Before the Heat Of Summer

I’ve never understood how a fat crescent moon can leave the night sky dark and star-studded and still throw off enough light for me to see a gate lock. On a cold Spring morning at St. Marks NWR, I admired the night sky and took advantage of the moonlight to get the Tram Road gate open. 

I had the windows open and my parking lights and the seat heater on. Also, a down vest. About three quarters of a mile down the dirt road I heard the low monotonic trill of an Eastern Screech Owl, probably a territorial male. It’s nesting time for this species.

I doubled back and slowly worked my way around to the inner levee on Stony Bayou II, but heard no more owls. By then it was nearing first light, the stars were fading and only Jupiter, Saturn and the crescent moon were visible.

I left the comfort of my SUV and began walking along the levee, just listening. It was continuing to lighten and the moon was now a lonely presence in the fading night sky. Rails began to call. A few King Rails, more Soras. I heard Barred Owls hooting and then breaking into their monkey call as two pairs disputed a territorial edge somewhere in the big cypress dome on the North edge of the marsh.

First light came and daylight flooded the world. Cardinals and Marsh Wrens began to sing. Tree Swallows began to fill the sky. I estimated at least 500 birds rising out of the marshes. I moved down to the East end levee as the sun rose. Pileated Woodpeckers were calling and herons began to fly.

I was out to monitor shorebirds and just after sunrise I logged a single Willet sitting on a mudflat. The first of over 2,000 shorebirds of 13 species that I would count. I kept scanning the morning sky for migrating Common Loons, but saw none. The loons coming through St. Marks have been tracked heading up into central Canada, North of the Great Lakes. They’ve already begun migrating and it is curious that none moved on that morning. A thick fog bank sitting off the coast may have deterred them.

I turned on to the Outer Levee and began to work my way West. There are the remains of three experimental pools in the salt marsh on the Gulf side of the levee. Oaks have become established on their edges and they are a good place to look for birds. I could hear an Orchard Oriole singing from some unseen perch. A pair of Eastern Kingbirds were hunting the levee edge and a Bald Eagle was sitting on the branch of a dead oak, slowly ripping the feathers off a Common Gallinule. As I approached the cross levee between the two Stony Bayou pools, a Northern Bobwhite ran along the levee edge and disappeared into the thick grass.

The water level on Stony Bayou I is going through its seasonal drawdown in order to create nesting habitat for Wilson’s Plovers and Least Terns. I had expected that I would get some shorebirds there. I ended up getting almost 1,300 birds, mostly Dunlin, but lots of Western Sandpipers and Willets and a surprising number of Semipalmated Plovers. Later in the morning on Tower Pond I would get even more Dunlin, Westerns and Willets, but also many Short-billed Dowitchers.

Shorebird migration is underway. Dunlin numbers, although still high, have dropped by a third in the last two weeks. Shorebirds begin to molt into breeding plumage on their wintering grounds and complete their molt during migratory stopovers. Because of this, the birds at St. Marks are in a mix of plumages ranging from drab winter gray into a range of spotted and checkered patterns with some species showing splashes of browns, reds and chestnut. 

Some of the birds on the refuge have spent the winter here and a few yearling birds, like Semipalmated & Black-bellied Plovers, Short-billed Dowitchers and Greater Yellowlegs will spend the summer at the refuge. They won’t molt and migrate until their second year. Other shorebirds on the refuge are passing through, returning from South America.  All are headed for their breeding grounds. For Dunlin, and most of the shorebirds, that means the High Arctic, but for dowitchers it means muskeg bogs in the boreal forests of Canada.

It was a nice day in Spring migration at St. Marks. The ducks are mostly gone. I had three scaup, a Redhead and a Bufflehead. A few dozen Blue-winged Teal were moving on Stony Bayou. The teal were likely migrants up from South America. The last of the teal will still be moving through in early June.

I don’t see many migrant songbirds while driving the levees, but I did have Palm Warblers moving up the levees in the early morning. These were Western race birds from Western Canada that wintered in the Caribbean and may have come in overnight. 

Come down to St. Marks. You still have time to enjoy a few cool Spring mornings before the heat of Summer arrives.