Saw-whet Owl, Henderson County, NC, April 9, 2020

One of my key local targets now that I’ve moved to the mountains of western NC is Saw-whet Owl.  Although they are occasionally found as a wintering bird throughout the state, they are most often encountered in the NC mountains.  The following information on Saw-whets in the NC mountains comes from “Birds of North Carolina: their Distribution and Abundance”  (http://ncbirds.carolinabirdclub.org/view.php?species_id=341) -

Breeder in the higher elevations; winter resident over most of the region. Uncommon to fairly common in the breeding season along the southern Blue Ridge Parkway (Great Balsam and Pisgah ranges) and in Great Smoky Mountains NP, above 5,000 feet. Generally uncommon elsewhere in spruce-fir stands, being found at essentially all such stands (Black Mountains, Grandfather Mountain, Roan Mountain, Long Hope Valley, etc.). Also apparently nests in some hardwood stands, such as Pickens Nose (Macon). On the breeding grounds, arrives probably in Mar. At lower elevations, probably Oct into Apr; abundance poorly known in winter, though likely not truly rare except at lower elevations.

A month or two ago I ran into local birder Eric Smith while we were birding Jackson Park.  At the end of our walk Eric told me about a calling Saw-whet Owl he had had at his house almost all summer long in 2018.  But Eric doesn’t live in the higher mountains – he lives in east central Henderson County at about 2,000 feet in elevation.  They’re not supposed to be nesters at those lower elevations.  When we parted ways Eric agreed to get back in touch with me if his Saw-whet happened to return. 

I stayed in touch with Eric subsequently, sharing recent sightings and trading ID tips.  Then on April 8th Eric contacted me to say he had just seen a Saw-whet at his house – his first observation since the calling bird 2 summers ago.  That sure was intriguing to say the least.  He was happy to have me come by his place and try for it, and although I was skeptical about whether we might re-find it, I decided to give it a try the very next night. 

I arrived at Eric’s house at about 8 o’clock on the 9th to give it a go.  Three other birders were there as well, and we all promised to maintain our social distancing while trying for the little owl.  Eric’s property is located just a bit north of Big Hungry Road near the Green River Gamelands, one of my favorite birding spots.  He has tremendous habitat, though the woodlands are mostly deciduous with a few white pines and hemlocks.  There are certainly no spruce-fir stands which are the preferred Saw-whet nesting habitat.

We waited a while hoping for some spontaneous calls, but with no luck.  Then one of the other birders, Vicky Burke, played some tape, but still no response.  Again we waited hoping for some calls.  Then at about 8:40 Vicky played some more tape but still no replies.  One of the other birders mentioned he was going to give up.  And just then we heard 2 “toots”.  We looked at each other – what was that?  I mentioned that I had experience with Saw-whets responding with a single toot, so just maybe we had our bird.  Then we heard 2 more toots.  Then after a short break there were 3 more toots.  We indeed had the Saw-whet Owl!  We played some more tape but to no avail.  It certainly wasn’t the long call you hear on the tapes or hear when the bird is calling spontaneously, but it was enough for a solid ID.

Many thanks to Eric Smith for inviting us to his yard and sharing his special bird!

The next day I did a bit of research to try to understand if Eric’s Saw-whet could still be a migrant or whether it was a possible breeder.  I was principally trying to estimate when the last migrant Saw-whet might leave our region.  In other words, was yesterday’s sighting late enough in the year that the migrants have already left, implying that the bird would be a possible breeder. 

I went onto eBird to see when migrant Saw-whets might leave the area using eBird’s “Explore Species” function.  This function allows you to create a bar chart for a specific region – county, state, country.  The complication is that if you select a region where Saw-whets are both migrants as well as breeders, then the eBird data won’t easily separate sightings of migrants vs. breeding birds.  For instance, the North Carolina bar chart has sightings for every week of the year except the 3^rd week of March, with almost the same frequency each week. That means you can’t separate the summer sightings of breeders up in the mountains with wintering and migrant birds throughout the state.  I then selected Henderson County and there are only sightings in 4 weeks – 1^st and 3^rd week of Feb., 3^rd week of Nov., and now the 2^nd week of April (of course Eric’s sightings from Summer 2018 aren’t included).  So there’s not nearly enough Henderson County data to make any conclusions.

