Missed My Two Target Birds But Still Got a Statebird, Biltmore Estate, NC, May 13, 2020

The local Blue Ridge Birders text group had been abuzz reporting on good numbers of migrants at the Biltmore Estate, highlighted by a report from Aaron Steed of 85 species in just 4 hours.  Interestingly, this came at a time when migration had slowed in my yard.  Then early on the May 13th came a report of an Olive-sided Flycatcher there, with very specific information on the location.  Since things were slow in my yard, and most importantly since I had an annual pass for the Biltmore, I decided to give it a try.  Though first I had to make a reservation to access the grounds, and luckily there were openings for the very next hour.  And just before I hit the road I got directions to the Black-billed Cuckoo spotted there the previous day.  Both birds had been spotted close to the Lagoon, so with a bit of luck I could possibly come up with 2 possible statebird targets in the same general area.

I arrived at the Lagoon within an hour of the sighting of the Olive-sided, and joined several other birders already on site.  And we soon found the exposed perches where the bird had been spotted on an island in the river.  But unfortunately there was no Flycatcher, as least not right now.  There were plenty of potential perches and habitat in the area, so after a couple minutes we decided to split up and cover more area up and down the river.  I decided to head down river toward yesterday’s Cuckoo location – maybe I could run into both birds.  How lucky would that be?

Just a few minutes later I got a text that the Olive-sided had returned to its original perches on the island.  Although I instantly started to run back to the Olive-sided, it took a lot longer than I had expected – I had covered at lot of territory.  I finally made it back to the island, but unfortunately the bird had just left a few seconds earlier.  Alas, the Cuckoo search took me too far away from the Olive-sided spot and cost me the Flycatcher.  As Maxwell Smart used to say – “Missed it by that much.”  (And by the way, I never even made it to the location where the Cuckoo was seen the previous day.)  Ugh…

The good news was the bird was still around, and it certainly had preferred perches.  So I decided to just stay at the island to wait for the bird to return.  About an hour later I received a text that a Wilson’s Warbler had just been spotted near the other end of the Lagoon, within just a couple hundred yards from where I waited for the Flycatcher to return.  I needed the Warbler for my statelist as well, and started to wonder if I should give up on the Flycatcher to try for the Warbler.  There had been no sightings of the Flycatcher in an hour, and the Warbler had just been spotted.  But I decided to stick with the Flycatcher search as it was the rarer of the two.

My vigil was now going on 2 hours still with no sightings.  And just then I spotted a large dark flycatcher flying across the river, leaving the Biltmore side roughly even with the island.  I followed it in my binocs as it continued across the river and land in a tree on the far side.  It was pretty far away – roughly 500 feet – and I couldn’t be sure of the ID.  It was large and darker above, and it could well have been the Olive-sided.  Though I couldn’t eliminate Phoebe.  Then again no one had spotted a Phoebe in the area.  And I would think that if a Phoebe had been nearby I would have heard it calling before its flight across the river.  A maybe – but not definitive.

At 2 PM I finally threw in the towel on the Olive-sided after a 3-hour wait.  I had not only missed the 2 previously reported targets (1 by less than a minute), but also hadn’t chased after the Wilson’s Warbler.  On a whim I decided to head back to the area where the Warbler was reported, even though it had been 2 hours since I had received the text.  On the way I ran into Bob Butler who said he just had a female Wilson’s at the original location.  With renewed optimism I went to the spot where Bob had his bird but could only find Redstarts.  Once again dejected, but undeterred, I walked a bit further along the river’s edge in nice brushy wet habitat and spotted a glimpse of yellow.  A second later I had a male Wilson’s Warbler in my binocs! 

Wilson’s Warbler was #294 for my NC statelist.  In my statebird map below, the blue-shaded states are those where I’ve seen this species; cross-hatched states are those where it is regular though I’ve yet to see it.  I still need this species in a number of eastern states, as it is much more common in the west.

I briefly thought about returning to the favored perches of the Olive-sided, but decided I had given that one enough of a try.  I may have missed my initial key targets, but at least I was still able to find one new unexpected statebird.  It was a bittersweet trip, though I can only imagine how I would have felt if I hadn’t been able to re-find the Wilson’s Warbler.