After visiting and photographing the Northern Wheatear, I talked with a very-reasonable security guard as he was finishing his shift. He didn't enjoy hassling birders this afternoon, and anyone visiting tomorrow should be polite and recognized that they are just following protocols (while perhaps keeping your camera pointed down and away from the buildings).

More importantly, we are very lucky to have a chance to see this bird in the Upper Valley, for although their range is huge, they don't often get this far south in North America. They are one of the few species which have been observed flying over the Greenland Ice Cap (3,000+ m elevation), with several reports from local scientists working there. An excerpt from a cool paper is pasted in below, based on research done with geolocators (as VCE scientists are also using); I am happy to share the whole paper (4 pp).

Equally exciting for me today was an encounter with one of our resident species, a White-throated Sparrow. Running down a dirt road in mid-day drizzle it was dead calm and completely silent, until the sparrow sang loudly from no more than 5-10 m away. It must have been a well-practiced, after-second year bird, for I heard every nuance of the song in perfect pitch. One of those magical moments that happen when least expected!

"...our results provide the first incontrovertible evidence that a migratory songbird regularly travels between Arctic regions of the Western Hemisphere and Africa. Scaled for body size, this is the one of the longest round-trip migratory journeys of any bird in the world and raises questions about how a bird of this size is able to successfully undertake such physically demanding journeys twice each year, particularly for inexperienced juveniles migrating on their own."

Bairlein, F. and others, 2012. Cross-hemisphere migration of a 25 g songbird. Biol. Lett. 8, 505–507. doi:10.1098/rsbl.2011.1223

-------- Original Message --------

Subject:	eBird Report - VA Hospital, WRJ, May 23, 2014
Date:	Fri, 23 May 2014 19:48:40 -0400 (EDT)
From:	[log in to unmask]
To:	[log in to unmask]

VA Hospital, WRJ, Windsor, US-VT
May 23, 2014 5:55 PM - 6:10 PM
Protocol: Stationary
Comments:     Observing previously located bird
2 species

Northern Wheatear  1     As reported by others today. Photo:  <iframe src="https://www.flickr.com/photos/36866981@N03/14067924628/player/" width="75" height="75" frameborder="0"></iframe>
American Robin  3

View this checklist online at http://ebird.org/ebird/view/checklist?subID=S18526937

This report was generated automatically by eBird v3 (http://ebird.org/vt)

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