damp

The weather has certainly put a damper on things but I did get one new bird today: a Spotted Sandpiper on the muddy edge of our pond at low tide. This little teeter-totter bird is a familiar wader in fall migration (they often show up as early as mid-July) but this is the first one I've seen this spring. Parula Warbler and Red-eyed Vireo are both still here along with a Common Yellowthroat on territory. No more Yellow Warblers and no Pine Warbler. Similarly, the Great Crested Flycatcher and Eastern Phoebe are hanging in but Eastern Wood-pewee has seemingly moved on.

I found a fallen nest -- presumably from last year -- at the foot of a pine tree, probably knocked down by the fairly strong winds of the past day or so. It was a rather messy shallow cup made out of dead grasses with strips of bark on the outside and no real lining. What bird made it? My first thought was Chipping Sparrow but it's probably too shallow for a sparrow. Grackle? Probably too small. Mourning Dove makes shallow unlined nests but usually made out of sticks. Pine Warbler? Too shallow and too unlined. The best match is Scarlet Tanager -- it makes a small, shallow and somewhat messy nest -- but that's a bird that has never nested down here to my knowledge. Hmmmmm.

Eric Salzman