Loudoun Wildlife Conservancy

Skippers are the toughest of the butterflies to identify.  Similar to the birding world where that unknown bird gets put into a lot called ”LBB” (little brown bird”), with butterflies we have our own LBBs, and they are the skippers. 

Identifying them is so rewarding though because it makes you really look at their markings, pick up on subtle cues, watch their behavior, and put together the clues. They have great names, too, like “Dreamy” and “Sleepy” and “Long Dash”.

Mona Miller emailed me a great website that helps with Skipper Identification so I wanted to share that here with you in case you’d like to try your hand at Skipper identification: Skipper Butterflies  I bet you have some in your garden!

Today is our 14th Annual Loudoun Butterfly Count and in a couple of hours over 70 of us will be heading to our team meeting spots and starting off the great count. We’ll no doubt encounter our share of skippers throughout the day.

Either tonight when I get home or tomorrow I’ll start posting some photos and news from our count day.  In the meantime, wish us luck!

This just in from Monarch Watch (see report below). It will be interesting to see what we find through our butterfly count this Saturday and compare it to previous years. I’ve only had a couple of encounters with Monarchs this year and I’ve been looking!  Our intern, Erin Snook, took this great shot of a Monarch caterpillar at Banshee earlier this season.

Status of the Population

The 2009-2010 overwintering monarch population in Mexico covered a forest area of only 1.92 hectares. This figure represents an all time low for overwintering monarchs and is well below the long-term average of 7.44 hectares (1994-2010).

We worried about these low numbers because of the possibility that a devastating storm could drive the population even lower. And then it happenedŠa storm of the worst possible dimensions hit the overwintering area starting on 2 February.

Accounts of the flooding and landslides can be found on the Monarch Watch Blog at

http://monarchwatch.org/blog/category/mexico/

Attempts to find out how the monarchs fared following these winter storms were unsatisfactory. We estimated that at least 50% of the monarchs died during the winter months, recognizing that this value could have been low.

Fortunately, the conditions encountered by the monarchs that reached Texas were favorable. The result, in spite of the low number of returning monarchs, was a substantial first generation.

These butterflies colonized much of the northern breeding area from late April to mid-June.

It appears that the monarchs are making a modest recovery and we expect the overwintering population will measure close to 3 hectares.

For a more detailed status and updates throughout the season please visit the Monarch Watch Blog at http://monarchwatch.org/blog/

I had a great time monitoring two of our bluebird nestbox trails yesterday morning and thought it’d be fun to share some of what I saw and experienced.

The two trails that I monitor are Banshee Reeks and the Dulles Wetlands.  While both trails are not too large (10-11 boxes each), I took a good while doing it, and meandered my way through each trail, checking out other birds flying around, spotting butterflies in the grasses and along the forest edges, and just generally enjoying the day, oh yea, and doing frequent checks for ticks – since I didn’t want to take home too many hitch hikers.

I started my morning of monitoring at Banshee Reeks at about 8:30 and after picking up the monitoring log book and perusing the sightings from last week, I went off along the trail.  It’s always exciting to peek inside the nest boxes because, while we have an idea of what we’ll see based on the previous week’s observations, stories play out over the course of the week as birds pair up, eggs are laid, boxes are fought over, and so on.

At both Banshee and the Dulles Wetlands, we have a healthy number of both Bluebirds and Tree Swallows, although the Tree Swallows seem to make up the majority of nesters.

Tree Swallows can be a pretty aggressive bird when it comes to defending the nestbox, dive bombing and chittering at our heads.  All monitors are given training prior to monitoring at a trail and we always warn new monitors about the Tree Swallow behavior. Our protocol – in general – is to get in, take a peek to gather the data, and then get a good distance way from the box so to put the Tree Swallows (and Bluebirds) back at ease. 

At the trail at Banshee, as of May 16, we have 23 Tree Swallow eggs, 10 Bluebird eggs and 9 Bluebird babies. At the Dulles Wetlands, we have 32 Tree Swallow eggs, 5 Bluebird eggs, 4 Bluebird babies and 5 House Wren eggs. 

