Home Barely

It is Wednesday morning here in Chapel Hill. I arrived home last nite and will be leaving again tomorrow to go to the Outer Banks of NC to do 3 days of pelagic trips there. I was up at 5 AM today to pick up my neighbor who birded with me in Florida back at the end of April. She had talked to some local birders and found where we could go look to find the eastern whip-poor-will near my home. I still needed this bird because I had not known the American Ornithological Union was going to split the whip-poor-will into eastern and mexican species.

We arrived at the local spot about 5:45 and had 3 birds calling over the next 15 minutes. The 3rd bird flew around us a couple of times before heading off into the pine trees. I had my friend back to her house by 6:30. On my way home as I drove by the dairy that is part of the land I live on outside of Chapel Hill I must have counted 30 eastern bluebirds flying over the pastures along with lots of chipping sparrows and a couple of pine warblers. All and all a very nice start to my day.

I saw 9 new birds for the week this morning, and the whip raises the YTD to 672. This weekend's pelagics are focused on an area off the Outer Banks that has white-faced storm-petrels this time of year. Stay tuned!