April 18, 2026

Where: Huntley Meadows Park

When: 3:00 pm

Bird Species: downy woodpecker, northern cardinal, white-throated sparrow, European starling, mallard, Canada goose, red-winged blackbird, American coot, common yellowthroat, great blue heron, osprey, blue-gray gnatcatcher, great horned owl, wood duck, red-headed woodpecker, American robin

Things I Thought About:

• A couple in the parking lot is talking about The Naked Gun and it only just this moment strikes me that "Liam Neeson" and "Leslie Nielson" sound very much alike. Probably this was part of the marketing in some way.
• I have heard that the new one is good, and yet I continue to wait in vain for a single woman I know to tell me it's good. I'll probably see it eventually, maybe even tonight. I am a Pam Anderson supporter, and I cheer on her endeavors. I hope she's really funny; I think she has a lot of guts and a lot of resilience. Glad she's still around.
• I watched Anybody but You because the way people talked about Sydney Sweeney at the time was completely deranged. I had never seen her act before in my life, and I was ready to become a defender. I was not five minutes into it before I was like, "Oh, no. LOL."
• I don't know why I thought about Sydney Sweeney. I don't think those two women are very much alike. I don't think she has either guts or resilience. There is no way she is doing okay.
• That white-throated sparrow is only my third bird. Not my third species, the third bird I have seen with my eyes. I have been here 35 minutes. I am hearing a lot of birds, and reasonably close, and I'm seeing nothing but leaves. I am struggling not to get frustrated.
• If you can't handle me at my Heard but not seen, you don't deserve me at my New lifer!!
• I might have a future in the niche birding T-shirt market.
• In the time they were away, I had forgotten how small yellowthroats are.

• The water levels are very low, and it's quiet out here today. The osprey isn't coming within photo range, but it's fun to sit on a bench and watch it soar and hover and search for dinner.
• A great blue heron is amazing to watch when it is taking off, landing, or fishing. Otherwise, it is a Muppet whose handler has fallen asleep after a long lunch.

• There is a phrase I have heard a time or two in the lower Appalachians, "as dead as three o'clock." This is either the deadest part of the night, or the time the dead are most likely to walk. I would submit that using it for 3:00 pm might also apply, at least in a wetland environment.
• Maybe I'll watch that new Vince Vaughn/James Marsden movie tonight. I love time loop shit. What was the name of that Kathryn Newton movie? I thought it was lovely.
• Maybe I'll watch four random episodes of Would I Lie to You? like most of my other wild and abandoned Saturday nights.
• Green tree frogs! It feels like it's early for them. This feels bad for climate, but good for me. I am obsessed with these guys. They are so very small, and so very cute, and this park gets a million of them. It's a treasure hunt.

• Oh, what a relief. What a joy, what a relief. I didn't tell the bird blog, because it was so sad, but last time I was here, when the owl nest had fallen with the owlets in it and they had just replaced them in the tree, the mother had not come back to the nest to feed them, and they were worried she never would. She was staying away in the trees, and there was a concern that the crows would, for want of a less euphemistic term, kill and eat them. But she did come back! She came back early this week, I'm told, and she's here now, with a mouthful of something, and she is raising them again.
• I'm not even going to try to get a photo, though. She's been through a lot and there are a lot of cameras here already. I'm just happy to see here, and the babies, who are getting very big.
• I can't remember when I stopped being annoyed at how quiet it was, but it was before the coot. Probably watching that osprey.
• I did break the news, complete with photos, about an American coot's feet to a small child, who damn near cried about it. Sorry to be this person, but it was very funny. I will state for the record that it was the parents who googled it up and then showed the photo. I would never show those feet to a child.
• And now the little birds are coming out as the sun sets. I may end up with a decent list after all.

BOTD: blue-gray gnatcatcher. I was so lucky to get several clear shots of one! I missed some yesterday without my camera, and I really, really like these birds. It's difficult to tell from the photo up top, which I did crop quite a bit, but they are a ridiculously tiny bird, even smaller than most warblers. They are very noisy, they call constantly. They have what is, to me, a very distinctive call. It's a lot like the little "Chk" noise you can make with a little suction on your own teeth. They sing, too, but the chk chk was constant.

What I love about these birds is that solid white eye ring. I have talked before about the solid white eye ring that hermit thrushes have, where, because they are so still and solitary, it makes them look startled. But these little guys are so active and social, and on them, the white eye ring is rather famous for making them look absolutely unhinged. What on the hermit thrush looks like shyness, looks on the blue-gray gnatcatcher like methamphetamine.

The gnatcatchers eyes are set kind of widely apart, and they have a little arrow of darker blue-gray color on their brows that comes down to the top of their bill, and if you catch them with their head at certain angles, the combination makes them look so angry. It is laugh out loud funny when you catch it. I didn't quite manage it tonight, but you might get the idea.

A terrific bird, who is rarely as cooperative as they were tonight. They'll be around all summer.

The name of the Kathryn Newton movie is The Map of Tiny Perfect Things.