On the farm

"Clouds of insects danced and buzzed in the golden autumn light, and the air was full of the piping of the song-birds."

-Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

I'm back from Georgia with a ton of pictures and at least one life bird. The weekend was amazing. Along with 13 other students, I lived on a pecan farm and worked to help them get ready for the fall harvest.

I hardly had any time to go birding, but I was able to get a couple pictures of some little songbirds that I've yet to identify (see below). I also saw a lifer, a male Brown-headed Cowbird from the tractor when we were crossing a field to the pecan orchards. Unfortunately, I didn't get a picture of him.

Here's the mystery songbird. I'm thinking Pine Warbler, but I could very likely be mistaken. They were all over the orchards, but incredibly hard to see, because you couldn't get close to them at all.
Here's another shot. I'm pretty sure it's the same kind of bird. I'm a little bummed I didn't get better pictures.
I just thought this was a cool picture. The farm was beautiful, and exceptionally photogenic. The temperature was great while we were there, but dropped down into the 30s on the last day. We still had a blast, though.

Apparently someone there knows their birds! I thought this was a really pretty sign we came across while hiking on the Peace Trail, which meandered around through the forests that surrounded the orchards.

And, in case you're like me, and don't know what pecan orchards look like, there ya go. They're huge. The trees are over 100 years old, and there were over 100 acres of them in this place. Needless to say, I ate wwaaaaaayyy too many pecans that weekend! ;-) It was great fun though, and just makes me want to travel even more.

Well, hopefully next week I can get back to work with Project Feederwatch, and hopefully catch some migrants in the process.

Happy birding!