urban birds

September 3, 2026

Sara Kate Wilkinson

Sara Kate Wilkinson

— 2 min read
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September 3, 2026
Bird of the Day: northern mockingbird, subadult, young thug

Where: Smithsonian Castle

When: 6:40 pm

Bird Species: gray catbird, American robin, northern mockingbird

Things I Thought About:

  • A lot of new little corner parks and benches and little installation pieces have popped up all over downtown and around the Mall, and I like a lot of them, and I kind of hate that I like them.
  • It is for sure in the high nineties again, and it is remarkable how much I am in denial about this. I am wheezing on the short walk in this thick air.
  • The days are getting shorter at an alarming rate.
  • I really like this garden. This is a nice spot.
The bird of the day is bee.
  • The bugs are really loud. You wouldn't think that would be restful, but it is. The sound rolls over you in short, sharp, percussive waves. You can find yourself sinking into it, breathing with it, keeping time. It feels like if you sit long enough, you could figure something out, some secret thread connecting your heartbeat to the stridulation of cicadas.
  • As happens with a frequency many find suspicious, I am reminded of the lyric of a hymn. Mortals, join the mighty chorus that the morning stars began. That is a mighty chorus of insects, and there are some frogs and birds in there to.
  • That hymn is set to Beethoven's Ninth, the Ode to Joy, something I am trying to keep myself open to. The lyrics fit nicely into what my friend Ben calls my Personal Pantheism. Vale and forest, field and mountain, flowering meadow, flashing sea, things of that nature.
  • Also chanting bird and flowing fountain, both of which I have right here at present. Not too bad at all.

BOTD: northern mockingbird. This immature adult was all over the place tonight. I wonder if this is the little fellow I saw here a month ago. He still has all the mottle on his chest plumage, and even a bit of the loose lip thing birds have before they grow into their mouths. Still quite young.

I did also see a full-grown adult sitting on a rope barrier, and he was one of the fattest mockingbirdsI have ever seen. The rope was pulled fully three inches lower from his weight. When he took off, the whole section jumped and vibrated for seconds afterward. It was hilarious. You maybe had to be there.

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