Black Throated Gray Warbler 

Wow..it's been awhile since I lasted posted anything in this blog. well it's a new year and good time to renew my efforts in keeping this blog up to date starting today.

Yesterday, January 4th was a rather mild winter day....with temps in the low to mid 40's...so I decided to start my year off by looking for the mega rare Blacked throated gray warbler that has been seen for about the past 3 months on and off in Noel Dorwart park near Millersville, Lancaster County, Pa. 

I left my house around 8am and it's about a 45 minute to the park. I arrived at 8:35am..there we very little traffic, and was the only one in the parking lot. I gather my gear and started walking the trails, immediately I saw several species of birds including White Throated, House, and Song sparrow in the weedy area next to the parking lot - a good start - 8 species and I didn't even leave the parking lot yet.

after checking the map of the trails I decided to walk the river trail where the BTGW was consistently being from. as I proceeded thru the now forested area, I didn't have my luck in seeing anything...a few red Bellied and Downy Woodpeckers...but as I emerged to the weedy area along the creek I heard the distinct call of a Catbird. I spotted and listened and watched and sure enough after about 5 minutes the Catbird popped up giving my a short but good look....another rare bird for the winter in this area   

After viewing, I continued on the trail, but had no luck seeing the BTGW on my first loop...I did see lots of other species but not he target bird I was looking for. I made two more loops around the 1/2 mile trail and finally after 2-1/2 hours I spotted movement in a large Sycamore tree. The movement turned out to be the Black throated gray warbler, that I was looking for...not the best looks but they where diagnostic enough to make a positive id..below is a photo taken the same day by another birder in the same area as I observed the species.

I returned to my car, with a total species of 27...that included two rare species for our area...the Black throated gray warbler and Catbird.

Until next time - good birding.