April 11, 2026

Where: Blackwater NWR, Cambridge, MD

When: 3:58pm - 7:39pm

Bird Species: great egret, bald eagle, common grackle, European starling, American robin. at least one or as many as three varieties of shorebird, northern flicker, wild turkey, red-winged blackbird, white-throated sparrow, northern mockingbird, trumpet swan, great blue heron, killdeer, mallard, osprey, northern cardinal, pine warbler, yellow-rumped (eastern, myrtle) warbler, downy woodpecker, chipping sparrow, Carolina chickadee, brown thrasher, tree swallow, eastern bluebird

Things I Thought About:

• I woke up a little late and started scrolling, and by 10:15 I was mad at the world and mad at everyone for even being online, so I decided to get the fuck out of town and settled on Blackwater.
• My rules for birding trips anywhere at all is I must be able to spend at least as much time birding at the place as the trip transit takes. After work in the summer, I can go to almost any park in my regular route, 40 minutes round trip and the sun doesn't set until 7:30. And trips to the coastal refuges are fine, 5 hour round trip, you either get up early and spend all day, or you get a room and catch a sunrise and sunset that way. This is my decision today.
• What this rule actually does is severely limit my exploration of hotspots that are 60-75 minutes away. If the place turns out to be a bust, I'm mad I spent so much time in the car, and if it's great, I agitate because I didn't plan to spend all day birding. A conundrum.
• It took longer than I thought it would to get here, between sleeping late and the traffic, but I have a good three hours or so of light and will make the sunrise tomorrow, so let's see what's up.
• Look, a bunny.

• And a great egret, but too far away. And a bald eagle. And a wild turkey, who should have been our national bird. And now I will sit on the hood of my car and watch a bunch of grackles for what turns out to be 20 minutes. I can do this from my own patio, but here, there are a lot more of them, flapping in and out of the tall marsh grass, and grackling so loud it sounds like swing shift at the Rusty Playground Equipment Factory.
• Watching a flock of birds hang out, for me, is like watching a campfire, utterly mind-blanking, soothing, I notice certain recurring actions, but it isn't at all predictable, and I can watch it until it either goes out, or a log shifts and breaks the spell.
• In this case, the log is an osprey, flying in low to grab a fish. There are five platforms in this refuge, and as it turns out, there will be an osprey, or two, on every one of them.

• Another bunny. There are fat bunnies in this refuge.
• Apparently, I left some sort of unwrapped protein bar or Easter candy in my backpack, because I now see that there is chocolate all over my hands and, as it turns out, the focus wheel on my binoculars. I imagine a child watching from a touring car and thinking "that lady likes birding so much she's licking her binoculars."
• A phrase I have always liked is "as useless as a chocolate teakettle."
• [blinks] Two fat bunnies.

• I am so hopeless with shorebirds it's embarrassing. I have no idea who this guy is, but he will not stop bobbing up and down and I think I love him. I am formulating a theory that there are only about four shorebirds, really, and all the rest of it in ornithologists ego and infighting. I think it's a greater yellowlegs, but if you told me it was some kind of sandpiper, I'd believe you.

• I can hear some small birds, sparrows and warblers, but I think I must leave the serious investigation of the woods trail until tomorrow for lighting reasons.
• Another bunny, and also a beaver.
• As I have mentioned, while I always keep a list, I don't often keep a count, but this is certainly the most myrtle warblers I've seen in one flock, and the most whatever these shorebirds are.
• Ugh, a killdeer, I freaking LOVE a killdeer, and he isn't anywhere near photo distance. Maybe tomorrow.
• I feel...I was going to say I feel taller when I do a long slow ramble along a big empty wildlife drive like this, but that isn't it. I feel lighter, healthier, better in my body, surer of my physical self. My bandana is stupid, and I didn't put on anything but sunscreen and Deep Woods Off, and now there is chocolate on my shirt, but I feel like this looks good on me.
• There is a sensory trick recommended for people when they are having a panic attack, where you are meant to name five things you can see, four things you can hear, three things you can feel, two things you can smell, and one thing you can taste. I feel like the minute I drive onto a refuge, that is running for me like a background process on a laptop the whole time. It's called a grounding exercise, to which I can only say, yep.
• I think I've seen close to 30 species in three and a half hours. The final bunny count is eleven. The bunnies are not beating the allegations.

BOTD: Pine warbler. I had just said to myself, man, I can hear them, but I still haven't seen any warblers yet, and then I walked a ways away to look at a blue heron, and when I came back this little guy was foraging and picking at plants about 40 feet from my car. I wouldn't want you to think he was cooperating, though. He was definitely being a warbler.

Bad news, the mosquitoes and blackflies are getting into season here, and you can get out of your car and walk around a bit and come back and find the whole door and window covered in them, and you have to really gird yourself to open the door and scramble in. I forgotten how very unpleasant this is! That really cut down on photo ops, since at certain points on the wetter side of the drive I was birding through the car window.

They called me mad when I packed no toiletries except sunscreen, my toothbrush and bite splint, and four kinds of insect repellant. I have treated the clothes I plan to wear tomorrow with permethrin and will hope to get some good photos before it gets too warm, but no promises.

I am saving some nice myrtle warbler photos for a rainy day, possibly literally. To that end, remember you can send your photo submission to skwbotd@gmail.com to be in the Back-Up Bird bank.

Would you look at these goddamn bugs.