This is the first brood of the year for all of these species.  We expect at least 1 more brood as we go through the season and then at the end of the year we’ll tally how many young were fledged from the trails across Loudoun.

Along the trails, I saw some nests that were complete and ready for eggs and some nests where there may have been disputes over box ownership, like the one in this photo which has 2 Tree Swallow eggs and 1 Bluebird egg.

Other boxes show signs of possible predation such as where I saw Tree Swallow eggs ejected from the nestbox and cracked on the ground.

We learn a lot by monitoring, not only about population trends but also about bird behaviors and the whole cycle of life. It’s quite fascinating.

For some additional views inside the nestboxes, I’ve posted a few photos from yesterday in our Facebook album.

Learn more about Bluebird Nestbox Monitoring.

Gerry Hawkins and I led one of the 10 bird walks we had going on last Saturday in celebration of International Migratory Bird Day.

For our walk, we went all around Bles Park – from the fields to the wetlands to the river, and we had some wonderful views of different birds.

We then went over to the Great Blue Heron rookery and observed them for awhile as they tended their nests. 

We finished our morning with a great walk through the nature trails around Loudoun Water where we had amazing views of Eastern Kingbirds among others.

We had an excellent day birding these areas, although some common species (year round-ers like woodpeckers as well as summer residents like the chats) were missing. Warblers were down too but we did get a great view of a Northern Parula (shown here).  

In all we had 54 species:

Canada Goose, Mallard, Double-crested Cormorant, Great Blue Heron, Great egret, Snowy egret, Green heron, Black vulture (poss. Nesting at Loudoun water), Turkey vulture, sharp-shinned hawk, Red-tailed hawk, Amer. Kestrel, Solitary sandpiper, Rock pigeon, Mourning dove, Chimney Swift, Belted kingfisher, Red-bellied woodpecker, Northern flicker, Peewee, Phoebe, Great Crested Flycatcher, Eastern kingbird, Red-eyed Vireo, Blue Jay, Amer. Crow, Fish Crow, Tree Swallow, Barn Swallow, Carolina Chickadee, Tufted Titmouse, Carolina Wren, Blue0gray gnat-catcher, Eastern bluebird, American Robin, Gray Catbird, Northern Mockingbird, European starling, Cedar waxwing, Northern Parula, Prairie warbler, Blackpoll warbler, Nothern Waterthrush, Common yellowthroat, Chipping sparrow, Song sparrow, Northern cardinal, Indigo bunting, Red-winged blackbird, Common grackle, Orchard Oriole, Baltimore Oriole, Amer. Goldfinch, House Sparrow

Many thanks to Gerry for such a great walk!  We had fun exploring the trail through Loudoun Water too!

Back in late March and early April, our Bluebird monitors started lining up their teams, setting their monitoring schedules for the season and getting ready for nesting! We made our first trips out to the nestbox trails, which are in various places across Loudoun – Claude Moore Park, Temple Hall Farm, Algonkian Park, Rust Nature Sanctuary, and others, as well as private trails maintained by homeowners.

During the first few weekends, we started seeing some early signs, like a pair of Bluebirds courting or sticking their heads in and out of the boxes, and heard the males singing. Then, we started seeing the nesting activity, with beautiful soft grass nests carefully formed for insulation and comfort.

By April 18th, we had nests and eggs along many of the trails. I monitored at both Banshee Reeks and the Dulles Wetlands trails on the 18th and the trails were very active with not only Bluebirds and full clutches of eggs but also Tree Swallows claiming boxes, pairing up and starting their courtship displays.

The Bluebirds will continue to pair up and get their nesting going and then they’ll have as many as three broods over the course of the season. So far, we’re off to a great start!

May is a crazy time for birding – you have birds that wintered here departing, birds that wintered elsewhere arriving, birds calling out for mates and establishing territories, nests being built – whew – trying to enjoy all this, I’m not sure when we have time to go to work

It’s because of all this great activity though that we also celebrate International Migratory Bird Day (IMBD) and hold our most important fundraiser of the year, the Loudoun Wildlife Birdathon – and we’d love for you to be a part of these.

