Infrequent Flyers

The common grackle is not the only mystery bird to appear at Forest's Edge. Being out in the country and smack in the middle of two of the largest state parks, we get all sorts of critters, feathered and otherwise. Sometimes this drives the boys and me crazy... we want to know exactly who is visiting our feeders! You've never seen pairs of binoculars handed around more than in our household.

Take, for example, the dark blue bird that has made three appearances, and only three appearances. The first time, M and I saw it pecking amongst the gravel in one of our parking lots. The light was bad, due to rain clouds rolling in, and neither my vision nor M's can really see further than a few feet in front of us. We could, however, see that the bird was a deep blue color. Was it a tree swallow? Was it a purple martin? It was too dark for a bluebird. Before I could grab the camera, it was gone.

The mystery bird made its second appearance a few hours later, again pecking away in the gravel along with some sparrows and a goldfinch. I thought I noted some black tones on its wings but, again, before I could grab the binoculars the bird had flown off.

That was the last I saw of our mystery bluebird until about two weeks ago, when I was standing by the glass doors of the sitting room, gazing out at the backyard waiting for the orioles to arrive. A quick flash of blue passed right in front of me and, holding my breath, I turned my head slowly to the left to look. There, on the furthest deck hook -- the one holding one of our hummingbird feeders -- perched the mystery blue bird. Knowing how skittish this bird seemed to be, I tiptoed in giant steps to the kitchen, grabbed my camera, and slowly approached the window. Making a mental note to Windex the windows, which were covered in suicidal mayflies, I managed to snap three blurry shots before the bird flew off.

It hasn't been back since, but thanks to those three shots I was able to identify my high-strung visitor as a male indigo bunting. I was thrilled! Indigo buntings are supposed to be common in my neck of the woods and specifically to the kind of habitat our property offers. However, there haven't been many sightings of these beautiful blue birds. In fact, the bird sightings board at WBU only has one indigo bunting sighting listed on it for the entire birding season. I'm hoping that he'll be back, if not now, then perhaps later as the buntings start their migration back south.

Another mystery bird should be further south but instead is nesting somewhere in the vicinity of my house. N noticed it one morning: a bright red flash streaking past the window. I wrote it off as a cardinal male, not having seen it for myself. A few dsays later, J and I were working around our pole barn in the late afternoon when something red flashed right past us, landing near the top of one of our forest conifers out front. This red was not cardinal red but a richer, deeper blood red. Checking the bird book, the only alternative I came up with was a scarlet tanager, but I simply didn't remember black wings at all.

The following morning, I was checking my bluebird trail via binoculars from the kitchen when, to my surprise, I saw my mystery red bird perched on the bluebird box furthest from the house... and nearest to the nesting bluebirds. Sean and Bluette didn't seem to care that the red bird was a stone's throw away, a fact I found puzzling since Sean's favorite hobby was chasing away any bird that drew too close to his mate's nest. As I watched, the red bird left the bluebird box and went to perch on the bluebird feeder hook in the middle of the yard. Grabbing my camera, I quickly got a series of shots of the red bird perching there, on a nearby tree, and on another bluebird box. To my disgust, all the photos showed was a red blob that might possibly be a bird. Ugh. In one photo -- the one in the tree -- I noticed a second bird with the red blob. Or rather, a second blob, this one a buff tan. Out came the bird books again and, after pouring through the sections on red birds the ID was made: a male (and a female) summer tanager.

Summer tanagers aren't supposed to come much higher than the Mason-Dixon Line during the summer. How could this pair possibly be here? I posted the question, with facts about my sightings, to the local birders' mail list, hoping that someone might be able to shed some light on this situation. Several birders replied, asking for photos of the red blob, which I gladly provided. One woman wistfully congratulated me on having such beautiful summer visitors. Another woman haughtily replied that as a neophyte birder, I couldn't be confident about my identification and that it was more than likely a vividly colored house finch. I replied as politely as my indignation allowed, noting that while I might be new to the birding mail list, I was not new to birding, and that amazingly, I could indeed tell the difference between a house finch and a red bird that happened to be bigger and a different shade of red all over its body.

I did receive an email from another birder, a man who actually lives in my town. His comments were friendly and reassuring: for the past three years, he has had one to three summer tanagers in his yard during the summer. He noted wryly that, due to climate change, the summer range of many migratory birds has also adjusted and that it was best to go by what we see first hand than what a book tells us is allowable. I breathed much more easily after that. And sure enough, every early morning (about 6 AM to 8 AM) and every late afternoon (about 5 PM to 7 PM), the summer tanager pair can be seen in my front and back yards, perching on a variety of areas.

My current mystery bird has had me scratching my head for days. It, again, is bigger than a finch, but smaller than an oriole. It is sleek, not plump, and it is soft grey in color. Its beak is finch like, not long and pointed like a blackbird's or oriole's, and it has darker wing bars, like a female goldfinch. Its belly is a softer grey-white, and on the few occasions I've been able to see the bird's belly, it did not appear streaked. It likes to feed from my safflower seed feeder, although sometimes it just perches on the deck rail. It doesn't seem to mind the male and female house finches (and it is definitely not a house finch). Due to my work and household obligations, I haven't been able to sit down with my bird books and try to determine what this mystery bird is yet. N has offered suggestions: a phoebe, perhaps, or a mockingbird. I'm not sure what it is, but just in case it comes back the windows and sliding glass doors have all been cleaned so that any photos I take end up anything but indigo-bunting blurry.