I’ve always wanted to say that, just not while birding, and especially during the fall migration! Turkey Creek Sanctuary was a bust today, in those terms. Oh, there were birds, but the anticipated migration season has been very poor so far.
I bumped into Shirley Hills, who has been birding at Turkey Creek for 20 years, and she said that hands down, today was the worst day during October she remembers. The story is the same all over the Space Coast. Either the birds are finding other stop-overs, or something drastic is going on. Maybe the birds are delayed, maybe their numbers are way down, it is hard to know.
Here’s my list for today. No pics for this post this time, folks. Sorry.
- Yellow-throated Warbler (a winter resident here, not a migrant)
- Ovenbird
- Blue-gray Gnatcatcher
- Northern Cardinal
- Northern Mockingbird
- Catbird (this one has been absent for me for a while)
- Carolina Wren
- Downy Woodpecker
Shirley said that typically this time of year there are at least a dozen or more warbler species moving through the Sanctuary. I can’t vouch for that personally, but my warbler ID had never been very good.
I’d like to be able to sneak off work this week to see if I catch anything, but that’s likely not realistic, so we’ll see what happens next time I get out.
Lonely Birder 