Day 5: Marsh Birds of Bodie Island

On this, the final day, I had two trips and was equally excited about both. The first was this morning at the Bodie Island light house and it involved tramping around in thigh high water to look for some wrens and rails. The search area is in red.

I met tour leader Steve Shultz at 7:30 am at the light and it became immediately apparent that we would be the only two on the trip. What, dragging around in the muck doesn't sound like fun? Soon, I was decked out in my hip boots, but having left in a weary haze at 5:45 (again), I unwittingly left my binoculars behind at the house. After a quick check call to Sarah, waking her up (now I owe her three), I embraced my Murphy's moment and off we went. Steve with his lightweight binoculars and me with my scope made of tungsten.

As we set off into the marsh, Steve remarked how high the water was and that we probably wouldn't see much. He was right, but we still saw enough to give me 5 life birds on the day, pretty incredible. In the marshes we saw my first Sedge Wren and Lincoln's Sparrow, the latter of which Steve said was a very good bird here. We also heard the Virginia Rail and King Rail, laterally compressed birds whose unique body morphologies allow them to pass unseen or heard through the marsh grasses. Incidentally, the term "skinny as a rail" embodies this particulary evolutionary trait. After we exhausted ourselves in the tall grass, we headed over to the Marina at the North end of the Bonner Bridge that spans Oregon Inlet for some more salt-tolerant sparrows.

Once in the marshes underneath the overpass we went straight to work and quickly rustled up a Nelson's Sharp-tailed Sparrow (at right) which was another lifer for me. A couple of minutes went by and we also flushed an American Bittern, a couple of Swamp Sparrows and Seaside Sparrow (another lifer). On to the next stop!



Our last birding locale was at the old Life Saving Station at the south end of the Bonner Bridge that spans Oregon Inlet. We were specifically looking for a Purple Sandpiper (which we didn't find), but we did find a Vesper Sparrow (at left) which Steve said was a very good bird for the OBX. Thanks Steve for taking the time to search for some great birds, for all the mud and the outgoing tide that almost drowned me.