#792 Painted Bunting
Today I signed up for a special trip with Jon Dunn. Jon’s a great birder and a fun guy (and also co-author of the National Geographic Field Guide to the Birds) but we did visit a strict subset of the sites I had visited the day before with Greg Miller on the Big Day so I didn’t find too many new birds; and only one was a life bird, #792 Painted Bunting. It was a female, and I only saw it for about a second and a half, so no photo.
It was extremely windy today, even more so than yesterday. yesterday the wind only tried to steal my hat. Today it succeeded:
I was going to leave the hat there, but a fellow birder was braver than me and climbed off the boardwalk, into the swamp, ignoring the “Beware of Alligator” signs, to retrieve it. It wasn’t just me either. Jon lost his hat once too.
I also managed to miss, once again, Green-tailed Towhee. Jon and some other group members found it, but I did not. It’s turning into this trip’s nemesis bird.
After yesterday’s seven life birds I was hoping I might hit 800 on this trip. However, with only one new species today that doesn’t look likely unless things really perk up.
