FreeLists / va-bird / [va-bird] Nashville warbler et al., McLean, Fairfax County.

["Peter Frechtel" <pafrecht@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

Hi VA-Birders,
 

I've been spending some time over the past few months at Pimmit Run Stream
Valley Park and Kent Gardens Park in McLean, close to where I live. If
anyone has birded this park much in the past, I'd love to hear from you off
the listserv.

 

I wandered around these little parks from 6 AM to 9 AM today, mostly on the
stretch north of Westmoreland St. and south of Old Chesterbrook Rd. This
seems to be the birdiest area to me. Best birds were a beautiful singing
Nashville warbler near the Beverly Ave. entrance to Kent Gardens Park, and a
singing orchard oriole on the path just south of Westmoreland St. Other
warblers: several yellow-rumps and yellowthroats, a single blackpoll, a
single black-throated blue, and several parulas.

 

Other interesting birds there: a couple of white-eyed vireos, phoebe,
great-crested flycatchers, great blue heron, indigo buntings.

 

The park has an interesting mix of habitats. It's very narrow: it just runs
along this little stream. It borders a lot of backyards. There's some open
space in there, too - a powerline runs right through it and creates some
scrubby / old field habitat for birds like indigo bunting and white-eyed
vireo. I even had a singing field sparrow in the park about six weeks ago.
There's an active red-shouldered hawk nest in the park just south of Old
Chesterbrook Rd. which is hard to see now that the trees have leafed out.
There is also a pair of barred owls living in there, which were much easier
to see before the trees leafed out. On the three or four occasions that I
saw or heard them, they were in the same area as the red-shouldered hawk
nest. My wife and I scared up a black-crowned night heron about a month ago,
near dusk, from the portion of the stream between Great Falls St. and
Westmoreland St.

 

Peter Frechtel

Falls Church



You are subscribed to VA-BIRD. To post to this mailing list, simply send email 
to va-bird@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx To unsubscribe, send email to
va-bird-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx with 'unsubscribe' in the Subject field.