Bird watch 3/6/20

March 5, 2020; 4:30 pm; East Woods Natural Area; cool and sunny weather; deciduous forest, surrounded by roads and highways

My walk began at 4:30pm. It was not quite dusk and still bright out, so I could already tell that I had come to early to see many birds. Also, the noise from the surrounding roads was quite loud, and combined with the sounds from the raging stream in East Woods, it was hard to hear many birds. However, early into my walk I heard crows calling and saw 5 fly overhead. They were soon followed by the songs of two chickadees singing back and forth to each other and a nondescript "chip" call, though I couldn't locate the source of any of them. Then, I saw some type of woodpecker, most likely a pileated woodpecker, fly through the canopy. I identified it by its distinct flying pattern, size, and one large patch of white under each wing. Later still, a small flock of Cananda geese flew by in the distance. They were not extremely vocal, though I heard at least one honk. I suspect that they were migrating back to Vermont, a behavior rooted in surviving the winter.

After these observations, I did not observe any more birds for a while, mostly due to constant sounds of traffic. I knocked on several snags, but nothing ever appeared, probably because it was still too early for them to return to the nest. Most of the snags I aw were large white pines, interspersed with different sized holes. The larger cavities were oblong, while the smaller ones were more circular. Later in my walk, I heard the calls of a woodpecker. It may have been the same one that I observed earlier, or a different one. Either way, the abundance of snags, each with many cavities, on top of my observations, indicates a considerable population of woodpeckers in the area.
Most of the birds that I observed seemed calculated in their behaviors. When they flew, they had a clear destination, and when not flying, not many birds spent energy singing or moving around. These are all adaptations to a winter in Vermont, even though it was a nice day for this time of year. Most birds were probably hunkering down to wait for the weather to be consistently warmer and their reliable food sources to return.

Posted on March 6, 2020 11:40 PM by