My "Big Month" of May Day 8

I arrived at the park just before 8:00am this Sunday and spent the next 3 hours trying to add new birds to my monthly list. Though I only managed poor shots, I saw the following species in the first 45 minutes or so; Ruby-crowned Kinglet, Wood Duck, Mourning Dove, Red-winged Blackbird, Yellow Warbler and Baltimore Oriole. Then things started getting interesting as I spotted not just one but two different migratory Sparrows that gave me the best looks I've ever had at both species. The first was a curious little Lincoln's Sparrow and if I'm not mistaken, this is the first positive ID I've made on this bird on my own! This drab looking Sparrow is easy to confuse with other Sparrows, but it was so close to me that I could see the gray patch on the head along with the fine streaks on it's tan (buffy) colored breast and a noticeable "eye ring." I tried repositioning myself for better light and ended up catching a photo with some green in the background that I really like. This bird didn't stick around as long as I'd hoped so I turned my attention toward a bright male Yellow Warbler. Mostly this bird stayed out in a clump of Pussy Willow where it really stood out against a nice green background of spring. But after a while it did come in a bit closer for better looks. In comparison to a Goldfinch, the Yellow Warbler is much more of an "orangey" yellow. Say like a School Bus color. The male of the species also sports orangey-red streaking on his breast making him look even more "deep yellow." After stopping to admire and photograph some wildflowers including various colors of Violets, Jack-in-the-Pulpit, and some beautiful Marsh Marigold, I heard an enthusiastic bird singing from the cattails. It was perched near the top of the cattails and I could tell it was a Sparrow, but which one? It did not sound familiar to me so I inched closer while lowering my profile to keep lower than the height of the plants. To my surprise it was a Swamp Sparrow, a species I've seen from distances before but have never gotten very close to. Today was my lucky day as this particular bird allowed me great looks while it sang it's heart out. Sparrows can be tricky to tell apart from one another but to me the Swamp Sparrow is one that kind of sticks out due to it's warm red/rusty wings (without wing bars or stripes) combined with a lot of gray on the head, neck and breast. I felt very lucky to have spent as much time observing this colorful little character for as long as I did today! Other species seen today included; Brown-headed Cowbird, Canada Goose, Black-capped Chickadee, Great Egret, Gray Catbird and Common Grackle. I also was nearly run over by a 12 year old kid zooming up and down the wood chip trails on a miniature dirt bike! I yelled loudly at him that motorized vehicles weren't allowed in the park and he apologized as he motored away. Sadly I've seen adults riding motorcycles on these trails as well.

41 Species!

As part of my "Big Month" of May, I wanted to set aside one day and basically bird all day at the park. So I arrived shortly after 8am today, took a lunch break at home and then went back for the afternoon. My other goal for the day was to see at least 40 species of birds, which on a nice day like today should be very do-able. One of my first sightings of the day was a Warbling Vireo, a bird that I've come to learn mostly by it's song, but rarely via sightings. Today that changed however and I got long looks at this fairly drab looking bird with the amazingly complicated song. I watched this bird longer than any other bird today and probably spent over an hour trying to catch an unobstructed view. In the end I would up with some photos I was pretty happy with including this one. Another bird I spent a fair amount of time with today was this beautiful and semi-cooperative American Redstart. This Warbler is known for being a tough one to photograph as they are normally hyperactive and blocked by foliage. This one however sat out in the open on a branch and just sung his heart out for a long time. I had ample photo opportunities and I kept telling myself what a rare occasion this was. He was still a challenge to capture well due to the black eye on top of black plumage, but I did my best and I have a few keepers that are better than most of my older attempts. The next bird pictured here is another Warbler, a male Common Yellowthroat that really stood out against the clear blue sky. He bounced around in a young Willow tree for quite some time but he kept moving ever upward, giving me the best looks from underneath. After lunch break I arrived back on the east side of the park to find a Green Heron posing nicely for me at the little pond just south of the parking lot. I knew it would be a short lived view so I took as many photos as I could before he left his perch. It turned out to be one of the nicer Green Heron photos I've taken! I saw a heck of a lot more birds –which I'll spell out at the end, but I spotted one species that until today I had never recorded in the park. It was quite a ways away but with my binoculars I deduced that it was an Olive-sided Flycatcher! And come to think about it, I remember seeing a similar shaped bird in the past in the same area that I couldn't identify –so maybe, just maybe I had seen one before. But at the time I likely didn't know what it was. But now I knew just enough to ID this bird and quite excited by the find! So here is my final list of species seen today, 41 species total! (listed in the order that I could remember them later)

