The weather was a little unseasonably warm this morning in Estabrook Park, but not one of the fine folks who joined the weekly wildlife walk complained one bit. We did see plenty of birds, but nothing really new, and maybe I was having just too much fun chatting with the company, because I barely took a picture.
Happily, I still have pictures left over from yesterday, when I had nothing to do but take pictures, so here’s that Cooper’s hawk that I mentioned. I did my best to recover the image from harsh backlighting, and you can at least make out the bird’s fierce expression.
In the same woods where I saw the Nashville and orange-crowned warblers yesterday, this little cutie, perhaps the last brown creeper we’ll see for the year, was busy creeping up that tree trunk in search of tasty morsels.
The crabapple tree that hosted the scene between the red-bellied woodpecker and the yellow-bellied sapsucker also attracted a few white-throated sparrows, and this one struck quite the heroic pose against that gorgeous blue sky.
We also saw the pied-billed grebe again on the pond this morning, and you may believe that you are growing weary of seeing my pictures of it, but once winter settles in, and the grebe has long flown south, you’ll be asking yourself, “I wonder where that cute little bird on the pond went?”
Finally, in the meadow beside the river at the north end, which remained mostly unmowed this summer, a monarch butterfly was filling up on the nectar of some small white asters.
Lastly, I see the forecast for tomorrow morning calls for clear skies, continued mild temps, but a good breeze out of the west, so who knows what I’ll see. Maybe the breeze will finally blow in those rusty blackbirds I’ve been pining for.
