Hi All,
 
Continuing a big year in DC, my wife and I hit two locations in Rock Creek today and came up with two pretty neat birds!  First we went to upper Rock Creek Park (just at the MD border with Beach Drive).  The birding at 4pm was pretty slow, but we had a handful of warblers and seasonal thrushes.  The highlight was an unexpected Red-breasted Nuthatch! This "winter migrant" was only the last in a string of such DC laggards we saw this weekend - including Swamp Sparrow, Junco and White-throated Sparrow.
 
Not wanting to stick around until the birding picked up around after 6pm, we headed up the the RC Nature center.  After a brief and again totally unexpected downpour, we found 8 species of warbler (led by Chestnut-sided and American Redstart),  a large flock (8+) of Cedar Waxwings, and an interesting Flycatcher near the stables.  Andrea and I disagreed on the ID at first (she being eventually right), but over 15 minutes the bird sat there, we agreed on the vest, the white throat, short tail and finally one and then two obvious white tuffs on the lower back. The kicker was that he began to call as we left.  Case closed on our FOY Olive-sided Flycatcher!
 
Hope everyone got a chance to bird this weekend, because the number of birds is going to drop as the temperature rises over the next month!
 
Jason Berry
Washington, DC
 
 

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