1. Song Sparrow
2. Red-winged Blackbird
3. Common Grackle
4. White-breasted Nuthatch
5. Pileated Woodpecker (Saw 2 together, possibly juveniles)
6. Hairy Woodpecker
7. Tree Swallow
8. Barn Swallow
9. House Wren
10. Northern Cardinal
11. Blue Jay
12. Rose-breasted Grosbeak
13. Scarlet Tanager (2 adult males!)
14. Baltimore Oriole
15. American Goldfinch
16. Sandhill Crane (heard only)
17. Least Flycatcher
18. Great Crested Flycatcher
19. Mourning Dove
20. Indigo Bunting
21. Yellow Warbler
22. American Redstart
23. Common Yellowthroat
24. Tennessee Warbler
25. Northern Waterthrush
26. Magnolia Warbler
27. Swainson's Thrush
28. Canada Goose
29. Mallard
30. Wood Duck
31. Gray Catbird
32. White-crowned Sparrow
33. American Robin
34. Great Blue Heron
35. Green Heron
36. American Crow
37. Brown-headed Cowbird
38. Warbling Vireo
39. Olive-sided Flycatcher
40. Black-capped Chickadee
41. House Sparrow

First Visit in May

Since May is THE best month of the entire year for bird watching, I set a personal goal for myself to go out bird watching every day in May, all 31 days in a row. So far so good but this Sunday is actually my first visit to Palmer Lake Park for the month. The first half of my visit was by myself and I spent quite a good deal of time just meandering slowly around the east side of the park. Later I was joined by a good friend of mine for the remainder of the hike. But before that I'd already spotted a handful of good birds and I was seeing so many species that I tried to keep the list in my head. On one of the ponds on the east side I spotted both a male and female Wood Duck perched on a log. At least at Palmer Wood Ducks are easily spooked and of course the male jumped off the log the instant I pulled up my camera. But the female stayed put as I tried to get an angle through the cattails. The females can be equally as beautiful as the males in the right light and I was surprised just how much blue showed up on her feathers. Near the southeast side I was spotting good birds left and right, including a number of different Sparrows including White-throated, Swamp, Song and this White-crowned Sparrow! This is a bird I usually only see once or twice a year if that so I was thrilled to find one today. He wasn't quite cooperative for a photo and this is the best one I got after much chasing back and forth. In this same area I also found a more cooperative Brown Thrasher. I was closer at first but then it flew up a little higher and into even better light so I was really happy with how this photo turned out. They have such bright yellow eyes and if I'm able to capture just that I'm usually pretty happy. When I met up with my friend near the south parking lot, she noticed a small flock of a dozen or so shorebirds land out in the muddy waters of the lake. They were so small they were barely noticeable and we wouldn't have even known they were there had we not seen them fly in. I tried to get a picture but they were so small and blending in so well I still don't know what they were. For size comparison you can see the bottom of a can of pop off to the right. We had a good hike through the rest of the park and noticed lots of good plants too, such as newly emerging Jack-in-the-Pulpit, lots of Marsh Marigold and Blue Violets. All in all I counted a total of 33 species of birds. Some of the more notable ones were my First of Year Grey Catbird, FOY Baltimore Oriole and FOY Yellow Warbler! P.S. I believe a friend has helped me to positively ID the shorebirds at Pectoral Sandpipers. A brand new species for me at Palmer Lake Park!

Great Backyard Bird Count 2015 (Sun)

