Day three of WV's New River Gorge Birding and Nature Festival (April 28th) began with frost covered windshields, plenty of warm clothing layers, and in my case, an expectant attitude, ready for whatever the day might bring. And that's the only attitude to have when you're headed for the bone-chilling winds of higher elevations. But with help from well-heated buses, paced stops and the camaraderie of new friends, the cold quickly took a back seat to new discoveries.
Bare tree limbs mean birds are easier to find and early flowers are just emerging. And if you've traveled from Tennessee, it's as though the calendar turned back in time with spring unfolding all over again.
These Red-winged blackbirds were no exception. A species few people get excited about, these birds didn't seem to notice our arrival, so involved were they in courtship displays. The males were hard at work singing and posturing while the less conspicuous females demurely responded with their own harmonizing vocals and feather ruffling. In the morning light the faded reeds enhanced the richness of these colorful festivities all the more, bringing habitat and behavior delightfully into focus. Just look at the impressive shoulder-patch display exhibited below!
This was our prelude to walking up what felt like the coldest hill on the planet to a field historically abundant with singing and nesting Bobolinks. But our star was conspicuously absent and our leaders speechless in the eerie early morning silence.
Our guides, Connie Toops, below center, and Kieth Richardson, above right, offered possible explanation but could only speculate on the bird's absence--a later, colder spring, or the aftermath of poisoning on wintering grounds. The last, a chilling consideration. (More details found in links at post's end.)
As luck would have it, we did see two distant Bobolinks after we descended the hill and snatched some quick looks through a scope (my first). I'm also happy to report that those who visited this area later in the week were rewarded with the arrival of more Bobolinks. Still, the reality of wide-spread extermination of a species has gripped me more than once lately.
Hunger and poverty are not to be ignored. So also, the survival of our world's wildlife. As we watch many species decline and earth's resources increasingly depleted, it is alarming that these urgent and complex problems don't have the unified attention of our world's most creative minds and leaders. In a century in which the human species considers itself so far advanced in the fields of science and technology, one has to ask, why not?
Next: High Country--Part II: Warblers and Botanicals
