An extraordinary number of our usual participants being elsewhere, committed to different schedules, birding in other states or countries, or preparing in whatever way Buckeyes do for a football game, it was three ‘leaders’ and only four ‘followers’ who set forth from the usual rendezvous for a trip up north. Plenty of news had been spread about interesting seasonal occurrences involving rarer sparrows and gulls, as well as healthy movements of regular fall migrants up that way. An enticing mix of migrants beckoned us toward NE Ohio, from whence most recent such reports had emerged.
Memorable birding this time of year depends largely on weather, specifically spates of storm with brisk northerly and/or westerly winds. Southbound migrants — shorebirds, waterbirds, passerines — then tend to bunch up, and strays from the Plains arrive, flooding the available habitat until even tyros such as we cannot fail to find them. Reports from the Cleveland area confirmed that a large flock of Bonaparte’s gulls had included many little gulls, and we knew that in October it might attract jaegers. Sharp-tailed sparrows were being found in familiar areas, and shorebirds were thronging to Lorain’s dredge-spoil impoundment. The combination of so many unusual finds made it obvious we’d go northeast, especially since fairly strong NW winds were in the offing the few days before our scheduled departure.
Our small band convened at the usual spot on 4 October 2008 with great weather and numerous birds in the offing. The old site of the Coliseum in the Cuyahoga Valley NP was our first stop, where early sunlight was burning off the mist, if not the dew, from the grasslands. We birded the field, headed toward the wet swale on the west side, and met an elaborately-equipped birder who’d attracted a Nelson’s sparrow and was kind enough to show us. We later found another, along with other sparrows, a snipe, innumerable meadowlarks, and other birds of the habitat. (Photo of the CVNP Nelson’s sharp-tailed sparrow by Kevin Hall.)
Headlands Beach SP was our next stop, where the promised gulls consisted mostly of lazing local ring-bills. The denser part of the woods produced some migrant thrushes, sparrows, and kinglets; the numbers of some species were high, indicating some migratory movement had occurred, but diversity, much less interestingly uncommon species, were not in the picture.
Dike 14 had more activity, and everywhere we looked we saw migrants. Still, variety was low, and while conditions were superb we found ourselves scrutinizing hordes of kinglets, butterbutts, and the commoner sparrows. Oddly, we found ourselves being stalked, as half a dozen people who seemed to be tourists from abroad followed us around, watching us watching birds as if we were some sort of memorable curiosity.
The Lorain impoundment was our next stop, where toxic sludge is again being pumped into a huge ring of stones in the harbor. The area has a notable history for birds, and a good variety of shorebirds had been reported there in the previous days. Numerous acres of decent-looking shorebird habitat, with wet and dry mud and shallow pools surrounded with vegetation produced, eerily enough, only a few killdeers. Our alertness for Nelson’s sparrows produced a couple more there soon after we arrived, and a walk around the area produced a few new species, as well as lots of some quite familiar ones.
Shadows were growing longer, and it was apparent that rarer birds would be especially rare that day. We made a stop at Wellington Reservoir, where a chilly wind and large flocks of ducks and gulls and geese reminded us of the season to come. Our modest list of 58 birds seen follows, all on a beautiful fall day spent in some dramatic habitats.
Canada goose
Mallard
Green-winged teal
Ruddy duck
Pied-billed grebe
Double-crested cormorant
Turkey vulture
Cooper’s hawk
Red-tailed hawk
American kestrel
Sora
American coot
Killdeer
Wilson’s snipe
Bonaparte’s gull
Ring-billed gull
Herring gull
Rock pigeon
Mourning dove
Common nighthawk
Belted kingfisher
Downy woodpecker
Northern flicker
Eastern phoebe
Blue jay
Common crow
Black-capped chickadee
Red-breasted nuthatch
White-breasted nuthatch
Marsh wren
Golden-crowned kinglet
Ruby-crowned kinglet
Gray-cheeked thrush
Hermit thrush
American robin
Gray catbird
Northern mockingbird
European starling
Cedar waxwing
Nashville warbler
Yellow-rumped warbler
American redstart
Common yellowthroat
Eastern towhee
Savannah sparrow
Nelson’s sharp-tailed sparrow
Song sparrow
Lincoln’s sparrow
Swamp sparrow
White-throated sparrow
White-crowned sparrow
Dark-eyed junco
Northern cardinal
Red-winged blackbird
Eastern meadowlark
Common grackle
Brown-headed cowbird
American goldfinch
House sparrow