Birdwalk Highlights for 2/6: Tour de West Freeport/Winter Finch Big Day!

Well, that was unexpected. And incredible!

Only very light snow and little wind encouraged us get out and about this morning, and with so little open water in the immediate area, it seemed like a good time to do our "Tour de West Freeport" where we try and find 20 species in the depths of winter within Freeport, but only west of I-295 and therefore without looking at open water.

That was the plan anyway.

Beginning at Florida Lake, we encountered expectedly few birds, but our luck really changed at Hidden Pond Preserve. First, we had 8 fly-over PINE SISKINS. Then, 8 PINE GROSBEAKS appeared, landing in a far treeline. We would have liked them to be a bit closer, but the flock of 26 COMMON REDPOLLS literally surrounded us, helping to make up for it!

An invitation to a feeder in backyard yielded 8 of our 18 PURPLE FINCHES on the day, and another fly-over Pine Siskin. We were still far short of 20 species, but, like Drake Maye calling a naked bootleg to seal the game, I decided to call an audible and do a winter finch "big day." So we headed up to Ross Road in Durham where in a very short time, 16 EVENING GROSBEAKS appeared in the ash trees they have been feeding in recently. The flock eventually came down to offer fantastic looks across the width of the road. 10 HOUSE FINCHES lifted off, our 6th species of finch.

Venturing cross country, we visited a pre-planned yard for padding our list, which immediately produced 26 AMERICAN GOLDFINCHES - our incredible 7th species of finch on the morning (no Red Crossbill today, and White-winged are non-existent in the state this winter.

We continued to pad some numbers, and a HAIRY WOODPECKER was species number 20 on the morning in Freeport alone, so we reached our goal there, too! Double-bonus!

The rest of the morning's totals were 32 AMERICAN CROWS, 23 ROCK PIGEONS, 12 BLACK-CAPPED CHICKADEES, 12 DARK-EYED JUNCOS, 10 HOUSE SPARROWS, 8 AMERICAN TREE SPARROWS, 8 RED-BREASTED NUTHATCHES, 6 NORTHERN CARDINALS, 6 EUROPEAN STARLINGS, 4 BLUE JAYS, and one each of RED-TAILED HAWK, HERRING GULL, and RING-BILLED GULL.

The Tour de West Freeport Challenge is always a lot of fun, but this one is going to go down in the books!