So next I started looking at other nearby states at roughly the same latitude, hoping to find states where Saw-whets winter and migrate, but don’t breed.  I can’t use data from VA and TN because they are breeders in the mountains of both states.  So I started looking a bit farther away and found these 6 states where there are no Saw-whet observations from the summer (suggesting no breeding).  The last spring sightings in each state are –

·       KY – end of March

·       AL – 3rd week of March

·       AR – end of February

·       DE – end of March

·       IN – 3rd week of April

·       KS – 3rd week of March

With the exception of IN, Saw-whet migration in all these states appears to be over no later than the end of March.  Which of course is at least two weeks before the observations of the bird at Eric’s house.

My conclusion – Eric’s bird on April 8th and 9th is not likely to be a migrant, and is instead a summering bird.  That would mean it’s either already breeding, or could be a bird actively looking for a mate.   

A few years ago I met a birder in SD that was managing a whole line of Saw-whet nest boxes, and had pairs nesting in many of the boxes.  The species wasn’t even known to nest in SD until he put up his boxes and met with considerable success.  Just as in SD, perhaps this secretive little bird may well be more common in the area than we think.  And small colonies of birds might well be breeding outside what we think of as their normal range – including at or near Eric’s place.

I pulled this information from owlpages.com –

Northern Saw-whet Owls nest in old woodpecker cavities, (primarily those made by Pileated Woodpeckers or Northern Flickers) or in natural cavities. They will also take to nest boxes quite readily. Nest trees are often dead and nest heights average 4 to 6 metres above ground. Nesting occurs between March and July.

Maybe they would use nesting boxes if they were put up nearby in Henderson County.

Saw-whet Owl was #290 for my NC state list.  My statebird map for Saw-whet is inserted below.  States highlighted in blue are those where I’ve seen or heard this species; cross-hatched states are those where it is regular though I've yet to see or hear it.  This is a wide-ranging species, though really difficult to find.  So although I’m happy to have seen or heard it in 15 states, I still need it in more than 20 others.

Merlin, Hendersonville Yard, April 3, 2020

When I moved to the mountains of North Carolina I needed both Peregrine Falcon and Merlin for my NC state list.  And that was also the case in SC.  But over time I slowly started to run into these Falcons.  In NC I found Peregrine twice, and in SC I’ve been successful in finding Merlin 3 different times.  Hmm… - multiple Peregrines in NC but no Merlin, and multiple Merlins in SC but no Peregrine.  I guess it would be too much to ask to get at least 1 of each species in each state. 

Since neither species is a rarity in the region, I wasn’t too worried that I’d eventually get all 4 “ticks” for my lists.  In fact, I would often receive eBird Needs Alerts for Merlin in NC and Peregrine in SC, reminding me that they are regular in the area.  Some of the NC Merlins were close to home, and I ended up chasing after birds in no less than 4 different reports, unfortunately all unsuccessfully.  And that’s despite the fact that 2 of my searches were within a couple hours of the birds first being spotted.  Perhaps Merlin had become somewhat of a nemesis bird for me in NC.  Since they don’t often hang around for long, I figured I’d just have to find one on my own somewhere along the line.  I even half-heartedly thought I’d find one in my yard.  After all I had a Kestrel stop by once last Fall.

Speaking of my yard – birding continues to be spectacular here!  Though my lot is just 0.8 acres, it is nicely situated on an isolated mountain (Lewis Mountain) covered in deciduous woodlands.  And adjacent to me is a small farm, including a nice mix of field, orchard, and hedgerow habitat.  That provides quite a diverse set of habitats for birds to call their home within earshot of my backyard deck.  Additionally, Lewis Mountain is surrounded by agricultural areas, making it an oasis of woodlands that could concentrate migrant passerines searching for natural habitats as they pass through.  As a result, as of the end of March my yard list was up to 101 species, even though I’ve only lived here for 7 months. 

During these days of isolation due to the corona virus I’ve been spending quite a bit of time birding from my deck.  Most days I’ll spend 3-4 hours doing what amounts to a “Big Sit”, getting 30 to 35 species most days in late March and early April.  And then mid-afternoon on April 3rd I looked up at just the right time to spot a small raptor flying overhead at treetop level.  I quickly got the bird in my binocs and realized I had my NC-first Merlin.  Yard bird #102, and NC statebird #289.  And it was the 8th species where I spotted my state-first bird in my yard.

My statebird map for Merlin is inserted below.  States highlighted in blue are those where I’ve seen this species; cross-hatched states are those where it is regular though I've yet to see it.  This is a wide-ranging species, though uncommon to rare in many areas.  As a result, I still need Merlin in quite a number of states especially in the center of the country.  

