This is the last post about our trip up to the Biggest Week in American Birding (BWIAB) festival. So I thought I would talk about good night-birds, and a good night birding,
One group of birds that I was not expecting to see much at the festival was birds of the night. [Also emus since they don't live anywhere near Ohio.] Therefore, I was pleasantly surprised that we ended up seeing 5 species of birds that are nocturnal.
One of the tours that we signed up for was a woodcock walk at dusk, so we were hopeful of seeing a woodcock. I've been out looking for woodcocks a few times in the past and never succeeded in seeing their aerial display. I was prepared for us to either not see any birds or the display would be distant and infrequent.
Our woodcock group met up with a couple of guides shortly before sunset. One of the guides told us that the displays had been going on the last couple of nights so he had high hopes. The bird that had been displaying near our spot was showing up as the very last of rays of sunlight vanished. So we had time for the guide to regale us with his guiding stories.
