WHile helping run the Darby Creek butterfly count yesterday, we were in fields most of the morning and ran across 2 sparrows of note for central Ohio.  In the Indian Ridge prairie (the site of a brief Scissor-tailed flycatcher sighting of several years back), there was a very accommodating Henslow's Sparrow singing along the Turkeyfoot Trail.  This bird was singing continuously during our hour there, and we were able to approach it quite closely.  Most Henslow's hereabouts seem to pick much more remote locations and are very wary, so this may be a young bird dealing with a late hormone surge.

Earlier in the morning, while on the way to Battelle-Darby MetroPark, I relocated a singing Vesper Sparrow just southeast of Bolton Field (a small airport between Grove City and Darby Creek.  This bird was singing in open fields along Johnson Road just west of its intersection with Big Run South Road, and has been here for nearly a month.  This is a bit of personal deja vu, since this was the site of my first Franklin County Vesper Sparrow over 10 years ago, and it seems incredible that they may have persisted at the site for that long, despite the suburbanization of nearby areas.  It probably helps that this area may be restricted to fields due to the nearby airfield


Rob Thorn
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