Blue Wall Preserve, 21 September

[Donna Slyce Bailey <dsbailey@conterra.com>]

In search of a change of pace and a challenge, I got myself assigned to 
cover the Blue Wall Preserve in Greenville county, SC, for yesterday's 
North American Migration Count.

Arriving at the Blue Wall at 6:30 am, I managed to get in 45 minutes of 
nocturnal listening before first Cardinal, picking up the expected 
brown-backed thrushes (Gray-cheeked, Swainson's, Veery, Wood) as well as a 
bonus Great Horned Owl.  I decided the coyotes I could hear weren't 
reportable and I needn't worry about counting them.

As light came up, just as I had secretly hoped, the trees filled with 
warblers.  In ten minutes I found what I figured was the bird of the day - 
a female Golden-winged Warbler, seen just well enough to conclusively 
identify her.  Warblers continued to materialize in the strengthening 
light, almost all of the hoped for "mountain" warblers - Tennessee, 
Blackburnians everywhere, Chestnut-sided - and others - American Redstart, 
Hooded, Magnolia, Cape May, Black-throated Blue, Black-and-Whites 
everywhere.  And I wasn't even out of the parking lot yet.

A strangely familiar but oddly cadenced song drew me back to a spur 
trail.  Listening closely, I finally identified Blue-headed Vireo as the 
singer.  As I stood listening and watching too many Blue-headed Vireos 
fighting, a Baltimore Oriole appeared at the top of a sapling.

I was stopped at the information kiosk by a group of warblers in the 
trees.  As I stood trying to identify warblers moving at warp speed, one 
bird finally slowed down and I found myself looking at an adult male 
Golden-winged Warbler just above eye-level.  I stopped breathing.  The bird 
dallied  for a full five minutes, feeding, in view nearly the whole 
time.  When he disappeared, I finally took a breath.  As I stood there, 
boggled and dazzled and vaguely shaking my head, the bird reappeared in the 
next tree over so close I could have touched him.  Breathing was suspended 
once more.  Again he diddled around, only rarely disappearing behind 
foliage, for another five minutes.  Then he followed the rest of the flock 
zipping back into the dense trees away from me.  I sat down to collect my 
wits.   It wasn't yet 8:00 am and I was never out of sight of my car.

The fun wasn't over yet, even after a start like that.  A short trip down 
yet another spur trail, to look at an oddball Phoebe, found a female 
Wilson's Warbler.  Agitated Ovenbirds at the end of the trail, with their 
little slanting crowns raised at me, brought a smile.  A yellow-chartreuse 
Scarlet Tanager youngster made a very careful inspection of me from a perch 
just ahead of me down the trail.  A heavy-footed scuffling in the leaves 
off the trail told me the bear wasn't far though I never saw it.  Then 
again, I didn't stop to look for the bear.  The rhododendron thickets were 
full of tussling Wood Thrushes, "wit wit wit", and their nocturnal note,  a 
sometimes bell-like "hee-yee".  The least interesting warbler feeding with 
a group of titmice and chickadees all day was a Hooded and every group of 
"the usual suspects" had a warbler among them, a Magnolia here, a Black-and 
White there, another Blackburnian there. I was relieved to find a couple of 
Pine Warblers close to the end of the day, happy to find some "normal" 
warblers.

I ended the day, soggy with rain, sodden with trail mud, and slaked with 
warblers.  I had seen 15 species of warbler in a day and the runner-up for 
bird of the day was a Wilson's Warbler.  That's not a bad day for 
warblers.   As hoped, it was an almost overwhelming change of pace and most 
distinctly a challenge.