On day 2 of my Great Backyard Bird Count, I certainly felt like I saw more species. At the time of my hike it was near 8 or 10º above which definitely felt warmer than yesterday. And thank goodness the wind had subsided. The park felt more active for wildlife today and I was seeing Downy and Hairy Woodpeckers left and right. There were also a fair amount of Cardinals active today and both male and female were visible. As I exited the wooded area from the north side heading west, a Red-tailed Hawk flew right past me. This is in the area where I've seen 2 of them this winter but after looking around for a bit I could not find another. On the south side at the duck pond the open water has shrunken yet more in size forcing more Mallards to find water elsewhere. There's still good numbers of them here thought that I'd estimate at 70 to 75. On the wood chip trail here I took particular interest in both a White-breasted Nuthatch and another Downy Woodpecker. The Downy was in a bush of Red-osier Dogwood and busily pecking at it's thin twigs. I crept up on it and took a few successive photos in burst mode. When I got home I was surprised to find that I'd captured the very moment when it pulled some kind of insect larva from the shrub! Essentially this happened within 3 frames I'd taken at 6 frames per second –meaning it found and pulled the larva in about one half a second. I find it incredibly interesting how skilled Woodpeckers are at finding and extracting something like this during the height of winter. Quite amazing. Further along I found a male Great Horned Owl standing guard near his now nesting mate. This big, snapped off tree wasn't exactly the place I would expect to see an Owl perch. He looked kind of like a king on a throne up there. The light here was terrible and I shot through a lot of brush for the photo and it turned out pretty grainy. My last good sighting of the day was quite a good one for many reasons. I was hiking on the wood chip trail heading towards where Shingle Creek empties back out of the lake. I was about to turn the corner at the creek when I thought I saw some wadded up old newspaper caught in a tree down near the frozen creek. Upon closer inspection it was a small raptor! Because of the birds vibrant orangey tone, I firs thought it was an American Kestrel –which is our smallest species of Falcon. But the face didn't seem right. At the point of noticing the bird I was already only 30 feet away. As I stood there taking photos the bird hadn't really paid me any attention so I approached a bit closer, hiking down the creek bank and half way out onto the frozen water. At this distance I was more skeptical and my only other thought is that it was a Merlin. A Merlin is also a Falcon but slightly larger and slimmer than a Kestrel. I have only seen a Merlin once before in the Palmer Lake Park area, but I did have a good opportunity to view another wild one last fall at Hillside Cemetery in North Minneapolis. That one had a much more distinct "mustache" our dark, vertical markings extending down from the front of the eye. This bird did not really show that and also showed a fairly bright "blueish" colored cap on it's head. I posted the photo to the Minnesota Birding Facebook page and learned that it is a known subspecies of Merlin called the "Prairie Merlin or Richardson's Merlin!" I don't think I would count this as a new species for the park but it is certainly interesting to note! According to the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, the Prairie Merlin subspecies occurs in Great Plains states and southern Canada.

Great Backyard Bird Count 2015 (Sat)

A few years ago I started a tradition of making sure to participate in the annual Great Backyard Bird Count or "GBBC" every February. At the time I guess I didn't quite realize that it's kind of a marketing scheme to get bird watchers to start using an online reporting tool called ebird. Not implying anything negative by that, it's just that when I did my first count I hadn't realized the tool already existed before I heard about the GBBC. In fact ebird is setup to allow you to report on a daily basis and for multiple locations including your own back yard. Anyhow, I think this is the 3rd or 4th year that I've made sure to pay more attention to what I'm seeing at the park and report it online when I get home. Last year my goal was to find a Northern Shrike to report. This year my goal was to report at least one Owl. I was joined by another good birder friend of mine today and we made our way around the entire perimeter before doing some off the trail hiking as well. The temperature at the time was roughly 0º and it was quite windy on top of it. It was hard to dress warm enough and my face was numb within minutes. Our first stop was at the duck pond where we could see that the area of open water had shrunk nearly in half from it's previous size. I estimate there were about 80 Mallards here today and there was barely enough room for them in the water. No sign of a Black Duck or anything else unusual but it was interesting to watch how they managed the cold weather. Most had their head tucked back and were covered in ice crystals. Despite the temps it was completely sunny out today so when we got out of the wind it was more tolerable. Birds were expectedly not very active today save for a few Robins, Cardinals, Chickadees and Hairy Woodpeckers. Having spotted one Great Horned Owl already, we spotted two more later on –a pair using a reconstructed Cooper's Hawk nest that I played a part in back in July of 2012. I wont say exactly where this is in the park to avoid extra attention as I know that dedicated bird watchers will find this on their own sooner or later. Much later on we ran into another birder friend of ours who stated that he just saw a Barred Owl fly through the woods. At first we were unsuccessful in relocating it and were about to give up. But when we hiked into the woods a little ways to see if we could get closer to some Cardinals and House Finches, there it was! I was quite happy to report a total of 4 Owls and 2 different Owl species to the GBBC. I plan on doing the same again tomorrow.

