npeatman's Journal

Tuesday April 5th

On Tuesday after class my friend and I went to Milton Vermont right near the sandbar where the waterfowl reserve is. As we were driving up to the sandbar both sides of the road had marshes and some open water. On the left side were the tall utility poles where we saw the 4 osprey making their nests. There were three different nests being made and one was flying in the background. We then drove down to the pull off that was on the bridge and saw the 2 Canada geese swimming in the open water near the bridge, on the Burlington side. We then parked the truck and looked at the 9/11 memorial near the flag and saw some ring-billed gulls flying overhead. Then a double crested cormorant flew overhead. On our way back over the bridge going back towards the sandbar over to the left on the St. Albans side of the bridge there were two common mergansers swimming near some reeds in the water. From what we could tell it was a male and a female swimming close by each other. We park the truck on the opposite side of the park and take out the binoculars to see some birds in the distance. That is where we saw the huge flock of mallard ducks way over near the trees. When we crossed the road we saw the great blue heron flying to reposition himself to a different hunting spot. When the brush started to build up on the side the red-wing blackbirds were flying on the edge, and the other blackbirds were flying to and from the northern-red cedar trees. We decide to go in between the trees to go to the waters edge to get a better look and maybe a hundred yards away a common goldeneye swims to a clump of reeds. There were two mallards over in this area as well, a male and a female. On our way back over to the truck on the grass there was a small grouping of robins foraging around for some food.

Thursday April 21,

On Thursday my friend and I decided to go to Mt. Philo for our birding adventure. We parked her truck and began our ascent up the hill. We noticed that it oddly quiet for about half of the trip up the first bird we heard was the caw of an American Crow. Then slowly as we neared the top we heard a few more Black-capped Chickadees. We heard many of them at the top. All along the top we heard a few American Robins. As we were making out way to different vantage points to see the amazing view of the Adirondack mountains we also kept an eye out for any birds flying below or above us. We did not come across any. we crossed the top to the more wooded side of the hill and looked into the trees. That is where we saw one male American Goldfinch and what we determined was some sort of flycatcher. It had the body shape of a flycatcher and wasn't too big of a bird. It looked like there were maybe two all together. On our way down we decided to take a different path that lead us to what was called the Devil's Chair. As we came to the Devil's Chair we heard a White-breasted Nuthatch call. We hung out at that rock formation for a little bit and possibly heard an owl but we weren't able to confirm or deny this. We decided to stay longer to watch the sunset from the parking lot so we turned my friend's truck around and sat in the bed and listened as the sun sank. Which is where we heard many Red-winged Blackbird calls. There were at least seven of them. We also got to see three Northern Flickers fly off to another edge of the woods. One of them was a female. We also heard a bird calling from behind us which what we thought was a Northern Cardinal. We weren't 100% sure so I went into the red pines to see if I could either get a better look or to flush the bird out so my friend could see it. We were able to see it and determine that it was a male Northern Cardinal.