Warren County Spotlight Summary
October 11-14, 2024
For our 3rd and last installment of spotlights this year in the state, PSO ventured back towards the NW corner to visit Warren County and visit some Alleghany Forest. Will we see or hear any Squatch evidence? Or even hunters of such? We shall find out.
I again twisted Scott Stolsons arm to help us with another county near him and he did another outstanding job luring locals to help and lead us around or share knowledge of where to go, eat, etc.
The night before the spotlight, Chuck Berthoud and I traveled outside the county to where John Fedaks owl banding was occurring. We did see some of the wild sky colors of the Aurora, but didn’t get to see it as good as others who were in more open spots. We found Johns spot, could hear the toots of the Northern Saw Whet Owls, walked back the trail and found John and his friend sitting at a toasty fire awaiting the first net checks. We were there maybe an hour and got to enjoy 2 different First Year Hatch females and saw the process that was done for banding. Certainly, a new county bird for McKean for both of us. John and his helpers have been doing this for 12 years and it is a thankless job, imo. Not sure what cuter bird you could find in the dark.
Day 1 – Oct 11th, we met at the Tidioute Riverside Rec-Trek Trail in Tidioute, PA, we met leaders Ken & Elizabeth Nicholson. X number of us walked the wonderful level trail along the Alleg River. The cold morning and fog didn’t bring out as many birds as we hoped, but we got a nice list. We moved from there to the boat launch in town and got more species as the skies started opening up. After some of us had a nice lunch at Buccardo’s, we traveled towards Economite Rd to join Carole Winslow near her camp. It was our first open fields to check out and we enjoyed the areas around there, she had some great birds all of the mornings but it was a bit quieter until we got there. We did enjoy getting into some small flocks and see/hear Brown Creeper, Kinglets and Chickadees.
From there, some of us headed to Jakes rocks since the winds and skies looked like it could offer some raptor migration. We were able to add our first gulls and see some soaring raptors. Friday night, several of our attendees went to visit Fedaks owl banding and had success again. Joe Gyekis, Jessie Sauder and myself decided to try for some Warren County owling and Scott S suggested Chapman State Park. It was very dark & quiet but some moon.
We tried our luck with Eastern Screech Owl calls by mouth and got one to respond on the way in, along the lake. After the big parking lot, we went down the road and tried Northern Saw Whet Owl and within seconds, we had one tooting back to us and it went off and on for over 15-20 minutes. We were quite ecstatic on that adventure and to add both to our weekend’s effort. The first day ended with 52 species.
Day 2 – Oct 12th, we met at Akeley Swamp – SGL282 and the attendance was a bit overwhelming. Alejandra McNeil and Jim Berry led this crew and birds were very active and being counted as soon as people were getting out of the cars. We only walked partway in when we realized it was duck season, talked to a few hunters and thought we should get out of there for the sake of our birders as well as not disturbing the hunters. Highlights were – Green Winged Teal, Purple Finch, Eastern Meadowlark, American Coot, Rusty Blackbird and Sandhill crane. We made a quick decision to head over to Hatch Run and had a nice walk up into the hills and also enjoyed a large grassy field and pond. Highlights were – Winter Wren, Blue Headed Vireo.
Our afternoon trip was to Chapman State Park, this would be the first time some of us had seen it in daylight, we took the road down the main parking lot, tried to see if the owls were around or vocal in the daylight, explore much of the trails and a big highlight was hearing a Ruffed Grouse drumming. Some of our crew went to visit John F’s banding again but most returned to join us for more night time owling at Chapman. Before we left the parking lot, we had hoped the group tent camping area would give us an American Woodcock and we were able to see and hear at least a couple. We were then able to get a Saw Whet to respond again, then some Screech Owls, then even a Barred Owl. It was quite a trill for all of us. While you will always hear strange noises, at night while out and about, we weren’t able to confirm any Squatch evidence…..this time. The 2nd day ended with 77 of species for the spotlight.
Day 3 – Oct 13th, had the forecast calling for rain which it delivered. 9 number of us were brave enough to meet at Newbold Estate, managed by Allegheny National Forest and Anders Run Tract Natural area which is part of Cornplanter State Forest. It was a beautiful wooded area of old growth white pine, hemlock and oak forest, which gave us a nice trail to walk along the river as well as an old rails to trails area that offered a really cool swamp. We had to work hard for the birds we got, so we cut the day short.
Some decided to go home, some of us decided to head over to Chapman State Park again to get under the pavilion to see if anything was good on the lake. The Pied Billed Grebe was still lingering on the water, and some lucky ones found Rusty Blackbird and Orange Crowned Warbler. Jeff Kenney and Angela Romanczuk were able to stay over and do more birding and they hit some new areas and working on target species that was missing. They were able to get Virginia Rail, Sora, Wilsons Snipe and Great Horned Owl at SGL 197. They also found 2 Sandhill Cranes near SGL 306 and Common Loon hear Kinzua. The owl banding got rained out.
Day 4 – Oct 14th had its daytime banding cancelled due to weather which brought some white substance from the sky to the ground. We weren’t able to add any additional highlights for the weekend.
So, our final numbers came out to be 83 species, which is very good due on how that 2-week rain deluge hit the state and opened up the skies for migrants who were busting to leave our state. We had 100 checklists, x species with photos and x with audio. Julia Plummer did her own thing again solo so she could get better quiet audio.
To enjoy our official eBird trip report, here is that link: https://ebird.org/tripreport/253364
Warren county is just another county not visited enough or appreciated enough in our large state that has 67 counties to visit. It offered all sorts of habitats, terrain, elevations and views. It has some great game lands and state forests and of course a national forest. I have been lucky enough to have visited there several times, from a PSO annual meeting we held in McKean 10 years ago, or driving through and even visiting Kinzua area. I was personally able to add 27 new species to my county list which is now at 113. I know many of our visited for the first time, some obtained life birds, some added new state birds, someone even saw a bear.
This ends our 2024 spotlights for the year. We enjoyed Forest in March, Fulton in April and now Warren in October. In 2025, we already have 2 lined up for the spring with Northumberland, March 28-31 and York, April 25-28. We like the March one already because it has so much of the Susquehanna River to include and even those on the western side of the river can view the river and include their checklists for the spotlight. York will be another southern tier county which will allow for some early migrants at the end of April. We are working with some local friends right now lining up some trips. As we have said before, if you can join these spotlights, feel free to run to spots on your end, visit hotspots, join up with some friends or official trips, just share your checklists with PSO Birding Data and we will get everyone’s effort.
