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spring is arriving!!




At last, over the weekend, summer resident breeding species began to return
to Fairfield county. 

Saturday morning saw the return of a breeding species - a single male
Black-and-white Warbler was seen and heard singing weakly in the yard
Saturday morning at dawn.  Another was also heard singing at the top of the
hill an hour later.

Thirteen days after learning that the Yellow-throated Warblers were singing
on the immediate coast, I finally heard my first Yellow-throated Warbler in
the Piedmont.  Sunday morning was fruitful for listening for the first of
the "returnees".  Just after dawn on Sunday, I could hear the usual first
Louisiana Waterthrush singing from behind the dam of the pond, a snatch of
song from the Yellow-throated Warbler, and singing from the winter species
still present - Dark-eyed Junco and Winter Wren.  Also singing were other
breeding species - Brown Thrasher, Northern Cardinal, American Goldfinch.  

Late Sunday afternoon, the "spee spee spee" of a returning Blue-gray
Gnatcatcher was heard from one of their favored sweetgum trees in the front
yard.

An arrival date of March 16 for the Black-and-white Warbler and an arrival
date of March 17 for the Louisiana Waterthrush are both two days earlier
than my previous early arrival dates for the two species.   As always, the
results are mixed, though.  The Brown-headed Cowbirds were eight days
behind their earliest arrival date, arriving on March 9 this year.

 
Donna Slyce Bailey		
Winnsboro, SC

e-mail: dsbailey@conterra.com

URL:  http://www.conterra.com/dsbailey
	Where are the Birds?  Migration across South Carolina