To celebrate Environment for the Americas’ International Migratory Bird Day on May 8, the Loudoun Wildlife Conservancy (LWC) has scheduled 10 different bird walks, all led by experienced and enthusiastic birders.  Every one of the walks has great habitat that is important to both migrating and nesting birds.  Some of the sites are regularly visited while others are only open to birders a couple of times a year.

If you are interested please join us on one of the following walks.  To get an idea on how many people are planning to attend please let us know if you are planning to attend by registering online on our IMBD signup page.  If you need more info on a site or directions please contact Joe Coleman at jcoleman@loudounwildlife.org  or visit “Loudoun’s Great Places” on the website.

All the walks begin at 8 am unless otherwise noted.  From east to west in Loudoun County:

1) Algonkian Regional Park, led by Bill Brown.  Algonkian is a Northern Virginia Regional Park which includes extensive wetlands and rich forested bottomland along the Potomac.  Bill completed a bird list for the park a couple of years ago.

2) Horsepen Preserve (privately owned), led by Andy Rabin and Linda Sieh.  This heavily forested preserve is immediately upstream from Algonkian and has several wetlands and small streams.

3) Bles Park and distant viewing of a Great Blue Heron rookery, led by Gerry Hawkins and Nicole Hamilton.  Bles Park is a small jewel of a Loudoun Co park that borders the Potomac & includes meadows, wetlands, and heavy forest.  After Bles the group will drive to a close-by spot where they will view, with scopes, a 55-nest Great Blue Heron rookery along Broad Run and close to Rte 28 that LWC has been working to protect.

4) Banshee Reeks Nature Preserve, led by Dori Rhodes & Del Sargent & co-hosted by the Friends of Banshee Reeks.  Banshee Reeks is a 725-acre nature preserve with a wide diversity of natural habitats rich with wildlife.  LWC was the lead organization in establishing the Banshee Reeks Nature Preserve in the late ’90′s.  In addition to the Friends of Banshee Reeks, there is also a VA Master Naturalist Chapter at the preserve.

5) Dulles Greenway Wetlands Mitigation Project, 6 am, led by Bruce Hill and Cheri Schneck.  LWC has partnered with the Dulles Greenway who created these wetlands to mitigate the wetlands lost in the building of the Dulles Greenway.  For years LWC has monitored bird populations on the wetlands and more recently established a bluebird trail here and begun monitoring other wildlife as well.  With special permission from the Dulles Greenway, LWC periodically lead walks on this 200-acre wetlands.

6) Ball’s Bluff and Red Rock, led by Robert and Cathey Daugherty.  Ball’s Bluff and Red Rock are two heavily forested Northern Virginia Regional Parks in Leesburg that border the Potomac.  While well-known for their many spring wildflowers, these parks are also nice spots to find a wide variety of migrant and nesting birds.

7) Rust Nature Sanctuary, led by Phil Daley and Paul Miller.  Owned by the Audubon Naturalist Society this 68 acre preserve has a wide variety of different habitats on the edge of Leesburg including a meadow, a mature deciduous forest, a pine plantation, a pond, and a rare perched upland wetlands, all of which attract migrants and are also home to several interesting nesting birds as well.

8)  Morven Park, 8:30 am, led by Bruce Hill and Cheri Schneck.  Morven Park is a private large historic house and estate that encompasses over a 1,000 acres of gardens, fields, lawns, and extensive forest along the Catoctin Ridge right outside Leesburg.  The trails in the forest are rarely open to the public and are a good spot to find a nice variety of nesting & migrant birds.

9) Phillips Farm, led by Dale Ball and Mimi Westervelt.  Waterford, a well-preserved Quaker village dating to the 1730′s, saved the 144-acre Phillips Farm from development a few years ago.  In the last three years LWC has partnered with the Waterford Foundation, who owns the farm, to plant over 1,200 trees and shrubs along Catoctin Creek, a State Scenic River that is home to a wide variety of birds and other wildlife.

10) Blue Ridge Center for Environmental Stewardship (privately owned), led by Joe Coleman and Larry Meade.  This 900-acre property in the northwestern corner of Loudoun Co borders the Harper’s Ferry National Park and is only a couple of miles from the confluence of the Potomac and Shenandoah Rivers.  It includes heavily-forested mountain slopes, numerous vernal pools, and two different stream valleys along with large meadows, a lightly-managed power-cut, and several ponds and is home to numerous birds, mammals, and other wildlife.

The Loudoun Wildlife Conservancy is also sponsoring a Birdathon from May 1 through May 15. 

Hope you can join us on one of our May 8 walks!  You can sign up for any of these on our website: http://www.loudounwildlife.org/IMBD_Signup_Form.htm