Friday, May 25, 2007

Early Morning Birdwatching

As I mentioned in my last post, I've been doing a lot more of my runs in the morning now that the sun's out so early. It's great especially since we're having a little bit of a heat wave so it's still nice and cool in the morning.

I really like the challenge of trying to identify birds without slowing down or stopping. The path I run along is very dense in vegetation, which makes it even harder to spot the birds when I hear their calls.

The few birds I was able to spot yesterday morning included two Baltimore Orioles (very vocal), a Goldfinch and what I believe was a Northern Waterthrush, since my Sibley Guide says they're very common in dense shrubs and small trees new slow-moving or standing water. I've seen these little and white-streaked birds during many of my trips down to the river, but I haven't put much effort into identifying them. I'll have to get a better look next time.

I'm going to be down the Cape this weekend for Memorial Day. I'm a little nervous about the traffic, but I'll try to be optimistic. We're going down Sunday to go camping in North Truro. The Wellfleet Audubon Sanctuary is on the way and I really want to try and stop there. I know they have some wonderful trails and it's an excellent spot for birding.

6 comments:

Larry said...

I hope you have a good time birding there.-Take some pics, and let us know how you make out.

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Veery said...

I like your blog, it is a good read.
Birding-by-jogging; another fun way to bird! I can't think of a better activity to mix with jogging. Birds Rule!

dguzman said...

How was your trip?

Birdinggirl said...

dguzman, the trip was good but we got stuck in SO much traffic. That's something I forget about being a native of Cape Cod. On holiday weekends we usually bunker down and down go anywhere so I forget how bad Route 6 can be. Another downside to the trip was that we didn't make it to the Wellfleet bird sanctuary. But thanks for the reminder- I want to make it a priority before the end of the summer. I see you're from central Pennsylvania. I went to college there- it's a beautiful area. I love going hiking and camping there now.

Birdinggirl said...

Hi veery, thanks for stopping by. I definitely need to make my blog more of a priority, but I still try to check in as much as possible. Yes- jogging and birding is really fun. I run the same route every time so I'm familiar with the area and I actually try to practice identifying calls. More times than not I can't see the bird, but when I do and I guess right it's a great feeling.