Cape Henlopen, Delaware
It was a beautiful, sunny morning that would see temperatures rise to near 50°F by the end of our tour. The two tour participants, Susan and Dick, made a special trip from Maryland to join Tom on this morning. The three set out to explore the coastal marshes and the maritime forests of southern Delaware, primarily in search of birds and an educational experience.
Susan and Dick were both knowledgeable backyard birdwatchers. They arrived with binoculars of their own, but were happy to have the opportunity to use the high quality Zeiss optics that Tom offered up at no additional charge.
The boardwalk of Cape Henlopen State Park is an often traveled location, where both serious and casual nature enthusiasts mingle with bicyclists, joggers, and families out for a stroll. It was a perfect location for this tour group. The forest composition and the coastal habitat was a change of scenery for the tour participants as well as Tom, who is based out of Cape May, NJ about 15 miles across the Delaware Bay to the north. That’s right, there is a marked subtle difference between the habitat types of Cape Henlopen, DE and Cape May, NJ in spite of the short distance between the two and their similar outward appearances.
Walking along the boardwalk the group immediately encountered Brown-headed Nuthatches, a tiny close relative of the White-breasted Nuthatch that frequents backyard bird feeders throughout the entire United States, spare Florida and some lowland regions of the southwestern deserts. The Brown-headed Nuthatch is particularly partial to Virginia and Black Pine stands, and are very picky with their localities. They are extremely common in southern Delaware. Susan and Dick didn’t know this at first, because they had never seen them before, but Delaware happens to be the farthest north that the species typically occurs. Although pine forests are abundant in many regions of the eastern US, these tiny nuthatches are often absent from seemingly appropriate habitat types. In the world of wildlife, naturalists refer to these types of habitat preferential species as “local” with respect to their distribution. The Short-leaf and Virginia Pines are two abundant species of pines that dominate the dune forests of Cape Henlopen, that are relatively sparse in inland regions of Maryland and in Cape May, NJ where the tour members and guide came from earlier that morning.
As the tour continued, Tom explained phenomenons of migration and the role that seasons and weather, such as wind directions, can have a large impact on migratory actions. In the marshes Tom spotted an unseasonable adult female Common Yellowthroat, a common bird during the warm seasons but a rare sight during February in Delaware. The group was able to enjoy good views of this colorful hardy individual, in the marshes.
More in line with the winter residents of the region, the group also had good views of about 60 snow geese and an assortment of ducks including many Northern Shovelers and Bufflehead to name a few, and on a walk along the beach the two common species of wintering sandpipers were observed.
The day concluded with a relocation to Prime Hook National Wildlife Refuge for a brief walk at Turkle Pond trail. This trail is in densely wooded forest with more of a notable presence of deciduous hardwoods compared to the piney dunes of the State Park. It was this hardwood component that gave us a memorable sighting of the largest North American woodpecker species, a Pileated Woodpecker! This was a great way to conclude the tour, and always is such a magnificent bird to see in person. They are truly enormous woodpeckers, rivaling the size of crows. They can be seen throughout a wide range of the country, but they are another somewhat “local” species due to their negative response to habitat fragmentation and reliance on mature hardwood forests. Woodpeckers in general have large territories and require larger expanses of habitat to provide resources compared to most songbirds. It is perhaps no coincidence that our largest member of the woodpecker family is one of the most sensitive in this respect. We marveled at its size and its beautiful plumage, showing a brilliant red crested head and jet black body with bold white stripe running from the facial area and down the neck.
It was a wonderful day to be out with good company. It is always a joy for participants to get high quality views packed full of interesting educational commentary from our guides, but our guides also get great enjoyment of sharing the experiences. This was a productive and interesting day for seeing birds and we hope to see Susan and Dick again on another tour sometime.
This is a Bayberry bush, a common food source for one of our most abundant birds sighted on this day - Yellow-rumped Warblers