Hiking and birding close to home

I’ve discovered a new place to hike just around the corner from my house. The Burlington Landlocked Forest is a hilly tract of land with a high-tension electric line passing through that is cut off from the rest of Burlington by big highways. One trail is right beside the highway, but others are deeper in the forest, which mutes the car noise somewhat. I've been going there almost every day since I discovered it a couple of weeks ago, and its interesting up-and-down trails are helping me get back into exercising regularly.


I’m surprised by the unusual wildlife I’ve seen here, more than in other conservation areas in town. Whenever I come out of the forest and head down the gravel path in the electric right-of-way, I've seen an interesting bird. (Pictures are from Wikimedia Commons; hover for credits)

Rose-breasted Grosbeak-2752Pheucticus ludovicianus CT4 Birds  Today it was a female rose-breasted grosbeak that caught my attention. It was in the bush like the ubiquitous song sparrows, but it had a heavy two-toned bill (the picture doesn't show two-toned) and strong white lines above and below the eye. Of course it is also larger, but that's harder to judge in my binoculars. I guessed grosbeak but didn’t know that it was rose-breasted until it flew up to a nearby tree to join the beautiful male. (If I was up to snuff with birding details, I’d know that rose-breasted is the only streaked female grosbeak around here.)

On other days, in the open brush of the right-of-way or the edge trees, I’ve seen indigo buntings and a scarlet tanager. I usually hear towhees singing and occasionally see them. A wood thrush, perhaps more than one, sings deeper in the forest, along with jays, titmice, chickadees, white-breasted nuthatches.

Picture by US Fish & Wildlife Service
Fisher cat  On Thursday,  in the forest, I heard a riot of blue jays, which usually means they're mobbing some predator, perhaps an owl. In my walking-briskly trance, I almost didn't notice. When my consciousness came back to the forest, I started scanning the trees around the birds. Up in the crotch of a tree, I saw a fuzzy tail, then the head of a fisher! Fishers are part of the weasel family and seem to be making a comeback around here, from what I've heard from friends who live near woods. This is the first one I’ve seen.

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