Expectation
By Todd Miller
Around halfway between Route 137 and Route 7, I recognized the sound. That is to say, I’d heard this song many years ago. Rather than on the tip of my tongue, it was in the back of my mind. A warbler, for sure, but which one? Magnolia? Canada? I was in no rush. Why not just wait a few minutes, and see what unfolds? After only a few seconds, my desire to see it was overwhelming: I couldn’t just leave it to chance. It might not sing again. It might fly away. Almost instinctively, I lisped a crude imitation of the musical, whistled phrase. Whether it responded to my call or simply continued singing, I didn’t know. Hoping to attract the male — most birdsong is sung by the males to say to nearby males: “Go away, this is my territory” and to potential female mates: “Come over here, I’m an unmated male with a territory” - I whistled every few seconds, alternating with the songster.
Further away than the source of the sound, I saw a small brown, bird fly away from me, and land briefly on a tree trunk before climbing up a few feet up, when a second, similarly-sized and shaped bird landed next to it. It touched beaks with the first one, and flew off. Combined with its small size and brown color, and that it was climbing up versus down the trunk, I knew it was a brown creeper. They, I know, have a thin, almost thrush-like song unlike the warble of the unseen warbler. A minute later, I saw movement closer. As I brought my binoculars up to my eyes, I heard a different song “ pssshh, pssshh, pssshh-wee.” A black-throated blue warbler, perhaps not very uncommon in the northeast, but only a migrant west of the Appalachians and south of the north woods of the northern Great Lake states: Grayish-blue back and wings with a large white, wing patch, black face and throat, and snow-white belly. Ahhh! What a gem! To think, just a month ago, this tiny individual was living in the forests of either Central America or the Caribbean! (And I thought my road trip from Missouri was long and exhausting. Imagine the herculean equivalent of running several thousand miles!)
After a few minutes — the original song had stopped — I walked another few hundred feet and saw the largest hemlock of the day: very nearly three feet in diameter. There were others two feet in diameter nearby, but this one tree was clearly larger. It must be at least 200 years old, I thought. Standing some 20 feet away, I heard a different whistle: more piercing and pulsating “psss psss psss psss pssss.” I was fairly sure this was a black-and-white warbler; I’d heard several of these songs in the previous few days, but would like to confirm that, indeed, this was the species that was singing. I stood transfixed, waiting, watching for any movement, waiting… there! Some movement, 25 feet up and to the right, obscured by some evergreen foliage. Then a glimpse of a bird slightly smaller than a sparrow flying, landing on the trunk of the large hemlock. Another brown creeper? No, more starkly patterned. A black-and-white warbler. Yes! Confirmation! Also climbing up the trunk like the brown creeper. Perhaps it’s not a coincidence that the creeper and black-and-white are some of the first neotropical migrants to arrive. Timed with warmer spring days, but before the leaves of the deciduous trees have emerged from their buds. Prying and poking for insects in the nooks and crannies of the trunk of the trees, while smoother branches and twigs don’t harbor any protection from the elements for insects. For that matter, the black-throated blue was in shrubs that were beginning to leaf out, in a large gap. After I’d had my fill of watching what became a pair of black-and-whites, I decided to continue my journey.
Alas, I never saw the mystery singing warbler, but I did see three delightful other species and had a glimpse into the precise timing of these birds’ 2,000- mile migrations, only a week or two before other species that will glean insects off tree foliage. Black-and-white warblers only breed in large tracts of forest, hundreds of acres. Sure enough, this tract of forest between 7 and 137 was hundreds, perhaps even 1,000 acres… (Susceptible to cowbird parasitism). In part, it was my desire to see the mystery birds that led me to my experience and epiphany of the early, bird migrants. If I hadn’t wanted to see them, and waited, I probably wouldn’t have seen the black-throated blue or brown creeper, or come to understand what they have in common, or for that matter, what I have in common with them: a yearning to return.
