After a dreadful, damp day on Friday, the weekend has seen a return to warmer spring weather, offering more great opportunities to enjoy the gradual increase in northbound migrants. Friday really was a poor day to be out in the field, but our Higbee Beach walk went ahead as planned and even had a very high air of expectation about it since Roger Horn started the day with a Pileated Woodpecker in the woods there at 06:45AM. Though Chris Marks and I managed to get there in time to hear the bird calling in the damp fog, we didn't get to see it again, but our group nevertheless had some good birding which included a singing Blue-headed Vireo, a Yellow-throated Warbler in the parking lot, good numbers of Field Sparrows and six Hermit Thrushes in one holly tree.
Friday rounded off a little better at the point than it had started weatherwise and the day finished with a report of a Cattle Egret at the Rea Farm. Up at Heislerville things are setting up nicely for our regular Heislerville walks which start next week. All the roads are now passable after having been closed for some time as repairs were made to the site after the passing of Hurricane Sandy, while bird news from there on Friday included Black-necked Stilt and American Golden Plover. The plover made it through into Saturday and there was also a Glaucous Gull there, but the stilt appeared to have been a one-dayer.
On April 11th, two Green Herons were at Cox Hall Creek WMA, while today, a number of people reported good numbers of Pine and Yellow-throated Warblers and Blue-gray Gnatcatchers throughout Belleplain State Forest and a Yellow-billed Cuckoo was reported along Tom Field Road, off Sunset Road. An adult Broad-winged Hawk was hunting the roadside along Mackeys Crossing Road in Belleplain today, while the forest was alive with insect life; especially noticeable were Blueberry Azures which were just about everywhere and good numbers of Blue Corporals and Leptophlebia mayflies along Tom Field Road. A Green Darner was on the wing on Hunter's Mill Road.