I cannot believe I have been here for almost a month now! Since my last post I have been to Arizona and back. I brought my bins with me, but somehow did not have the heart to take them out and use them. My empty feeders hung from their hooks in the yard and I filled only one with the leftover thistle seed I had in the garage. A few hummingbirds were buzzing around. My son and his wife did attempt to feed them. I got a brief glimpse of a Rufous hummingbird and a Black-chinned. The Costa's are still there in force feeding from the Cape Honeysuckle I planted to attract them. Butterflys flitted all around and I couldn't help thinking that Doug Taron would love to be there right now.
But mostly I was busy. Too busy to stop and think until the last day when I was there alone in the almost empty house. Walls stipped bare of artwork. Trees stripped bare of feeders. After three days of blazing hot weather a storm moved in and the air cooled to 70 degrees in the afternoon! I changed into my bathing suit and soaked in my hot tub one last time. It felt so good on my sore muscles. Then I got out, showered and dressed and drove away. I did not look back. I did not take even one photograph. I boarded the plane the next day and came back to New England.
And I started counting birds once again.
I saw an Osprey as I crossed the town green in Colchester. I discovered there are Turkey Vultures hanging out on top of the steeple of the Federated Church. I have been trying to count birds on a regular basis at the Lion's Pond on Halls Hill Road. I can tell you that there is almost always a Great Blue Heron hanging out there if you want to see one.
I have not seen anymore Life Birds since the Piping PloverI saw in Rhode Island, but today I spotted a new bird for my Connecticut List: a Cooper's Hawk that was flying over Salmon River State Park. I wanted to go out birding today, and indeed I did, but the rain foiled my plans and soon sent me home where I had a cup of tea and a nap instead. This stormy autumn New England weather makes me moody and wild and creative. I wrote poetry all evening. Some of it will show up on my poetry blog, Kathie's Poet Tree.
For those of you who are birders, here is what I saw today in various places:
- Turkey vulture
- Cooper's hawk
- Great Blue Heron
- Mourning dove
- American Crow
- Blue Jay
- Black-capped chickadee
- Tufted titmouse
- White-breasted nuthatch
- Northern Cardinal
- House finch
- House sparrow
And here is an update to the stats I posted last time (changes are in bold):
Life Birds-386 species/387
Total species for the Year-250/261
So far this month 31 species/67
Connecticut Life Birds 94 species/97
Maine Life Birds 85 species/85
Massachusetts Life Birds 18 species/36
New Hampshire Life Birds 8 species/8
Rhode Island Life Birds 2 species/15
Vermont Life Birds 0 species/0
We move into our apartment next week. I hope to have my own computer up and running by then and I hope to have the photo thing all work out as well.
Come visit me on Kathie's Poet Tree where poetry is happening!
