On
Saturday, October 6, we met for a cool and breezy Bird Language sit at
the Minnesota Valley National Wildlife Refuge Visitor's Center. We sat
along the forest edge near the open field just to the east of the
Center. The breeze was coming out of the northwest and made it
challenging to hear bird sounds. Jon sat behind the observation deck of
out the wind where he observed quite a bit of bird activity
being so close to the feeders by the Center. During the sit he saw
Yellow-rumped Warblers and American Gold Finches near his spot. He also
had a good view of the large dead tree in the middle of the open field
which American Robins used as a perch, displayed sentinel activity,
sounded mild alarms, and moved in small groups, behavior which could be
related to fall flocking activity. In the middle of our sit area we
heard several unidentified birds making sharp and short contact calls
with each other that persisted throughout the sit. We didn't settle on
an ID, but were wondering whether some migrants were stopping to feed.
The corvids were active, with Blue Jay calls in the south during Period 1
and American Crows flying about at different times and locations during
the sit.  |
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