The smoke hasn’t cleared yet…

The Canadian wildfire smoke is still with us, and it was cloudy this morning, as well, so the sunlight took its sweet time filtering down into Estabrook Park. Add to that the fact that the Milwaukee Birders were here just yesterday, and I should not have been surprised that not many folks turned out for our wildlife walk today. Oh well.

Our first sight at the pond was this great blue heron that flew in to perch high over the island, and it really blended in with the bare branches, so see if you can spot it.

On my way to the parking lot to meet everyone, I did see a green heron, too, but it had made itself scarce by the time I returned with the group. Darn.

One bird that was there for both of my visits was this female hooded merganser. “Thanks, Sweetie!”

The big treat of the day came as we started to make our way back south from the boat launch at the north end. That’s when Jenny noticed someone small and yellow in a tree right beside the trail. It was flitting around pretty energetically, and it took us a while to get a good look, but we were finally able to determine that it is our first Nashville warbler of the fall migration. Yay!

As we were frantically tracking the warbler, look who John found just on the other side of the path, the first female ruby-throated hummingbird we’ve seen since the nest emptied out back in June.

In the meadow, just a bit downstream, I was thrilled to find at least one pearl crescent still there.

Another big treat, at least for me, was spotting this amazing-looking moth beside the trail that runs along the edge of the bluff behind the dog park. It is our very first Virginia creeper clearwing (Albuna fraxini), and you may notice that, besides small clear patches on its wings, it also has a bushy tail similar to that of the snowberry clearwing we’ve been seeing lately, and which is in the same family, Sesiidae.