Another Take on Life, the World, and Adventure: The Great Backyard Bird Count

As I mentioned in my post last week, yesterday was the Great Backyard Bird Count. Numbers were low for the training workshop this time, so Joey and I sat in for moral support while we waited for the sun to get a little higher (and warmer). Joey introduced me to the park ecologist, Terri Hogan. Joey had worked with her when he was volunteering at a national battlefield in Tennessee a few years ago. I think Terri will be a good contact to have, she's only been at CONG for about a year, but she no doubt keeps up with what's going on, and from what I hear she is a bit of a visionary and is great at her job. Plus, Joey says she really knows her frogs, so I'm looking forward to hiking a "Frog Log" one night.

After an hour or so at the Visitor's Center, we headed down to the King Snake Trail to get on the creek. It took a little while to get on the water. We have to haul the boats about 100 meters then navigate the man-eating mud-pits boobie-trapped with cypress knees and tangling roots before we make it to the water's edge. Okay, I guess it's not that bad...

After a few hours on the creek we hiked down the Kingsnake trail a little ways where we were able to pick up a couple more species. We were watching about a dozen White-Throated Sparrows when we flushed a Barred Owl that had been watching us. He didn't seem very pleased about being disturbed and we heard him hooting away a few minutes later. He was answered by another Barred Owl to the other side of us. As we listened, the deep hoots of the owls was pierced by the cries of Red-Shouldered Hawks. We watched as two hawks, calling back and forth, descended on our location, and converged on another hawk near us that we had not noticed. It seemed that they were being pretty aggressive, but the thick canopy made it difficult to get a good view. But the racket was amazing! For a few minutes we were surrounded by the constant and LOUD cries of Red-Shouldered Hawks and Barred Owls. It was awesome and pretty creepy!

For the most part, given our goal for the day, the camera was ignored in favor of the binoculars. It's a shame. Not only do I love taking the photos, but the GBBC runs a photo contest. I am very tempted to go back out and try to get some shots today, but I must be a good student (for a change) and devote the day to preparing for an analysis exam I have on Tuesday.

The GBBC folks post many of the photos they recieve online, and they are amazing. I'm tempted to submit some of the images I've captured in the park over the last few weeks, but the photos have to be taken during the count weekend. But, who would know, right? I would. :-( One category in which the images tend to be less-than-stunning is the people catagory---people enjoying birds/birding. So I've submitted this photo of Joey (posing) on the creek:

I think the composition is pretty nice, and the red maple looks pretty cool. We'll see what comes of it, but I'm not holding my breath!

Joey was a good sport about posing for these photos. He even pulled the Nat. Geo. Bird Guide into one of them. Those GBBC folks eat that stuff up!

I mentioned the White-Throated Sparrows earlier. These guys were fun to watch. We had our first go at "pishing" with them, and it really seemed to work. I would pish, and the birdy heads would pop up. We still had to focus to located them, even though they were only a few feet away. How cute is this guy peeping out from the brush?