A fantastic day for the "bluegrass" as KENTUCKY WARBLER (KEWA) made its pompous spring debut , their overdue arrival in Prospect Park. And to top it off, lighting strikes twice, as two KENTUCKYs showed off themselves , one more true to the skulky nature, but the second bird tame and cooperative beyond expectations. And we have to thank Steve Nanz for both sightings, leading the Brooklyn Bird Club on the last Thursday walk of the spring.
This morning as I was rushing to get to work by 7 am , waking up late, I arrived ,sat down at my work computer, turned on my phone and saw a text message from Steve. It said: "Kentucky warbler 50 yards north of the Picnic House at old snag". There's nothing I could do till 730 when I get out into the field. When the time arrived, I took a ride over there and found several birders at the fence of the West Wood planting restoration area. Talking to Ed Crowne, he mentioned I was better off over with the group by the path. I head over to the path that runs along the west fence and found Steve Nanz's BBC group. They had just seen the KENTUCKY WARBLER quite close perched in a Tulip tree sapling , but it now dropped down into grasses. Then a shout , I turned my head to lip read Ryan Candee to see what he was saying, and I read "Kentucky Warbler perched in the dead low branches of the big limb of the big tree: I looked for the bird , found the dead branches, scanned downward and there's the Kentucky Warbler singing away ! ( I can tell it was singing because I could beak read the beaks moving ). About thirty seconds look, I was satisfied as well as many others given this bird's cooperative gift.
Awesome !!
But thats not all. A second KENTUCKY WARBLER figured it could do better than the first. Again, the beneficiaries Steve Nanz's BBC group spotting the Kentucky at Lookout Hill's northwest slope trail, a bird attracted to a termite hatch out. This circumstance produced spectacular looks of a tame bird that at times came out unto the mulch dirt trail . Long story short, many observers benefited terrific looks of this KENTUCKY for a long time , quite content for these birders getting a fantastic show as the bird came in and out of the shadows into the light. One of the best looks of the species I've had in my many decades birding Prospect.
One last note. There possibly might be two Kentuckys at the Lookout Hill termite spot; if so , then three of the KEWA species revealed themselves today in Prospect. I asked bird photographer Janet Zinn to send me the photos , maybe some distinguishing features might prove the case.
The Lookout Hill KEWA spot is on the trail just beyond the fork of the woods mid slope dirt trail south from the northwest stairs up from Center Drive near the intersection at West Drive.The second bird lingered along this trail at the lip of the lower slope above the bridle trail.It hung mostly near the fallen logs that had the termite hatch out.
As far as I know, two Kentucky Warblers today made Prospect Park their old Kentucky home.
I hope to get some photos for a gallery later for the blog.
Peter
BBC
