Arvo in the Arbo

Yellow-rumped Warbler Setophaga coronata

Winter Wren Troglodytes hiemalis

Fox Sparrow Passerella iliaca

White-throated Sparrow Zonotrichia albicollis

juvenile Cedar Waxwing Bombycilla cedrorum

juvenile Cedar Waxwing Bombycilla cedrorum
(quite goofy-looking)

Necklace, the Chickadee Dan wants to adopt

Turkey Vulture Cathartes aura

American Red Squirrel Tamiasciurus hudsonicus

Leaf-footed Bug sp.

The scene of the dirt bomb incident

Goblintree

Morgan Arboretum, October 22, 2022
  Last time Dan and I hit the arbo, we got mired in a lovely blizzard. We did a tour of the benches there today, amidst the lovely fallllll follllliage.

  Oh oh, here’s a good’un. One time, when we were birding there as wee lads, I threw the best dirt bomb ever. Dan was way down the hill by the parking lot, cheerfully looking for kinglets, minding his own nine-year-old business. I happened upon this solid little dirt bomb, a perfect projectile, and decided to fire it down towards Dan, to startle him perhaps, with a dramatic near miss. I leaned back and launched it on a high mortar trajectory, like I was skipping a stone into heaven. I almost forgot about the thing because nothing happened for so long, and then everything happened all at once. Dan’s head was enveloped by a massive brown impact cloud, and then he crumpled like Lee Harvey Oswald. The birders around him were confused…confounded even. Pretty sure his mom needed smelling salts to revive him. I felt bad about it at the time, but we can laugh about it now. I think the dirt bomb knocked him into the land of wind and ghosts because it had some pebble knuckles at its core, or something. Paf!

  Enough silly stories, back to the birds. Before today, I’d never seen a juvenile Cedar Waxwing, nor had I ever seen the species flycatching before. That changed over the Quarry. We watched a group of seven juvie Cedar Waxwings…flycatching. Always cool to see a novel age and/or behaviour in a familiar species.

  Fox Sparrow was my bird of the day. We had one skulking by the cedar trail near Blossom Corner. We bumped into Ron Rind there, and joined forces to try to figure out what the ‘Dees were mobbing in the cedartops. A Merlin, most likely. Other notable sightings included several Yellow-rumped Warblers, and a couple of showy Winter Wrens.

  Oh yeah, it was unseasonably warm…like low 20s warm. Spring Peepers were singing, as were the crickets. Loads of insects were out and about, including Cabbage Whites, dragonflies, and clouds of the cursed invasive Asian Lady Beetles. Plus a gnarly-looking Leaf-legged Bug.

  We tallied 23 species in four hours. The end.