Vertebrates at or near Highlands Biological Laboratory
September 13-14, 2003
Weather: beautiful sunny days, almost no wind
Other notes: few migrant birds except for one little flock of
warblers -- also one migrant hawk, one acrobatic Raven, and a glimpse of a
Peregrine at Whiteside Mountain!
Please send additions/corrections to
Haven Wiley
Birds
 |
|
|
| Green Heron | 1
still around the pond |
| Mute Swan | 3 as usual
|
| Broad-winged Hawk | 2 headed
for South America |
| Peregrine | 1 flying to the
cliff at Whiteside Mountain (where 2 young raised this summer) |
| Mourning Dove | 10 |
| Ruby-throated Hummingbird | 10 feeding on the orange jewelweed flowers before leaving for
Central America |
| Belted Kingfisher | 1 beside
the pond |
| Hairy Woodpecker *** | 2 with
pure white outer tail feathers and proportionately large bill -- and calls
that were a shade deeper in pitch than those around Chapel Hill -- as
appropriate for these larger birds (more like those in New York
state) |
| Blue Jay | 12 perhaps
migrating southward |
| American Crow | 8 |
| Common Raven | 1 plummeting
from the sky to investigate strange calls from a strange person on
Whiteside Mountain |
| Tufted Titmouse | 2 |
| Red-breasted Nuthatch * | 1 |
| White-breasted Nuthatch | 1 |
| American Robin | 2 |
| Gray Catbird | 3 |
| Blue-headed Vireo ** | 1 |
| Tennessee Warbler | 4
in a small migrating flock |
| Magnolia Warbler * | 3 in the same
small flock |
| Black-throated Blue Warbler ** | 1 |
| Hooded Warbler | 1 calling
from rhododendrons in the botanical garden |
| Northern Cardina; | 2 |
| Eastern Towhee | 4 including
a female feeding a small striped fledgling just out of the nest -- very
late in the season |
| Song Sparrow | 3 |
| Dark-eyed Junco ** | 6 |
| American Goldfinch | 4 |
Mammals
|
|
|
| Gray Squirrel | 2 |
| Red Squirrel * | 1 calling |
Reptiles
|
|
|
| Northern Watersnake
Nerodia
sipedon | 1 beside the dining hall (not
venomous!) |
* northern species that extends southward in the mountains to southern
Appalachians
** northern species that extends southward in the mountains and has
evolved a distinctive subspecies in the southern Appalachians
*** species with a northern subspecies that extends southward in the
mountains to the southern Appalachians
|