Patterns gleaned from several different local sites over the past few days around central Ohio:

Purple martins - colonies have moved to other 'roost' sites, including man-made structures.  Tops among them are powerline pylons, where I've seen groups of 10-20 martins roosting at 4 different locations recently.  And you thought they only loved us for our martin houses!

Wood Pewees - as usual, they're still calling, skewing our perception of their abundance versus other forest birds in late July.  I quickly heard the 2 calling at Woodward Park this morning, but it took me much longer to find the 2 quiet Red-eyed Vireos at the same spot.

Red-shouldered Hawks - return of the (urban) native.  The species continues to expand in urban Columbus, where I've had 4 different juveniles in 4 different parks recently.  Look for more of them in our urban neighborhoods, especially along stream corridors.

Grasshopper Sparrows - another victim of central Ohio's hot real estate market.  As developers quickly move to build on vacant fields here to take advantage of our latest spec bubble, the weedfields that supported local populations of these inconspicuous birds are disappearing quickly.  Formerly I could find them in many outlying areas of Columbus; recently, I've only found them in protected fields at MetroParks (Glacier Ridge, Rocky Fork, Battelle Darby)

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