My wife and I hiked north from Carver's Gap on Thursday for a few miles. On our way back up to Round Bald, near where the flaming azaleas are still blooming, we heard a Swainson's Thrush sing several times loud and clear. It definitely caught me off guard as I wasn't necessarily expecting to actually hear one, but I did see the post Dean Edwards forwarded from the NC list serve, so I was keeping an ear out for it. Quite a nice ending to a great hike. I did double check my thrush songs and the singer was definitely a Swainson's Thrush and not a Hermit. We were 2.5 miles or so north of Round Bald and had a pair of calling Hermit Thrushes in the thick woods. I never saw the birds (mostly because we didn't stop for long and I didn't carry my binoculars!). Two male Vesper Sparrows were around Round Bald as well. Both perched up nicely on trail markers and sang for us. Good birding, Scott Somershoe State Ornithologist Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency P.O. Box 40747 Nashville, TN 37204 615-781-6653 (o) 615-781-6654 (fax) www.tnwatchablewildlife.org www.pbase.com/shoeman ************************************************* BRISTOL BIRDS NET LIST MENDOTA HAWK MIGRATION DAILY AND SEASON TOTALS CAN BE FOLLOWED DAILY ON THE HAWK MIGRATION ASSOC. SITE http://hawkcount.org/month_summary.php?rsitep6&PHPSESSID²eb5deb1ae5a23e55dcf30171c5ba85 Be sure and visit the Bristol Bird Club website at: http://bristolbirdclub.org Nature Calendar for NE TN / SW VA: http://www.google.com:80/calendar/embed?src=eHlvbjQyQGdtYWlsLmNvbQ This is a regional birding list sponsored by the Bristol Bird Club to facilitate communications between birders and bird clubs of Southwest Virginia and Northeast Tennessee. -------------------------------------------------- You are subscribed to Bristol-Birds. To unsubscribe, send an email to bristol-birds-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx with the one word 'unsubscribe' in the Subject field. -------------------------------------------------- Wallace Coffey, Moderator wallace@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx (423)764-****