In Search of Migrants in Chesapeake, Virginia

Birding is fun if you’re good at it. The really great thing about birding is that even if you are terrible at it, it’s still fun. I am terrible at it. I don’t like to get up early. Somewhere I have cloth to clean my binoculars, but I’m not sure where. I have a tendency to find a bird way off in the distance and wish I hadn’t left my scope in my car. And lord help me if I’m supposed to figure out where that bird song is coming from, because it’s not happening. But I love to be out on my own in nature, and I love going new places and seeing if I can find that one bird I heard was there, even if I miss it.

After our recent trip to Virginia Beach, this week I had to go back to the area to make a work trip to Chesapeake, in the southern part of the Hampton Roads region. I couldn’t resist taking some time out for birding. I had wanted to go to the Great Dismal Swamp, which is really its name, but decided I didn’t have time for the 45 minute drive from civilization. Instead I went to a couple of parks in Chesapeake’s Great Bridge neighborhood in search of spring migrants.

Birding on the Battlefield

Great Bridge Historical Park in on the site of the first Revolutionary War battlefield in the South. Colonial rebels captured a bridge over Elizabeth River while trying to get Norfolk where the Royal Governor was holed. Today there’s a high-tech drawbridge and some wonderful trails. The coastal pine forests of the Hampton Roads area are great for birding. The whole region is heaven for many species of Warblers during spring and fall migration. After the battlefield, I drove five minutes up the river to a waterside park swarming with Purple Martins.

Where Are The Warblers?

Warblers are the stars of spring migration birding in the US, and I keep seeing eBird lists where people are getting 15 different species. Though the Historical Park seemed like prime territory, I found only one species, the Yellow-Rumped Warbler. There were many calls I didn’t recognize, however, which implies that somewhere up in the treetops a better birder would have found lots more. I also missed the Brown-Headed Nuthatch, a specialty of the coastal pine forest, and the sandpipers that were recently reported in the nearby wetland. But there was still something wonderful about the pine needle path along the Elizabeth River.

Hanging Out With My Bird Friends

Waiting for me right as I turned in to the park, on the site of an old Redcoat fort, was a friendly Brown Thrasher. This is a beautiful, less-seen relative of the Mockingbird. There were, of course, numerous Northern Mockingbirds in evidence as well. The wetlands gave some great habitat for Red-Winged Blackbirds. A couple of Ospreys flew high over the modern bridge among many dark-headed Laughing Gulls. Two Cardinals even got into a fight right in front of me, not particularly concerned that they had an audience.

Spotlight on the Purple Martin

Purple Martins once nested in holes in trees. However, for thousands of years dating back to the Native Americans, humans have built houses for them. They eat insects and are generally cool to have around. Today, Purple Martins nest almost exclusively in human-built homes. Several such homes are built along the water in an apartment complex near the Elizabeth River in Chesapeake. This makes the spot very reliable for birding purposes. It was so easy to find Purple Martins there that even I succeeded. The Martin is the largest member of the Swallow family in North America, and lives mostly near bodies of water. I felt weird because it looked like I was peering in people’s windows with my binoculars like a creeper, but hey, the birds were cool.

Where Else Should You Go?

Hampton Roads is a birder’s paradise. You can get ocean-going birds without ever leaving your car while traveling over the Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel. My kind of birding. There are also more local National Wildlife Refuges than any other region I know of. Back Bay National Wildlife Refuge in Virginia Beach preserves salt marshes crucial to many Atlantic migrants. The Great Dismal Swamp is one of the biggest wetlands left, so large that runaway slaves once simply disappeared into the forest and lived out their lives. Grandview Nature Preserve in nearby Hampton is site of the largest nesting colony of Least Terns on the Atlantic Coast.

If you are good at birding, then Chesapeake is a great destination. And if you’re terrible at it, it’s still beautiful.