Post or Poster

I've been working diligently all week on finishing up my poster presentation for the Society for the Preservation of Natural History Collections annual conference. Less than two weeks to go and I realized how quickly I've been needing to get it done. My posts have therefore been remiss but I thought I would quickly catch up on some of the sightings I've had. This past Friday I stopped at some open space in Orange for a quick walk before meeting a friend for a drink. It was a great stop with 2 foy's for me and a life bird. Life birds are really easy right now since I've never been birding in the spring before. LOL. I added Blue-winged Warbler to my list! Luckily I've been studying enough so that when I finally pished him in I was able to get the ID. Other great birds were Indigo Bunting, Eastern Phoebe, nesting Tree Swallows, and a viewable Ovenbird. I think Ovenbirds like me because it seems like I trip over them.

Monday my coworker and I made a quick stop at Long Wharf in New Haven on our way into the museum to move some elephant bones out of the attic. At Long Wharf were a few Brant milling around, one Lesser Yellowlegs, a Spotted Sandpiper, and a raft of about 150 Double-crested Cormorants, every pylon in the harbor had a cormorant on it.

Before we had even made it into work that morning though we had added three new birds to our work list and 2 more life birds for me. Easy pickings with the warblers, both Black-throated Blue and Magnolia Warbler were in the trees in the parking lot. The Baltimore Orioles, Chipping Sparrow, and American Redstart were all present as well. It seems so early in the season but last week we already found a nest of fledgling American Robins and Monday morning I found a fledgling Mourning Dove with mom nearby, sitting on the curb a few rows from my car.

I've already taken Friday off to wind down from the busy work week. And there is a good birding forecast. So, I think I might try to get back up to Orange for an early morning hunt for Rose-breasted Grosbeak and Yellow-billed Cuckoo. The first species was there the other day according to someone I ran into and the later I had while trail running a few years ago. This time I'll leave the running sneakers behind and pack the telephoto instead.