This morning a group of friends and I did some easy local birding around the Westerville-Galena area in northern Franklin and southern Delaware Counties. Everyone wanted to see the two Eastern Screech Owls I posted recently. So we began with the bike trail at Alum Creek Park South in Westerville. We parked and began leisurely walking south on the trail from near the Westerville Senior Center. Stop one, the gray morph in the tree cavity. It was very visible as it sat in the cavity facing the trail with one eye seemingly peeking at us. After everyone enjoyed our cooperative first on the wanted list bird, we continued south on the trail picking up a few common species until we reached the steel bridge over Alum Creek. There, sitting behind a narrow cross strut was the rufous morph Eastern Screech Owl. The head and tail were visible, but the middle was blocked, all reminding me of Congress. Two extremes that just don’t meet. We retraced our path and made one last visit with the gray morph owl before heading up to the Hoover Nature Preserve. Two members of our party had never been to Old Sunbury Road in the preserve. I led our flock north along the old road bed. Several Bald Eagles were active around us, soaring over us at tree top level, once or twice with trigs in their talons. Nest Building? A thought I like and hope for. They put on a great show for us. In and near the pine stand we found Brown Creeper, Ruby-crowned Kinglet and a shy Barred Owl. The owl spotted us before we spotted it and we had to watch it fly away through the pines. We next hopped over to Hoover Meadows where we picked up several Swamp Sparrows, White-throated Sparrows, an American Tree Sparrow, Northern Mockingbird and a group of active Eastern Bluebirds. Although our list isn’t extensive we were happy with our morning as along with some nice finds we got to spend time with friends. A list of our morning follows. Charlie Bombaci Species observed: Turkey Vulture Canada Goose Northern Pintail (flock flew over) Bald Eagle (2 or 3) Red-tailed Hawk Ring-billed Gull Mourning Dove Eastern Screech-Owl (both rufous and gray morphs) Barred Owl Red-bellied Woodpecker Downy Woodpecker Blue Jay American Crow Carolina Chickadee Tufted Titmouse White-breasted Nuthatch Brown Creeper Carolina Wren Ruby-crowned Kinglet Eastern Bluebird American Robin Northern Mockingbird European Starling Yellow-rumped Warbler American Tree Sparrow Song Sparrow Swamp Sparrow White-throated Sparrow Dark-eyed Junco Northern Cardinal Red-winged Blackbird American Goldfinch House Sparrow ______________________________________________________________________ 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]