Centennial Park

February 19, 2016
On a last minute decision I decided to go for a walk this morning around 8 am. It was about 15 degrees outside, yet felt much colder. I had a friend drop me off at the entrance of the Centennial Woods Park area. As soon as I began on the trail I heard a woodpecker pecking a tree. In a search to find out what it was a followed the noise into the woods just a little bit and rather close to me was a Hairy Woodpecker. It was medium in size and appeared to be female; however, I am not confident on that sexual identification.
As soon as I continued on the path I could hear a variety of birds most of which were chickadees and what I believed was red-breasted nuthatches. I identified the call as red breasted because it sounded more hollow or nasally than the white-breasted. Further into my walk I did see a red-breasted nuthatch up in a tree. There were many other bird calls in the woods at that time; however, I was unable to identify what they were. There was a call that sounded as though it may have been a finch based on what I know thus far.
After about 25 minutes of walking or so I decided to turn around and head back toward campus. I continued to hear many birds but was not able to see very many. One thing that I noticed was how the birds have acclimated to the sounds of the airplanes taking off and landing. Even when airplanes went overhead the birds did not stop their calls. As I was exiting the woods I did see a pair of crows right along the edge of the woods.
All in all it was good to get out there and see some birds; however, I was hoping to get my eyes on a few more species while out there. The Hairy Woodpecker was by far the highlight of my walk seeing as it was the closest bird I got to all morning. It was neat to see a Hairy Woodpecker up close. I do wish I had a chance to capture it on camera, but by the time I had thought of taking a picture it was too late.

Posted on February 20, 2016 02:56 AM by mdpalmer