A Looong Hike with Larry

Today is Martin Luther King Jr. Day and thus an extra day off work for me. As I pulled into my parking space today who should pull in right beside me but another birder friend of mine Larry. He has grown up around the park and hiked (and watched birds) here at Palmer Lake Park since he was a kid. Thus he is one of the most skilled birders I know and can tell you of some pretty amazing sightings at the park. Some of them being birds that are just not seen at the park anymore and would cause a state-wide phenomenon if they were spotted anywhere near the park today. We decided to hike together up the frozen creek heading towards the north side. As we did the sun made it's first unexpected appearance for the day and cast an eerie glow against the dark sky in the north. We likely did more talking than looking but to be honest there has just not been much to see this entire weekend. It's just that time of year when a Chickadee or Woodpecker is an exciting spot. Larry would of course prove me wrong though as we went around the north side when he pointed out a Barred Owl. It could be seen from the trail but was behind such thick brush and against the sun too, for a pretty crummy view. Niether of us wanted to bump him so we watched from the trail for a bit before moving on. On the west side I noticed a Downy Woodpecker at almost eye level on a Willow tree. He was more interested in poking his tongue into the crevices so I followed him around the tree clicking photos. I kind of like how this one turned out. We had been hiking since 9:00am today and my legs were actually starting to hurt. I knew lunchtime had come and gone but I wasn't quite sure how much time had gone by because I forgot my phone at home. Upon getting home to find it was 2:30pm I then realized I'd been hiking for 5 and a half hours! Holy crap, no wonder my legs hurt! One last bird I stopped to photograph for they day was this American Tree Sparrow. Opposite of some of the birds Larry used to see in the area as a kid, he pointed out that Tree Sparrows used to be a very rare sighting when he was young. A few other species we saw today included Mallards, a mature Bald Eagle, Red-bellied Woodpecker, Black-capped Chickadee, Dark-eyed Junco, American Crow and Northern Cardinal.

ZZZZ-ZZZ-ZZ Zero Degrees for a High

A major winter storm system swept across the midwest last night. We were predicted to get a couple inches of snow but here in the northern suburbs we hardly got a dusting. But one thing they did get right was the extreme cold following the system. Our wake-up temp this morning was -5º and I was really thinking I would just stay inside today. BUT because the sun came out and we've seen so little of it lately, I decided what the heck. When I arrived at the park at 2:30pm we were just hitting our high temperature for the day of 0 degrees! As if that weren't bad enough, it was windy as heck on top of it. I really had one goal in mind today and that was to find and photograph a Cedar Waxwing. When I started out I wasn't really seeing much and I started second guessing why I was here watching birds on such a day as this. Off to my right I noticed what looked to be a bird frozen to the side of a tree. This White-breasted Nuthatch was just sitting motionless on the side of the tree facing the sun. I hiked in closer, almost underneath it and the bird never bumped, making me think it was just trying to warm up. A bit later I spotted a mature Bald Eagle perched high in a tree near the center of the park. It was too far away for a good photo, but is my first BE of the year! When I stopped at the Duck Pond on the southeast corner I wasn't too surprised to see Mallards, but wow was there a lot of them! I loosely estimated that there were at least 450 of them swimming and diving and flapping and chasing each other in water that had to be much warmer than the air temperature today. In fact the water was steaming in the cold temperature. Finally on the south side I located my Cedar Waxwings. In fact the first one I saw from a distance stayed put the entire time as I crept closer and closer to get a photograph. There were about 6 to 8 Waxwings in a Buckthorn tree busily picking and gulping down the berries along with a dozen or more American Robins. I couldn't have asked for better lighting conditions but it was hard to get an unobstructed view of them in such a thick tree. I took quite a few photos and this is just one of my favorites. The Robins were also busy eating the same Buckthorn berries and they looked quite colorful against the clear blue sky. I decided today that I really appreciate Robins more in January than any other time of the year. Ha ha. Here is my checklist for today.

Happy New Year 2015!

