I got out again today to recover from the storm damage at the preserve.  It's 
amazing how the wind simply snapped trees of all sizes. We lost some trees  
that had to be 200 years old. It's like losing old friends.
 
I checked the damage at Wiese Road first today. Eight nest boxes were down  
along with their trees. I was able to recover and reinstall six, but the  other 
two were beyond recovery. There were many shorebirds along the mudflats at  
Wiese Road but I wasn't able to do much identification as the shoreline was to  
the east and the sun left me with silhouettes and not much more to work with. 
A  rough guess would be yellowlegs and an assortment of peeps. The American 
White  Pelicans on the other hand were impossible not to identify. All five 
were  peacefully perched on a snag between Wiese Road and the boardwalk at Area 
M. I  didn't get to the boardwalk to determine the status of the Marbled Godwit 
or the  Wilson's Phalarope. There were a few scattered warblers at Wiese Road 
including  Magnolia, Black-throated Green, Wilson's, and American Restart. 
Also observed a  Red-headed Woodpecker and an immature Bald Eagle.
 
My next stop was to check the damage at Dustin Road (Area L). The old road  
resembled the low hurdles at the Olympics. Going up and over with a backpack of 
 tools was a workout. Five nest boxes were down in this area and I was able 
to  recover all and reinstall them. On the small peninsula there was a flurry 
of  activity, mostly warblers, for about ten minutes and then all got quiet. It 
was  like being in the eye of a hurricane. I then spotted the reason, a 
Sharp-shinned  Hawk looking for a snack. The warblers here were the same as at 
Wiese Road, plus  both Blackpoll and Chestnut-sided. 
 
I next looped my way around the point and headed up Little Walnut Creek to  
clean and maintain the nest boxes there. At the edge of Little walnut Creek  
southeast of the trestle there are some new mudflats and feeding there were 11  
Willets and 2 yellowlegs. They caught my eye quickly when several flexed their 
 wings and that defining white wing stripe appeared. Somehow I managed to 
have  only two nest boxes down along the creek. Both were recovered and 
reinstalled.  Since I headed up the creek along the shore I was unaware of the tree 
carnage  along the path. I used the old roadbed to return to the car and I 
constantly had  to detour into the woods to go around the large trees that fell 
across the  path. I didn't see much warbler activity at this location, only a few  
American redstarts.
 
It was a productive morning as I now stand at 190 nest boxes cleaned and  
renovated and only 60 to go. Of course many of the last 60 are in areas that  
required me to be part mountain goat. The worse will be those in the far  
recesses of the coves at Twin Bridges. It's a mile back to them and the  elevation 
rises and falls by over 100 feet as you go through the ravines. That  will be a 
two bottles of water hike.
 
Charlie Bombaci
Hoover Nature Preserve
 
 
 
You  cannot begin to preserve any species of animal unless you preserve the 
habitat  in which it dwells. Disturb or destroy that habitat and you will 
exterminate the  species as surely as if you had shot it. So conservation means 
that [we] have to  preserve forest and grassland, river and lake, even the sea 
itself. This is  vital not only for the preservation of animal life generally, 
but for the future  existence of man himself—a point that seems to escape many  
people.
-Gerald  Durrell, The Nature Conservancy 



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