, I have every day that includes a "Y" off now, generally.  We met up about 11:00 and headed to the park.  Our focus would be the Old Cabin, Big Woods, and Pine Trails, but we also hiked a bit along the river after that.

After years of trouble-free operation, my inReach is no longer mapping my tracks accurately much of the time, adding all sorts of additional track lines and garbling the results, so I won't show a map.  We did hike about 8 miles and did a bit of exploring in the woods when we could not find the connection between the Old Cabin and Pine Trails.  Eventually we did, although unlike is normally the case in our state parks, it was very poorly marked.

Here are some photos of this hike.  As far as wildlife, we didn't see any but did hear a number of birds (lots of the big pileated woodpeckers, downy woodpeckers, white-breasted nuthatch, Carolina wren).

Doug on the trail...

Stark winter tree branches

The snow of two weekends ago was all but gone.

The old cabin site.  I wonder who lived here and how their lives were?

Hiking along the Pine Trail.

Skunk cabbage bulb.  Yeah, they smell a bit like skunks, but a sure sign of the spring to come.

Interesting fungi, almost like a fan.

All of the above photos were of the first hike of the day.  The second was along the River and Gold Mine Trails, and was shorter.

We saw at least 3-4 places where the rarely seen moles, a star-nosed perhaps, tunneled in the darkness hunting for worms and grubs.

There is a memorial to our friend Holly Walker, who did exceptional work for State Parks as a naturalist, along the River Trail.  She is gone too soon and missed by many people.

It's a lovely spot to memorialize our friend.

The River Trail is scenic and easy to hike.

I'm glad that Doug suggested on hiking together last Friday and doing so before the rains of Saturday arrived.