These activities, our IMBD bird walks and the Birdathon are great for all ages and experience levels. 

On May 8, the official day for IMBD, we have 10 different bird walks lined up – in Leesburg, Ashburn, Sterling, Neersville, Waterford and more. Each is led by an experienced birder and the whole goal is just to get outside and enjoy nature, spotting and observing the variety of birds that are around us on our different walks.

The birdathon is the fundraiser that we do during the same time during IMBD. For this, you form a team of 2-6 people and ask people to sponsor you for your count to raise money. You can raise as little as a dollar and it will still help Loudoun wildlife so no pressure – ever bit helps, just have fun and participate, that’s the key. It’s also a great way to tell people about Loudoun Wildlife Conservancy and that’s really important too.

For the birdathon, you can come on one of the IMBD walks and get a little help identifying birds or go out on your own for a few hours during any 24 hour period between May 1-15.  You can even do your birdathon in your backyard or neighborhood.  

This is a great activity for families as well as groups to not only try their hand at birding while raising  a little money for Loudoun wildlife and learning about local birds and habitats. As part of the birdathon, we also have prizes, both thank you prizes for participating as well as a junior birder prize and other awards. It doesn’t matter how much money you raise – every bit helps, and we give recognition to everyone who participates. We truly appreciate your support.

To sign up for any of the IMBD birdwalks or to jump into the Birdathon and help with this fundraiser, please visit our IMBD webpages. It’s all for the birds and other wildlife here in Loudoun!

Loudoun Wildlife Conservancy offers many opportunities for citizens to participate in nature programs that promote the collection of important environmental data across the county.

Stream Monitoring

Interested in what you might find in a stream near you?  Loudoun Wildlife Conservancy works alongside the Loudoun Watershed Watch in monitoring our local streams for all types of bacterial and invertebrate life. Sign up on our Stream Monitoring page to join a stream team in the search and identification of species integral to monitoring the quality of Loudoun’s streams. Requires a commitment of 3-4 hours at each of three monitoring sessions between the months of April and November.

Bluebird Nestbox Monitoring

Bluebirds, some of our most beloved songbirds for their beautiful colors and cheerful songs, need our help to thrive.  Join LWC’s Nestbox Monitoring program and observe the nesting behavior of this magnificent species, while at the same time providing valuable census information on the local population of bluebirds. We have trails across the county – from Leesburg to Ashburn and Sterling to Neersville, Purcellville and Waterford. Requires about 2 hours per month from April through August on a public trail or you can register your home nestboxes with us and report your data. Visit our Bluebird Nestbox Monitoring page to become a part of this rewarding experience.

Amphibian Monitoring

Amphibians are wonderful natural indicators of the health of wetlands and forests. In order to gauge just how well these fascinating creatures thrive in Loudoun County, Loudoun Wildlife Conservancy launched the Loudoun Amphibian Monitoring Program (LAMP). Help monitor the health of our amphibious population through frog and toad call surveys, amphibian site surveys, and migration mapping. Time commitment can be as little as a few hours in each of the four monitoring windows from February through July or more if you really get into it. To volunteer for any of these subsets of LAMP, or for more information, visit our Amphibian Monitoring page.

Bird Atlas

Participate in Loudoun County’s unique bird atlas program, in which volunteers track and record the species and numbers of birds found in Loudoun. The county is divided into 75 blocks, and each of these 10 square-mile blocks is assigned to a different individual or group to ensure countywide coverage. The atlas has been an ongoing project since 2009, and is set for publication in 2014. Volunteer while you can – more eyes on the ground mean better data for the atlas!  You can sign up as a helper for a block or a block owner, or just sign up to report incidental sightings. All birds count so this is a great activity for people of all experience levels. Time commitment can be as much as you like.  For more information, please visit our Bird Atlas page.

Here’s a nice event being organized by the Virginia Society of  Ornithology (VSO) coming up in June. While it’s not in Loudoun, it will provide some really fun birding and other nature experiences.

