oh those flycatchers!

A soft, short trill and a double-note call in the woods near the porch caught my attention yesterday afternoon and I scooted outside to find three small tail-twitching flycatchers hunting in the open understory. These rather plain birds, darting from perch to perch, had wing bars but no visible eye ring and the double-note call was a soft version of the Willow Flycatcher song. AlthoughI have seen all the other Eastern empidonaces in migration, I have never been sure about the Willow; all the 'Traill's' types have always appeared to me to be Alders passing through. The most difficult empid has always been our one local breeding type. This time, I am quite sure these were Willows: a flycatcher family with an adult and young birds. The call was not the full-out 'fitz-bew' that we hear from this bird on the breeding grounds but a softer version of the same, probably used for communication purposes.

Incidentally, most Alders that I see have a narrow but noticeable eye-ring while most local Willows have no visible eye-ring at all. In fact, the confusion species around here is Eastern Wood-Pewee which is only about half an inch larger than a Willow and somewhat similar in structure. But Pewees don't have that two-note call and they don't flick their tails. For some people, empids may be just LBJs (Little Brown Jobs) but, as I suggested in a recent post, flycatchers are actually the most exotic birds around -- true visitors from the tropics! And a challenge to figure out!

Speaking of flycatchers, Great Crested Flycatcher is still active and occasionally calls from the same woodland but there is no visual or audible sign of the Eastern Kingbirds which may have abandoned their attempted nesting in a big old Pitch Pine down at the shore.

This morning's catch included the season's first Spotted Sandpiper on the pond edge, a sure sign of mid-summer. I usually see this species in mid-July but July 9 is probably the earliest date yet (it was an adult bird with a full complement of spots). Also on the pond, was a handsome, breeding-plumaged adult Yellow-crowned Night-Heron; I didn't see the immature that has been here almost daily for the past week. A pair of Rough-winged Swallows has been hawking insects over the pond, calling attention to themselves with their low buzz call -- like a short-circuit. And the Common Yellowthroats are still making a fuss up at the head of the pond.

A non-bird note: I found a chicken mushroom (a beautifully plumaged fungus, not a bird) yesterday and, thanks to Lorna, we had it for dinner in a delicious cream sauce.

Eric Salzman