As I lay in bed last night listening to fireworks and other noise at midnight on New Year's eve, I instead was thinking about a whole new year of bird watching. I felt optimistic for a change about what I might see and/or photograph in the new year and decided that I would try to do a better job at recording my sightings. So today when I visited Palmer Lake Park like I often do on the first of the year, I tried taking at least one photo of every species I saw. Then at home it made it easy to enter my data into ebird.org. It would be neat I think to do this from now on so that at the end of 2015 I could look back and easily tally up the number of species. My very first bird of the year was an American Tree Sparrow on the east side of the park. Though still a sparrow I kind of appreciate them now as they are only here in the winter and tend to disappear come Spring. I spent a while at the Duck Pond this morning trying to catch a photo or two of the Mallards bathing themselves and splashing water everywhere. I did manage a few neat shots but I really liked all the color in this one as he was preening. It was during a short time when the sun stayed out. The next thing I saw was a pretty good sighting I think for the very first day of the year. I noticed a Great Horned Owl fly from it's perch over the wood chip trail and land in another area. I hiked back to where I'd already came from and found not just the one Owl but a second one as well! This is the time of year when GHO's are "pairing up" in preparation for mating and nesting in Feb - March. When I took this photo the first one had already taken off. I saw a total of 15 species today during my hike which is not a lot by any means but fairly average for this time of year. I was happy to add some Mourning Doves to my list near the end of my walk. They tend to overwinter in the park near the northeast side.

An Extra Friday

Today is Friday the 28th of November and the day after Thanksgiving. I had an additional day off of work today so of course I went to the park. It was a dreary, overcast day and every photo I was taking was turning out dark. I didn't even know until later when I got home that the first bird I spotted today was a White-throated Sparrow, a bird which I've not seen for quite a long time and I'd assumed they had left for the season. There were hundreds of Mallards congregating in the Duck Pond on the southwest corner but no unusual ducks among them. Finally I had a great photo opportunity at a Blue Jay that perched right in front of me. And I completely blew it and this is the least-blurry shot I got. For whatever reason Blue Jays are very difficult to photograph. One would think because they're such a common species that it would not be hard, but just try getting close to one in the wild! Shortly after I spotted a Great Horned Owl perched high up on the trees but he was too far away for a good photo. I took some non-the-less but nothing worth sharing here. Probably the busiest area for birds today included House Finches, Tree Sparrows, Chickadees, Cardinals, Mourning Doves, and a Red-bellied Woodpecker. I'm still trying for better photos of House Finch as they can be a very pretty bird. But with the light being what it is lately I'm lucky if any of the male's violet-red color shows up at all. I was happy though to get photos of both the male and female House Finch today.

15 Birds, 2 Mink and Some Insects!

I can hardly believe it is only late November now as the weather we've had since our first snow on the 10th has felt much more like December or even January. We've already dipped below 0º and had a couple more snowfalls and it's not even December! This Saturday was slightly warmer and I was anxious to hike around the park. I started tallying up the number of bird species that I spotted because it is just so slow this time of year. After watching some Chickadees and Juncos moving back and forth from the cattails, I spied a small group of Cedar Waxwings picking at the Buckthorn berries. The light wasn't so good and especially shooting upwards like this but I like this picture non-the-less. When I got over to the "duck pond" I started to see all sorts of birds including a few House Finches and Goldfinches. I always enjoy seeing or hearing Goldfinches in the wintertime as they remind me very much of Summer. I'm guessing this one might be an adult male in his winter-time plumage since he shows a bit of very bright yellow still on his face. The Mallards have been slowly growing in numbers since the first snow and I always stop to check out the group just in case there's a stray duck of a different species among them. So far now luck. I did try my hand at catching a picture whenever one would bathe or stretch it's wings and this was the best of the bunch. I'm still no good at catching movement and not having it appear blurry. My very best photo of the day however would be taken just minutes later after I spotted a handful of Cardinals –males and females– moving around low in some dogwood. I crept closer very slowly and positioned myself perfectly on this male somehow without spooking him. He had clearly just eaten something as evident by food left on his bill, so he must have been content just to sit there for a while. So I took advantage and popped off numerous shots and got a couple of very sharp ones. For me, a decent photograph of even a common bird can make my whole day of bird watching well worth it. And at this time of year when everything outdoors starts fading into black or white, a bright red Cardinal is very appreciated! In a short while later I spotted another flash of red, this time being on a Red-bellied Woodpecker. It was here in this same area on the wood chip trail bordering the duck pond that I spotted the majority of the birds I saw today. I believe I had roughly 15 total including:
1. Dark-eyed Junco
2. Black-capped Chickadee
3. American Crow
4. Mallard
5. Blue Jay
6. Northern Cardinal
7. Cedar Waxwing
8. Downy Woodpecker
9. Hairy Woodpecker
10. Red-bellied Woodpecker
11. House Finch
12. American Goldfinch
13. American Tree Sparrow
14. American Robin
15. White-breasted Nuthatch
Aside from these birds, I actually spotted not one but two different Mink! One nearly ran into my foot as I hiked along the wood chip trail on the south side of the park. I could hear shrieking in this area and at first I thought a Raptor had caught a rodent of some kind. But I quickly learned it was indeed a Mink moving through the cattails at a hurried pace –possibly with another one chasing it, though I only saw the one. Then on the complete opposite end of the park, I spotted another one. This time bounding up the banks of the drainage ditch under the northern most paved trail that leads out of the park. Neither one stayed put long enough for a photo of any kind. However it was here that I spotted something interesting –flying insects! There were 2 or 3 of them flying through the air and landing on dried Goldenrod plants. I could hardly believe what I was seeing considering how cold it has been. Simply amazing what nature can withstand.

