Midsummer birding
By DON MORROW
The cabbage palms are beginning to bloom at St. Marks National Wildlife Refuge and pine hibiscus blossoms now dot the low wetlands. In the predawn darkness, frogs are calling in the marshes, but up in the flatwoods, where fireflies are flashing in the night, the Chuck-wills-widows have mostly gone quiet. It’s midsummer at the refuge and sometimes already 80 degrees at sunrise. It won’t be getting cooler anytime soon.
We are at a tipping point in the refuge year. It is a gray area between the tail end of spring migration and the first slow start to fall migration. In truth, the two sometimes overlap. It is also the annual low point for bird diversity when there may only be 120 species on the refuge and without large flocks of wintering birds, it’s also the annual low point for bird numbers. However, things are about to change.
Our summer resident species are generally single-brooded and are finishing up their breeding cycle. Everywhere you look you can see evidence of this. Morning bird song has diminished. Parula warblers are feeding young at the Double Bridges. Territorial behavior is breaking down as species finish nesting and disperse. Chimney Swifts and Purple Martins are showing up in the refuge skies as they fatten up before migrating. I have already seen one large post-breeding flock of Mississippi and Swallow-tailed Kites at the refuge. The temperature may not reflect it, but fall migration is beginning.
The refuge’s shorebird population also hits its low point in late June. There are five breeding species found at the refuge: Willet, Wilson’s Plover, American Oystercatcher, Black-necked Stilt and Killdeer. Most have finished nesting. The Killdeer started early and are already flocked up on the edge of Stony Bayou near Lighthouse Road. There are still, however, a few stilt nests on Mounds Pool 3, where newly fledged Wilson’s Plovers are running across the sand flats.
Yearling birds of some shorebird species don’t migrate and the refuge has had a good number of Short-billed Dowitchers, Greater Yellowlegs, Black-bellied Plovers and Semipalmated Plovers oversummering here this year. These birds stay in their first winter plumage until their second Spring, when they molt into breeding plumage and begin their first northbound migration.
The first few Fall migrant shorebirds have arrived at the refuge. I’ve seen small flocks of Marbled Godwits and Whimbrels, two species that often show up in late June. Among the Short-billed Dowitchers and Black-bellied Plovers I’ve seen single birds in breeding plumage, indicating that they have returned from their breeding grounds. I also recently found a Wilson’s Phalarope feeding with stilts and yellowlegs.
There’s a lot of summer left to go, but as the weeks progress, the refuge will see an increasing number of migrant birds. More shorebird species will appear; Least Sandpipers, western Willets and Ruddy Turnstones. By the end of July, we’ll start seeing the first migrant warblers. I always watch for Yellow Warblers in cabbage palms in late July. Sometime in August, the first Bald Eagles and Blue-winged Teal will arrive.
There is no denying that it is miserably hot. However, if you get up early and come down to the refuge, there’s a lot going on.
Don Morrow can be reached at donaldcmorrow@gmail.com.