With an exceedingly rare Gray Kingbird that played hide and seek with birders in Eastham this week, the Cape reclaimed the title of rare bird capital of the region, but sadly this Caribbean visitor kept moving - it was last seen on the 19th at Nauset Light Beach. There are less than 10 records ever for Massachusetts and only one previous for the Cape, so do keep an eye out for a big, gray and white flycatcher with a stout bill if you’d like to curry favor with the local birding set. High Head and Highland Light in Truro are both good places to check. We also had report of a female-type Painted Bunting at a brush dump in Eastham and a Western Kingbird near Wellfleet Harbor – who knows what other exciting birds are waiting to be found in thickets, fields, and yards right now.
We haven’t had anything as rare as those species yet at my place of business, Wellfleet Bay sanctuary, but we have been under siege by bluebirds and other more expected birds this fall. A flock of several dozen Eastern Bluebirds is typically somewhere around the big sandplain grassland north of the driveway, often accompanied by Yellow-rumped Warblers, Northern Flickers, and other birds. Among the menu items keeping these birds around is one of my absolute favorite native plants, and not just because it sounds like it might be a bird – it’s Virginia Creeper.
This underappreciated member of the grape family is a gentle, tree-climbing vine that packs a powerful punch in terms of both wildlife value and aesthetics. The deep red fall color is spectacular right now, so look for a patch on your next walk for both the beauty and the chance it’s hosting hungry birds. In spring and summer, the tiny flowers feed innumerable bees and the leaves feed the larva of several species of moth, including the strikingly big, often bright red Pandora sphinx caterpillar. But right now is when the birds really dig it, as the small, dark blue fruits are bite sized for songbirds, and higher in fat and protein than many of the other fruits available to birds now.
A walk along the Bay View Trail at Wellfleet Bay this week should reveal the aforementioned flocks of flickers, bluebirds, warblers, robins, waxwings, sparrows, finches, and other birds flying back and forth across the field to reach the fruit-laden Virginia Creeper vines – look for the bright red leaves climbing up the trees at the sunny woodland border north of the offices. The birds tend to plant it widely, so you might have some in your yard. Some might mistake it for poison ivy, but it’s very different, with five serrated leaflets. Nurseries should sell Virginia Creeper instead of the truly awful English ivy, an invasive, antisocial, yard-escaping vine which is still legal to sell in Massachusetts for reasons I cannot discern.
Another sort of creeper that likes to climb trees was stealing the show at Wellfleet Bay on Monday – the Brown Creeper. These tiny birds look like a moving piece of bark and are fun to watch as they spiral up tree trunks looking for insects. Clearly there had been a heavy influx of these normally scarce migrants the previous night – I was hearing their high-pitched calls whenever I went outside, and was distracted during multiple indoor meetings by Brown Creepers visible on tree trunks outside the windows. Thankfully my boss and coworkers know me well enough to overlook the fact that I’m actively birding while they’re trying to tell me something.
So there you have it – a disjointed series of October vignettes covering rare birds, common, birds, little bark-loving birds, fruiting vines, and even caterpillars – it’s like nature ADD in essay form. I can’t help it, I love all of this stuff so much, and I want you to as well. So humor me this week and look for both Brown Creepers and Virginia Creeper during your outings. And I, the White Creeper as I was known in college, will catch you next week.
