February 28, 2026

Where: Huntley Meadows Park

When: 7:47am

Bird Species: downy woodpecker, red-bellied woodpecker, brown creeper, white-breasted nuthatch, red-headed woodpecker, tufted titmouse, eastern bluebird, mallard, northern pintail, swamp sparrow, song sparrow, Canada geese, redwing blackbird, American coot, hooded merganser, green-winged teal, gadwall, American black duck, hairy woodpecker, bald eagle, turkey vulture, red-shouldered hawk, pileated woodpecker, great horned owl, ring-billed gull

Things I Thought About:

• Last legal spot in the parking lot at 7:43am. The news about the great horned owl nest must be out.
• Immediately I hear about ten different songs and calls, and before I've left the pavement, I have seen a nuthatch, a downy, a cardinal, and a titmouse. Now, not five minutes in, I see a brown creeper. These guys are small and exceedingly well-camouflaged. They are a tough capture, and I should be excited about this, but I am going to have to share something the bird blog readers may find shocking: I do not like this bird.

• There are damn few birds I do not like, in fact, I can’t really think of a another one, although surely there are some. But there is something about the proportions of the brown creeper that I find very off-putting. His bill curves down, in a line with the curve of his body, and he’s a very flat sort of bird. Even though he behaves like a nuthatch, his body shape is much wider and flatter, like a lump of bread dough that has been sort of smooshed. He kicks his legs out wider than his body to climb, and the length of his tail combined with his speed and that flatness, he reminds me, I hate to say it, of nothing so much as a palmetto bug. They call him a creeper, and he gives me the creeps.
• [imagines your horrified gasps] I get to not like a bird!!
• Now, here are birds I like. Ducks! None are especially close for photos, no luck at all with the teals, but they are back, along with a married gadwall couple today and two American black ducks. I think I see a female shoveler, but I'm not sure enough to count her. A couple of mallards are doing that thing where their green heads look a deep blue-purple in the sunlight. A beautiful effect.

• As far as other waterfowl go, there are a few ring-billed gulls still around fucking up the atmosphere, but the big flock left with the ice. Canada geese, always, and today's special guest star, the American coot, being very cooperative in open water not too far away from the boardwalk.
• Why is my phone ringing at 9:40am on a Saturday? Why is my phone ringing at all, but why especially at 9:40am on a Saturday? 
• It is 1-800-Contacts. My contacts prescription expired in November, but they will let me order refills provided I can pass an online eye exam with these contacts in. I tried it Wednesday and got a letter wrong. Now this, to me, suggests that I need a real eye exam and likely my prescription updated. 1-800-Contacts has called me three times since then, encouraging me to pay another $20 and try the online exam again. There is the faint but definite undertone of “What kind of moron fails an open-book eye exam? Do you or do you not wish to commit this diet insurance fraud?” Mostly what I wish is to be able to see clearly.
• I have a pileated woodpecker framed up but he's pretty backlit. I move five steps to the right and lose him completely; can't find the bird, can't find the tree. This is birding.
• In general, people are behaving very well around the owl nest, but there are at least ten people there. No one is creeping up closer, no one is being noisy or leaving the trail, but pursuing a local celebrity bird is a lot like being an extremely online person in 2026. We all pick our times and our spots, we try to be ethical about it, we assure ourselves we’re behaving well and doing it the right way. We're all very quick to notice when someone else is getting out of line, and we try to read the room, but the bottom line is none of us should really be here and we all know it. “I’ll stay until it feels icky,” we all say, and some days it’s 20 minutes with an owl, and some days it’s eleven hours on Bluesky.
• Today I take four photos of the owl and leave while I can still deny being part of the problem. I'm one of the good ones!

• A big bird flew in and perched up on the other side of the pond and the people around me think it is a large red-shouldered hawk, but I'm sure it's a juvenile bald eagle. This is confirmed minutes later when an adult bald eagle charges it, talons out. They flap and yell at each other, and then the adult runs him off, pursuing him as he goes away. Now a red-shouldered hawk joins in, harrying them both, especially the big adult eagle. It's obvious now which is which, just screaming and swooping way overhead, and they are casting those giant bird shadows that make you want to duck a little. It's all very dramatic. Little kids are jumping up and down and cheering the hawk on.
• Nice of the red-head to swing back around since I blew it with the pileated.

• Pro-tip from me, in a crowded park: the single best social interaction in which you can engage is to ask an adult who is taking a photograph of kids with another adult, "Do you want one with all of you?" Of course they want to be in the picture. You are, in that moment, a hero.
• Hey, my vision insurance is going to run through the end of March from this job and then I'll get new vision from the new job! Maybe I'll get new glasses this year, too.
• I should ask my life partners at the periodontists' if they want to do anything crazy before March 31, too.
• Goddamn, that was never four hours just now!? No wonder my hips are killing me.

BOTD: the American coot. We don't get one every year, so it's fun to see him up close and having a nice paddle.

To me, his primary distinction is that he is ridiculous. He looks like he's barely staying upright as he floats, and his coloring is like a child designed a bird that came to life. "He's like goose but he's SMALLER, and he's all BLACK, but he's got a WHITE beak, and his eye is RED. But if you see him out of the water he looks like a WEIRD CHICKEN."

Do not look up American coot on land; it is unsettling and I want you to like him.