Hi Everyone,

I am in Fall Creek Falls State park in Tennessee for this weekend, and then on a road trip to/from Pennsylvania, fitting in some birding along the way.

This morning I visited Radnor Lake, just south of Nashville for about an hour and a half, and had a pretty good morning considering the short time and breezy conditions. (There have been tornadoes in this general part of the country and the front is still moving through, so it could get a bit interesting, although none of the worst cells came too near today.)

The highlight this morning was a 5-warbler day - the familiar Yellow-rumped Warbler (Myrtle's) and Wilson's Warblers were supplemented by a singing PROTHONOTARY WARBLER, a NASHVILLE WARBLER, and a beautiful and unmistakable male BLACKBURNIAN WARBLER. Non-warbler highlights included two BROAD-WINGED HAWKS - one seen flying over Radnor Lake in the morning, and a second one feeding on a kill in the woods near the conference center at Fall Creek Falls State Park. On the way from Nashville to the park, a stop at a rest area along the interstate generated a nice surprise - a pair of ORCHARD ORIOLES. At the first glance, the black and dark red/chestnut of the male suggested American Redstart, but then the pair flew right toward me and landed for good looks in a nearby tree. The color gives a very different impression from the familiar Baltimore Oriole.

Tomorrow all day I'm going to accompany a couple of local birders on an annual count (patterned after the CBC) that they do during migration - hopefully I'll add a few more east coast warblers and vireos to the list for the trip.

John Tubbs
johntubbs at comcast.net
www.tubbsphoto.com