And now an update on my yard list:  As of April 16th my yard list is up to 111, including 26 warbler species.  It’s been a good spring migration so far.  Since the Merlin, I’ve added the following species –

4/5/20 - Rough-winged Swallow, Black Vulture

4/6/20 - Great Blue Heron

4/8/20 - Common Loon (a nice flyover bird in breeding plumage), and Prairie Warbler

4/14/20 - Worm-eating Warbler, Palm Warbler, and Red-shouldered Hawk

4/16/20 - Orange-crowned Warbler

A silver lining to these times of self-isolation – there’s more time to spend on back yard birding.  And it sure helps when birding in your yard can be so productive!

Ruffed Grouse, Pisgah National Forest, NC, March 15, 2020

Ruffed Grouse can be a very challenging bird to find.  First of all, their preferred habitat includes mature woodlands that are often quite inaccessible.  And even if you can get into their best locales, they often are real skulkers.  But not to worry – in Spring they can often be heard drumming.  Though that is a challenge for me as I have problems hearing those low frequency sounds (even though my high-pitched hearing is still quite good).  Plus a final complication – Ruffed Grouse numbers have dropped significantly over a major portion of their range.  But despite these difficulties, sometimes you can get lucky and find one out in the open, even being quite tame.

The mountains of western NC provide excellent habitat for Ruffed Grouse.  As a result, I’ve been receiving a fair number of eBird Needs Alerts with Grouse sightings.  Few are likely chaseable, so I just treat them as reminders of a future target down the road.  But then came a Needs Alert on March 13 of a sighting by local birder Vicky Burke.  I reached out to her and got a specific location – along the Blue Ridge Parkway on a the trail heading northeast from the Mills River Overlook.  And more importantly, she has twice recently seen one in that same location.  Could this one be chaseable?  I decided to give it a go.  Besides, I haven’t done any birding along the Parkway yet, so this would be an opportunity for me to do some scouting in this area. 

I was out of the house at dawn the next morning and after a short drive I was heading south along the Blue Ridge Parkway.  As I climbed in elevation I got into areas of very thick fog, so as I got to the Mills River Overlook visibility was next to zero – no nice scenery views this morning.  I quickly found the trail suggested by Vicky and was soon taking a slow walk through some really nice habitat.  I spent more than a 90 minutes on this 1-mile trail but with no luck on the Grouse.  Birding was a bit slow at this elevation, but I enjoyed multiple Winter Wrens and singing Juncos.  Plus it was a great walk even though I struck out on my target bird.

It was still early so I decided to check out some more of the Parkway.  A bit farther south I came to the Mt. Pisgah Campground where there were a few reports of Red Crossbills in previous years - another of my higher elevation targets.  There were no eBird reports from the campground yet this year, so no recent news on Crossbills.  So I figured it could be worth a search.  Plus, again it would be a nice scouting effort.  The campground wasn’t open yet this early in the year, so I parked safely nearby and decided to take a slow walk through the campground.

It was great habitat in the campground, with numerous singing Juncos.  Were they already singing on territory?  There were also many calling Golden-crowned Kinglets, along with several in full song.  And Robins were everywhere.  I especially spent a fair amount of birding time focused on the mature conifers around the campground, hoping to hear or see Crossbills.  But even though they were loaded with cones, no Crossbills were around. 

After walking around the two western campground loops I was pretty much seeing more of the same.  So I debated about whether I should walk around the eastern loop as well, but decided I ought to head there especially for more opportunities at Crossbills.  As I turned onto that last loop I spotted some movement on the pavement up ahead.  And just as I got my binocs focused on that spot I heard and saw a whirr of wings – it was a pair of Ruffed Grouse that took off into the woods as they spotted me.  I quickly headed to the edge of the woods where they had disappeared, and could hear some rustling in the leaves, but never got any more visuals on the birds.  Boy was I lucky.  I didn’t find the potentially chaseable Grouse but found 2 other more cooperative birds nearby.  Though I never did find any Crossbills - they could wait for a future trip along the Parkway.

My statebird map for Ruffed Grouse is inserted below.  States highlighted in blue are those where I’ve seen this species; cross-hatched states are those where it is regular though I've yet to see them.  As I said at the beginning of this post, Ruffed Grouse has been a tough bird for me - I still need it in many states across the country. 

Ruffed Grouse was number 288 for my NC statelist.  And what a great introduction to birding along the Blue Ridge Parkway!