Connecticut and Wilsons Warblers at Wakefield (9/13)
Mike Collins (collins@ram.nrl.navy.mil)
Sun, 13 Sep 1998 13:10:35 -0400
There wasn't much movement early this morning at Wakefield
Park. For a few hours, I hung out at the Connecticut Warbler
stake out, where four of us spent part of yesterday morning.
No Connecticut, but I was rewarded with the first Wilson's
Warbler I've seen on the east coast other than at Cape May.
It was bathing in a small stream just two feet behind me!
I spent the rest of the morning combing the rest of the Park.
Just before noon, I flushed a Connecticut Warbler--the fourth
that Wakefield has produced this fall! At first, I wrote it
off as a Mourning because the eye ring appeared to have a break.
I was about to just move on because I hadn't had much luck
relocating Oporornis warblers after they go for cover. But then
I noticed it foraging in the brush--and it was walking! This
bird was very tame. For several minutes, I was able to watch
it walking around and foraging from the bottoms of low
vegetation. This was the first time I was able to observe
the long undertail coverts. A squirrel then flushed it up
into a tree, where I got to observe it from very close range.
The eye ring was bold and complete but pinched a bit on
one side.
I saw a total of 12 species of warbler, which isn't bad for
a day when there didn't seem to be much movement. The Connecticut
was on the west side of the creek a few hundred yards south of
the bridge. It was close to a thicket where the other two
eastern Oporornis warblers appeared this spring.
Mike Collins
Annandale, Virginia
collins@ram.nrl.navy.mil