It was just before noon when I closed the last gate at St. Marks NWR. The metal was almost too hot to touch. Waves of stolid heat were rising from the ground carrying smells that I remembered from growing up in North Florida. I swatted listlessly at the biting flies buzzing around my face as I got back in the Honda. I was six hours into a shorebird survey and I still had three more small ponds to go.
It’s late July at the St Marks refuge. Most of our breeding species are done with nesting and have flocked up. Red-winged Blackbirds are beginning to feast on sawgrass seeds and Red-bellied Woodpeckers are gulping down the newly ripe Peppervine fruit. The small yellow flowers of Partridge Pea are attracting pollinators and swarms of dragonflies float above the levees.
Shorebird numbers have more than tripled since my last survey a month ago. A small portion of this increase is due to the increased visibility of local breeders – Willets and Wilson’s Plovers – as they begin to flock up and fledgling young-of-the-year birds boost their population. However, fall migration has begun. Over half of the 424 birds that I recorded were newly arrived migrants, most of whom are passing through the refuge headed for their South American wintering grounds.
The migrant birds that are now on the refuge will be followed by increasing numbers of pass-through migrants and, as the season progresses, wintering shorebirds will arrive. From now on, shorebird numbers are just going to go up.
Newly back were Spotted Sandpiper, Lesser Yellowlegs and also Least, Western & Pectoral Sandpipers. Numbers of Semipalmated Sandpiper, Greater Yellowlegs and Short-Billed Dowitcher are up and almost all of the increase represents birds in breeding plumage, indicating migrant birds. In July, any sandpiper, yellowlegs or dowitcher in non-breeding plumage is likely a bird that has over-summered at the refuge.
All of the Black-bellied Plovers that I saw were in non-breeding plumage. The migrant Black-bellies will still be in breeding plumage when they arrive in September.
There were no unusually high shorebird species numbers, but most species were at the higher range of their expected numbers. While surveying, I had a Gull-billed Tern being closely followed by a juvenile bird that was begging. This may indicate a breeding record for this species, which would be new for the refuge.
I had several Black Terns. They nest in freshwater ponds on both sides of the Canadian border. In most years we have a few non-migrant young at the refuge in Summer, but they were absent this year. The terns that I saw were in breeding plumage, indicating migrants on their way to winter along the Caribbean coast of Columbia or Venezuela.
From the time that I had started birding in the dark of predawn, it had been hot and humid. The biting flies on the levee as I waited for sunrise had been horrendous. For enduring this, I saw Yellow-crowned Night Herons coming in to roost at dawn as Wood Ducks flew out. I was witness to and recorded the annual shift of the seasons as arctic migrants begin to stream through the refuge. I was able to watch the play of morning light as it swept across the salt marsh.
No one dies wishing for one more air-conditioned afternoon watching the Home Shopping Network. It’s hot, buggy and miserable, but go outside anyway. Life is in full progress and there are wondrous things to behold.
Don Morrow - Tallahassee, FL