Lazy Day in Late September

Today was Sunday and the weather was just beautiful for hiking through the park. I decided to bring my collapsible stool with me today and possibly just sit in the woods to see what I could see. I did just that on the southwest corner of the park –off the wood chip trail just north of the duck pond. Here I spotted a Magnolia Warbler in fall plumage! This is a beautiful Warbler any time of the year because of it's bright yellow breast with black spotting. I followed this bird everywhere, picking up my stool time and time again and setting it down closer. But as soon as I would sit down the bird would move again and so I finally just slung it over my shoulder and followed the bird on foot. It took my all the way to the opposite end of the park, all the while trying and failing at a nice, sharp photo. This was my best one and I joke that at least the butt was in focus. Besides the one Warbler, I also spotted Great Egret, White-throated Sparrow, Song Sparrow, Swamp Sparrow, Least Flycatcher, Black-capped Chickadee, Northern Cardinal, American Robin, Red-eyed Vireo, Red-bellied Woodpecker, and Gray Catbird. The last of which I managed a post-able photo of. I like the blue sky as the background and the fact that you can see a hint of the birds "rusty" colored rump patch. Near the end of my walk I scared up a couple of Wood Ducks near the railroad tie overlook at the lake. But there was one bird left that I managed not to scare away and I hid behind the cattails long enough for it to get comfortable again. As the duck closed his eyes I pushed my lens through the cattails to create my own view and snapped a few images. This was my favorite.

Morning Fog and a Beautiful Day

There are just some visits to the park I will remember for a long time and today was likely one of those. It was just such beautiful weather and with beautiful sights everywhere. When I arrived just after 7am, there was a heavy blanket of early morning fog settled over the park. It made everything green feel even more so, like a jungle of sorts. It also made for some great photo opportunities and at numerous stops I would try to catch the rays of sun through the trees lighting up the fog. On the east side there was a Killdeer running around on the baseball diamonds. I was hoping the fog would let me get closer to it and for once I did come closer than normal. Still this photo is cropped in quite a bit. I'm kind of fascinated with them as I really only became aware of their presence at the park this year. Killdeer are considered a "shorebird" but can be found in some interesting places. I once saw one in the Burger King parking lot in Brooklyn Center! As the sun began to burn off the morning fog, it left a dew on everything. I liked how it was reflecting in the sun on this tall grass so I tried to capture it in a photo. Birds of all kinds were easy to spot today but on the north side I ran into a Yellow Warbler who was singing it's heart out. As with all Warblers, the Yellow Warbler can be tricky to get a photo of because they just typically don't sit still. But this one sat in the same spot for over 5 minutes just singing loudly. Periodically it would stop to itch it's head with it's leg which was an interesting sight and something you wouldn't think a little bird was even capable of until you see it. Near the end of my walk I watched another comical sequence play out on the paved trail in front of me. An adult Robin landed near a half-dead earthworm. Immediately a young Robin landed just a foot away. The adult looked at the young one, picked up the worm and proceeded to shove it down the throat of the young one. In one big gulp the worm was gone and the young one stood there again with his mouth open. I snapped photos every few seconds and thus caught the entire sequence which I posted to the Friends of Palmer Lake Park facebook page. In addition to the birds listed above, I also saw: Brown-headed Cowbird, Gray Catbird, Downy Woodpecker, Wood Duck, Red-bellied Woodpecker, Mallard, Canada Goose (the largest flock I've ever seen –nearly 75), American Redstart, Red-winged Blackbird, Eastern Bluebird, American Goldfinch, Common Grackle, Mourning Dove, Song Sparrow, and Baltimore Oriole. I also saw a couple of Painted Turtles crossing the trail.