Today I monitored the Prothonotary Warbler nest boxes in three new areas around the preserve, the coves at Twin Bridges, Area O off Red Bank Road, and an area on the west shore which was added to the trail this year. I located and marked 14 new Prothonotary Warbler territories today bringing the current year’s count to 82. The females have arrived and I watched several bringing nesting materials to the nest boxes. Angling to observe nest sites from the steep banks and creeks at Twin Bridges turned out to be a challenge. I managed to find a deep pool in the stream and fill one boot with water and later I began sliding down a steep embankment so I reached to grab something to stop the slide, wrong choice, multiform rose. A blood sacrifice for the Prothonotary. Birds observed this morning : Canada Goose Wood Duck (16) Mallard Double-crested Cormorant (10) Great Blue Heron Green Heron (3) Turkey Vulture Cooper’s Hawk Red-tailed Hawk American Coot (nesting pair?) Killdeer Spotted Sandpiper (2) Ring-billed Gull Mourning Dove Yellow-billed Cuckoo (4) Belted Kingfisher Red-bellied Woodpecker Downy Woodpecker Northern Flicker Pileated Woodpecker (2) Acadian Flycatcher (6) Great Crested Flycatcher (4) Eastern Kingbird Warbling Vireo (13) Red-eyed Vireo (11) Blue Jay American Crow Tree Swallow Northern Rough-winged Swallow Bank Swallow Cliff Swallow (47) Barn Swallow Carolina Chickadee Tufted Titmouse White-breasted Nuthatch Carolina Wren House Wren Blue-gray Gnatcatcher Eastern Bluebird Veery (5) Swainson’s Thrush (2) Wood Thrush (4) American Robin Gray Catbird Northern Mockingbird Brown Thrasher European Starling Tennessee Warbler (3) Nashville Warbler (6) Yellow Warbler (10) Chestnut-sided Warbler (3) Magnolia Warbler (4) Yellow-rumped Warbler (11) Black-throated Green warbler (4) Black-and-white Warbler (2) Yellow-throated Warbler (1) Prothonotary Warbler (23) Ovenbird (2) Louisiana Waterthrush (2) Wilson’s Warbler (1) Yellow-breasted Chat (3) Summer Tanager (2) Scarlet Tanager (7) Eastern Towhee Field Sparrow Song Sparrow White-throated Sparrow Northern Cardinal Rose-breasted Grosbeak (5) Red-winged Blackbird Common Grackle Brown-headed Cowbird Baltimore Oriole (17) American Goldfinch Charlie Bombaci Hoover Nature Preserve Delorme 58 C (2) & (3) ************************************** See what's free at http://www.aol.com. ______________________________________________________________________ Ohio-birds mailing list, a service of the Ohio Ornithological Society. Our thanks to Miami University for hosting this mailing list. Additional discussions can be found in our forums, at www.ohiobirds.org/forum/. You can join or leave the list, or change your options, at: http://listserv.muohio.edu/scripts/wa.exe?LIST=OHIO-BIRDS Send questions or comments about the list to: [log in to unmask]