Forbush Bird Club Field Trip to Mt. Auburn Cemetery

Today I was up at 5:45AM in order to get to Mt. Auburn Cemetery in Cambridge by 7AM.  The Forbush Bird Club was hosting a field trip from 7-11.  Mt. Auburn is a prime area for migrating warblers, and this week was really the first major showing of migrants so far this spring.  There were two major problems:  The weather.  Gray and misty, with off-and-on showers stayed with us the whole four-hour walk.   My binoculars.  First, the strap broke on my binoculars, so I was carrying them the entire time.  Then, not 10 minutes later, as I was wiping the eyepieces dry with a cloth, one of the eyepieces broke off and dropped to the inside of my binoculars.  Uh oh.  I only had one working eyepiece, so I continued to use it, but it definitely took the ease out of viewing.  (I have enough trouble sighting birds through my binoculars anyway!)

I saw several life* birds and several first of years (FOY), making it a great outing in spite of my technical and meteorological difficulties:

1.  Chimney Swift* (flying overhead)
2.  Black-Throated Blue Warbler*
3.  Orchard Oriole*
4.  Common Yellowthroat (FOY)
5.  Great-Crested Flycatcher (FOY)
6.  Warbling Vireo*
7.  Magnolia Warbler (FOY)

Black-and-White Warbler (click to enlarge)

Common Yellowthroat

White-Throated Sparrow

tan-striped form

 Magnolia Warbler 

(sorry about the exposure of this one - I had to lighten it for the bird to show up)

Common Yellowthroat

When all else fails, you an always take photos of the flowers!

I thought this beautiful sculpture was a good one for Mother's Day.

Even the dandelions are pretty!