Manahawkin WMA | Stafford Preserve 5/23--Willow Flycatcher, Bank Swallow

. "Fitz-bew!" 

Back to looking for birds that have been avoiding me. I don't keep records of my earliest sightings in the year for particular species, but I know I should have encountered a Willow Flycatcher by now--everybody else has--so I was kicking around Manahawkin WMA this morning looking and listening for one. I can tell you that will be my last outing to that WMA for a while--the vegetation is high and while I was Muck booted, permethrin clad with permethrin socks stuffed into permethrin pants with arms and face slathered with repellent there were sections I was just not willing to walk into because of the high tick density. I came away tick-free (almost sure) but I don't like the odds there and until they mow the paths, I'm avoiding the place. 

I did find a Willow Flycatcher when I got out of the woods and fields and onto the impoundments. I heard the "Fitz-bew" clearly then found the bird atop a dead tree. It was the first of 4 Willows that I saw and heard. 

The water was extraordinarily low--whether intentionally or because of the recent lack of rain I don't know--and the mud attracted hundreds of shorebirds (Semipalmated Sandpipers, Least Sandpipers, Semipalmated Plovers, a few Willets) but I wasn't carrying my scope so that intriguing russet sandpiper with the long straight bill will go unidentified by me. 

After that I went to what is undoubtedly the most unattractive birding spot in Ocean County, the construction site cum wasteland in Stafford Township with the bucolic name of Stafford Preserve. It is a seemingly endless project of building condominiums atop the old landfill, though I don't think they've made much progress in the year or so since I was last there. The mountains of dirt scattered around the cracked mud are the reason to go there--I counted 10 Bank Swallow holes punched in one mound and saw four of the swallows flying around. Since I am very bad at identifying fast-moving birds at a distance, this is the sure-fire way for me to see Bank Swallows, though even there, Tree, Barn, and Northern Rough-winged Swallows were also in the mix. 

Interestingly, the nests seem to be in the same hill of dirt as they were last year, or at least a hill of dirt that is, as I recall, in more or less the same spot. That's one of the reasons I say it doesn't look like much has happened in the last year. Now, will the nests be let alone? I understand that in the sand quarries that pepper the Pine Barrens the workers leave the swallows alone when they nest in a hill, but I don't know if that tradition will extend to this project. 

As a species, we have evolved to look for faces. Its a survival instinct though sometimes it goes awry which is why the Virgin Mary appears on refrigerators or in bowls of oatmeal. Or why a couple of Bank Swallow nests and a horizontal stick suddenly grabs my attention.