FERRY NECK, AUGUST 27, 2010, Friday. 
            Stayed on our property all day, birded 5:30 A.M. – 5 P.M.  3.8 mi. by car, 2.5 on foot.  55 species.  To give some idea of the difference a good flight day makes, the best August day here was 85 species on August 30, 1994.  Chris Olszewski and a companion come to run their trot line for Blue Crabs. 
            BEST STUFF:  1 each of Yellow-bellied and Least flycatchers (I flatter [delude?] myself that with my personal banding experience combined with watching that of others, I can, with a good view, distinguish  most Empidonax in the fall on sight).  5 Bald Eagles (3 ad., 2 imm.).  1 Solitary (Field 1) & 1 Least (Field 4) sandpiper.  34 Chimney Swifts actively hunting most of the day over the fields and hedgerows.  1♂ Cape May Warbler.   
            Also:  12 Ospreys, 3 Royal Terns, 1 Black Vulture, 1 screech-owl, only 1 martin, only 2 Barn Swallows, 16 waxwings, 5 Black-and-white Warblers, only 2 redstarts, 8 Bobolinks. 
            SONG:  Not much going on except for cardinals and Carolina Wrens.  Around sunrise considerable from a Blue Grosbeak and Indigo Bunting, but then nothing from them for the rest of the day.  Breeding season’s about over. 
            GNATCATCHERS.  3 of these exquisite, agile little sprites.  In a spishing session one comes down and investigates me, hovering a foot from my head, then perches 5 feet away, uttering its subtle, 2-part call note, the first I’ve heard in years, even with hearing aids cranked up all the way.  Next on my bucket-callnote/song list: to hear Cedar Waxwing and Grasshopper Sparrow.  
            AND I SHALL HAVE SOME PEACE THERE.  In the past week the Soy Beans have grown several inches.  Much of the time, especially on the Olszewski trails, one hears little except for the drone of large flies as they go zipping by, or the constant music of hundreds of crickets all day in the field edges, this all reminding me of ‘Lake Isle of Innisfree’:  “I will arise and go now, and go to Innisfree,/And a small cabin build there of clay and wattles made;/Nine bean rows will I have there, a hive for the honey bee,/And live alone in the bee-loud glade./ … And I shall have some peace there, for peace comes dropping slow,/Dropping from the veils of the morning to where the cricket sings … .  –Yeats.  
            Be that as it may, in the lead up to today the weather forecast became increasingly less promising with higher temperatures predicted as each day goes along.  But it still sounded good.  The crusher came when the wind, forecast to change from NW to N, switched to NE at the last minute, and a day ahead of time.  Still, it was a beauty, but with very few migrants.  Clear, 68-84°F., NE5-10 – NW<5 –NW5+ at the end, when it was too late to do any good, low humidity. 
            BUTTERFLIES: 16 SPECIES – 2 Tiger, 4 Spicebush & 1 Black swallowtail, 6 Monarchs (passing through, migrants), 4 Red-spotted Purples, 12 Pearlcrescents, 2 Delaware & 7 Silver-spotted skippers, 3 Red Admirals, 30 Buckeyes (my favorites; they flap, flap and sail, like accipiters; so do Red-spotted Purples to a certain extent), 1 Eastern Tailed Blue, 12 Orange Sulphurs, 4 Common Wood Nymphs, 1 Snout (they seem to favor the Woods 7 area), 14 Cabbage Whites, and 1 Hackberry Emperor.  Several unID’d suplhurs.   
            OTHER TAXA:  6 deer (4 does, 2 fawns), 2 Gray Squirrels.  1 small Five-lined Skink on the front porch.  2 tiny Fowler’s Toads (size of peas, not petit pois, but regular, standard size peas).  1 Green Frog in The Pond.  8 or so Southern Leopard Frogs, seen in several places. 
            AUGUST 26, LATE AFTERNOON ONLY, Thursday.  A big Red Fox near Ruthsburg on the way down plus 2 kestrels there.  Has dried up quite a bit since that last time I was here (Monday) but all is still green and bright.  Dusk flights of 63 Laughing Gulls and 23 American Robins.  3 Snowy Egrets.  1 kestrel on the pole in Field 4 eating something (grasshopper?, of which there are plenty).  2 Green Herons.  High tide at 5:50 P.M.  Clear, NW<5, 83-77.   
            SLUGFEST.  Numbers here in Philadelphia. These slugs leave a bright, silvery, unnaturally mercury-colored mark where their trails have passed.  Up to 7 squirrels at the corn I cast for them ($20.99 for 100 lbs. from Eastern Service Corporation on Washington Street almost next door to Kool Ice).  A hummingbird at the feeder Liz has lovingly put out for it (them?).  Tiger Swallowtails and other butterflies at the Buddleia.  While gardening, Liz uncovers a harmless Little Brown (DeKay’s) Snake.  Nice, but not like being on the Eastern Shore.  ‘til the next time.    
            SOCIALISM À GO-GO:  “ [Theodore] Roosevely scoffed at the notion, expressed by people in Florida’s chambers of commerce, that the White House’s approval of AOU-Audubon wardens in Florida smacked of socialism. [THIS over 100 years ago, but … sound familiar in 2010?! – HTA]  ‘Every civilized government which contains the least possibility of progress, or in which life would be supportable, is administered by a system of mixed individualism and collectivism and whether we increase or decrease the power of the state, and limit or enlarge the scope of individual activity, is a matter not for theory at all, but for decision on grounds of mere practical expediency. … A paid police department or paid fire department is in itself a manifestation of state socialism.  The fact that such departments are absolutely necessary is sufficient to show that we need not be frightened from further experiments by any fear of the danger of collectivism in the abstract.’ “ 
            TEDDY ROOSEVELT ON SPARROWS.  “I do not understand the principles upon which the sparrows are generically divided.  The Swamp Sparrow seems to me in color scheme and even in voice to be more likely a Spizella than a Zonotrichia.”  (!!)  How very presidential.   
            Oh for a president in our time such as TR.   
            The 2 quotes above are from Douglas Brinkley’s The wilderness warrior: Theodore Roosevelt and the crusade for America (Harper, 2009, 940p.), pages 739-740 and 775 respectively.  A really terrific book but it is marred by many small errors, especially as regards birds, e.g. reference to “Bonnien Petrel” (p. 798) instead of Bonin Petrel.  TR established, or enlarged, 150 national forests, 51 bird reservations (most of which became national wildlife refuges), 4 national game reserves, 6 national parks, and 18 national monuments.  Bully, bully.  He hated being called Teddy.                Best to all. – Harry Armistead, Philadelphia.