VSO Foray 2010
Culpeper and Fauquier Counties
Focusing on the Loggerhead Shrike

The 2010 VSO Foray will be held June 12-20 in Culpeper and Fauquier Counties.  These counties contain a large portion of the newly established Culpeper Important Bird Area (IBA) (http://www.audubon.org/bird/iba/virginia/Documents/Culpeper%20Basin.pdf), which focuses on habitat for grassland and scrubland birds.  Forest birds have traditionally received most of conservationists’ attention, but there is an increasing awareness that grassland and scrubland birds have been neglected.

Among these understudied birds, we will pay special attention to the loggerhead shrike, “one of the few North American passerines whose populations have declined continentwide in recent decades” (according to “Birds of America Online”). Virginia lies at the northern edge of the range for non-migratory loggerheads.  These year-round residents tend to occupy permanent territories, so we are hoping to find overlooked shrike populations during the foray.  Other “species at risk” in the Culpeper IBA include Upland Sandpiper, Henslow’s and other sparrows, and Northern Bobwhite quail.

The counties will be divided up among foray participants, who will canvas their areas as thoroughly as possible. We will carry out eBird-style “traveling counts” of up to five miles per count, counting all birds seen and collecting additional information on habitat and exact location if/when a shrike is seen.

The foray headquarters will be the Best Western in Culpeper (540 825-1253), where we will convene for dinner on the two Saturday nights.  There are several other motels in the immediate vicinity (within easy walking distance), including Rodeway Inn (540 825-8088), Microtel (800 771-7171), Comfort Inn (540 825-4900 or 877 424-64230 and the Holiday Inn (540 825-7444 or 877 863-4780).  Those foraying Fauquier County may prefer to stay in Warrenton.

Anyone wishing to participate in the foray should contact Susan Brown, either by email (susanbb@umich.edu) or telephone (757 665-4364).

I’ll be posting this to our programs and field trips page shortly but wanted to get the information out to you quickly since this is a new event. Bird Atlasing is a great activity – people who have jumped into it have reported a new awareness for birds and their behaviors and have really enjoyed being part of this county-wide citizen science project.

Bird Atlas Training Session — Wednesday, April 7, 7:00 p.m. – 8:30 pm.We encourage anyone interested in volunteering with the Loudoun County Bird Atlas to attend a training session. The training will provide an opportunity to meet other atlasers and become familiar with atlasing and entering your data. A printed copy of the atlas handbook, block map, field card, and other information will be provided. The location for this training session is the Purcellville Library. Questions or to register: Sign Up On-line or contact the Atlas Coordinator, Spring Ligi, at sligi@loudounwildlife.org

You can also learn more about our Bird Atlas project by listening to our nature podcast episode #9or visit the Loudoun Wildlife Conservancy website.

Loudoun Wildlife Conservancy has been partnering with the Virginia Bluebird Society for many years now as we develop and manage bluebird trails across Loudoun county, monitor nest boxes, and report our data to VBS so it can be analyzed regionally and further reported onward at the national level to the North American Bluebird Society.

It’s a great activity that not only has helped bring back the Eastern Bluebird but has also served as a great way to learn about our local cavity nesters.

Bluebirds (as well as Chickadees, Tufted Titmice, Tree Swallows and others) will start nesting in the next couple of weeks so if you’re interested in learning more about this, this is a great time to jump in and see what happens through the spring and summer seasons.

To learn more, the Virginia Bluebird Society develops a great newsletter pertaining to nest box monitoring and the different bird species we encounter when we monitor boxes and the latest issue has just come out. This issue has a nice spring checklist for getting nestboxes ready for the season as well as information on predator guards and other bluebird news. Check out their website to view their newsletter – both current and past issues.

And, if you’re interested in doing some bluebird nestbox monitoring here in Loudoun – either by setting up a couple of nest boxes at home or joining one of our teams that monitors at public parks and other locations, check out our Bluebird nestbox monitoring page.  There’s also all sorts on information and some fun and games provided on the page that you can download.