Bird and Plant Walk at Herrontown Woods this Sunday

Join us for a bird and plant walk at Herrontown Woods this weekend, Sunday morning at 9, beginning at the main parking lot off Snowden. We'll have multiple walk leaders with expertise ranging from botany to birds to amphibians. Princeton natives John L Clark and Fairfax Hutter will be joined by naturalist and Hopewell teacher Mark Manning and myself. If lots of people show up, we can always split into multiple groups and head different directions. 

Fairfax offered up some thoughts on what birds we may see and hear:

My guess is that the birds we could find would be White-throated Sparrows, Song Sparrows, White-breasted Nuthatches, Juncos, N. Cardinals, Blue Jays, Titmice and Chickadees, Vultures, and probably easiest to spot would be (in this order): Red-bellied Woodpecker, Downy Woodpecker, Hairy Woodpecker, Pileated Woodpecker (yay!), and maybe a Yellow-bellied Sapsucker (I hear them first).

I’m hoping we might see and/or hear a Brown Creeper, they’re really neat birds. This is the time of year for them and I’ve seen them in HW while looking for amphibians. We could also get some Yellow-rumped Warblers, esp. if there are any poison ivy berries left.

I like the positive reference to poison ivy berries there. It's not a favorite plant where it grows on the ground, but as it ascends a tree it gains some positive traits, producing important berries for the birds and turning bright colors in the fall. 

Thanks to the Princeton Public Library for helping get the word out about this event, which is in addition to our usual Sunday morning workdays that start around 10:30.