Greg Beck and I started our Saturday morning at Wakefield Park in Fairfax
County. This was a disheartening experience. The large soccer field that was
once a great spot to see a Killdeer is now artificial turf. Additionally
there has been a great deal of "trail maintenance" (i.e., make it better for
the mountain bikers). Along the power line cut on an East facing hill, there
was once some spectacular habitat for Blue-winged Warbler (best spot that I
knew of) that is now nothing but dirt and gravel bike trails, very sad.
There was also a great many more bikers than I have seen in the past,
especially for so early on a Saturday morning. I will give it one more try
but it looks like Wakefield will no longer be as good of a place to bird. We
left after about 30 minutes, dejected. Onto Huntley Meadows.
We arrived late (~845am) at Huntley Meadows and saw pretty much all of the
same birds that Larry Cartwright earlier reported (though we did not locate
the Barred Owl chicks). We ventured down towards the "Coast Guard Swamp"
where we saw a flock of about 25 RUSTY BLACKBIRDs, 6 PALM WARBLERs (all
Eastern), and a very dark juvenile Red-tailed Hawk. The most exciting
moment, and bird, of all was a MERLIN taking a pass at a flock of
White-throated Sparrows that were not more than 20 feet from us. It was
quite an odd sensation to have the sparrows flush towards us. I suppose we
looked a good bit less threatening then Mr. Merlin.
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Jeff Clark
Fairfax City, VA
http://www.fairfaxbirding.com
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