Old Trail; Crozet, VA 10/19/16

All photos are © Marshall Faintich

It was already 70 degrees at 7:00 this morning, and the temperature was quickly rising to the mid- to upper 80s for the afternoon. I hiked this morning here in Old Trail, and constrained my hike to mostly shaded areas to stay out of the direct sunlight. I ended up with 20 avain species, and could have easily had another 4 or 5 species if I had hiked along the tall grasses near the soccer field. Most of the birds I saw were Yellow-rumped Warblers and Ruby-crowned Kinglets.

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Ruby-crowned Kinglet

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Ruby-crowned Kinglet

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Purple Finch

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Yellow-rumped Warbler

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Yellow-rumped Warbler

At one point I was only a few feet from a pair of Ruby-crowned Kinglets that were foraging in a small bushy area. Whenever one of the Ruby-crowned Kinglets got close to where the other one was foraging, the second Ruby-crowned Kinglet raised its ruby crest to tell the first one to move away to another spot on the bushes.

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Ruby-crowned Kinglet

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Ruby-crowned Kinglet

To quote a Florida birding pal of mine, "All it takes is one good photo to make a great bird hike!"


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