Colliers Mills 5/4--Red-headed Woodpecker, Blue Grosbeak

Red-headed Woodpecker

I was wrong. After 4 months of searching, I concluded the last time I was at Colliers Mills that the Red-headed Woodpeckers were gone. Out of sheer orneriness, I suppose, they refused to show up for me but suddenly this month I saw a couple of reports listing the birds. This morning was murky after rain at dawn but as soon as it tapered to a drizzle I drove out and walked in the field to the north of Success Road. I figured it would also be a good place to look for my FOY Blue Grosbeak and it proved to be the case as I first heard then found one male flitting from the skeletal remains of the burned bushes in that field. There were some hunters training their dogs in the field, but in between the BOOMS of their gunshots, I could hear the "queer" call of a Red-headed Woodpecker in the woods. I walked over toward the dead tree where I've seen them nesting and almost immediately, I got a flash of white rump. It took a few minutes to get the bird to settle down so I could get a shot in the low light conditions, but it posed on the branch of the nesting tree for a while, and I got what I got. I listed two birds because but I suspect there might be as many as three in those woods, but since all the movement and calling amounted to an avian game of three card monte, I'm sticking with two. 

Once I had those two year birds out of the way, I decided to walk around Turnmill and its southern extensions. All the usual warblers were in evidence plus a couple of more unusual species--a Northern Waterthrush at the end of the berm separating Turnmill from the small ponds and, at the southernmost end of the damned up stream that form these ponds, a Hooded Warbler was singing again, just as it was at the end of the last month. Two Spotted Sandpipers were on the mud flats there too. 

I'm still looking for Orchard Oriole and the tanagers there, but incrementally the list builds up. I'm glad to get the Red-headed Woodpeckers on the list--I was starting to take it personally. 

I spent a little over 3 hours walking in the woods. This is what I saw and heard:

44 species
Canada Goose  23
Mourning Dove  2
Killdeer  1
Spotted Sandpiper  2
Laughing Gull  25     Flyover flock
Turkey Vulture  1
Red-headed Woodpecker  2     
Red-bellied Woodpecker  4
Northern Flicker  3
Great Crested Flycatcher  4
Eastern Kingbird  1
White-eyed Vireo  10
Warbling Vireo  1     Heard
Blue Jay  3
Carolina Chickadee  2
Tufted Titmouse  2
Tree Swallow  3
White-breasted Nuthatch  1     Heard
Blue-gray Gnatcatcher  1
House Wren  1
Carolina Wren  1     Heard
European Starling  3
Gray Catbird  10
Brown Thrasher  2
Eastern Bluebird  2
Wood Thrush  1
American Robin  15
Chipping Sparrow  6
White-throated Sparrow  3
Song Sparrow  1
Eastern Towhee  5
Red-winged Blackbird  25
Brown-headed Cowbird  10
Ovenbird  25
Northern Waterthrush  1     
Black-and-white Warbler  15
Common Yellowthroat  25
Hooded Warbler  1     
Yellow Warbler  1
Pine Warbler  1
Yellow-rumped Warbler  3
Prairie Warbler  5
Northern Cardinal  7
Blue Grosbeak  1

Blue Grosbeak