A hawk spotted, no camera

4 / 15 / 2020
10:44 - 12:15
Weather: clear and sunny; 43 F

Birds:
House sparrow
Blue jay
Possible hawk

Habitat: A forested wetland with Eastern hemlocks, pines, oaks, speckled alder, staghorn sumacs, American beech, and yellow birch. There are steep inclines with most of the conifers but a flat area at the bottom which contains moist soil and lots of cattails and reeds.

Today, the birds are quiet and the first 30 minutes are spent walking around without any hint of feather or wing. I was lucky to spot and then hear a house sparrow. When I reached for my camera, I discovered the battery was dead. There was no way the iphone's camera was going to catch the tiny brown bird from the distance I was at. When I stepped closer, it flew deep into the reeds.

In a last ditch effort, I played mobbing noises on my phone. A lot of birds got angry, the loudest were the chickadees. I was hoping to get birds closer but most seemed happy screaming from a distance. However, a hawk, or some other large bird, perched on a branch nearby. It was a brown blob from the distance I was at. I managed to get a couple steps in before the bird flew away. A combination of bad eyesight and trees made it impossible to identify the hawk or other large bird.

This wasn't the best trip.

Posted on April 15, 2020 05:08 PM by tormiller