EXPERIENCE
ST. MARK’S FIELD TRIP
Our annual St. Marks field trip started off with a bang Friday afternoon when Bob kicked up a Grasshopper Sparrow in the field adjacent to the Best Western in Medart! Followed quickly by 6 Ground Doves seen by some of the participants from the Francis M. Weston Audubon Society (FMWAS) of Pensacola.
We bombed on shorebirds at Mashes Sands Beach and Bottoms Road, with tides so low we could almost see Cuba. Only a few female Black Scoters and a patient and persistent Bald Eagle got the adrenalin flowing for the afternoon.
Saturday morning we started out scraping ice from our windshields in 27-degree temps readying our drive to St. Marks NWR. Once there, I left with half of the group on the open-air tram for the wildlife tour at 9 am (brrr….) from the refuge headquarters, leaving Bob with the others to hike the dikes and bird Lighthouse Road. Both of our groups converged on an immature male Vermilion Flycatcher, sunning on a south-facing palm frond. High fives for many of the newer birders!
The tram tour with guides Dana Bryan and Matt Johnstone (both of whom were wonderful at spotting birds for us!) took us back behind Tower Pond and Mounds #3 Pool, where ducks were congregated. Four Black Ducks were lifers for a number of our group, though the antics of five Bald Eagles overhead kept moving the ducks around and swiveling our necks to watch them.
We had a total of seventeen species of ducks plus Snow Goose. We had 14 species of shorebirds. Matt, our tram driver, next stopped and pointed out a rare Franklin’s Gull. Again the eagles flushed the gulls, but it worked to our advantage as we could see the black band on the Franklin’s tail showing it to be a first winter bird.
Following lunch, the groups switched and the tram group topped our earlier group with Black-necked Stilt and American Bittern!
My group searched Lighthouse Pool and the exposed oyster reefs finding only a second Canvasback and American Oystercatchers, so we headed to the heliport to stomp the landing field for sparrows. The short walk to the heliport had a Brown–headed Nuthatch group, along with two more Eastern Phoebes.
We
crossed the open heliport field on the mowed path so we could walk northward across the field with sun on our backs. The eight of us spread out with 6-10 feet between each person, and started walking. The field was almost completely crisp and dry, and we flushed only one uncooperative Song Sparrow that took off for the woods.
I decided it would be good to walk the field one more time, then hit the road to head back to headquarters where we’d meet the tram tour group. Halfway across the field, near the left end of our line where the field was spotted with very short green wax myrtle bushes, Joyce yelped.
Six feet from her left a YELLOW RAIL sprang up flying in an arc in front of us, then flew almost straight ahead and dropped in a flutter into the grass about 15-20 feet ahead of us. The streaked back, stubby bill, and white secondaries were easily seen.
Immediately I yelled for everyone to surround the spot which we did. Converging on the rail’s landing location, we walked the area for the next ten minutes in between happy dances and high fives, but never flushed it again. It was a life bird for everyone except me (Lucy), as I had been fortunate enough to ride a friend’s combine in the rice fields in SW Louisiana flushing a number of them.
Our group ended the trip Sunday at Wakulla Springs. No new birds for the list there, but finding eight Ruby-crowned Kinglets bathing in one spot was surprising! Notably absent throughout the weekend were sparrows, just one here, one there. Our trip list totaled 126, definitely shy of a high of 138 several years ago. Who wants to try again next winter?
By Lucy Duncan