Western Wood-Pewee

Late yesterday afternoon Buster our dog was in need of a walk, so we grabbed our birding stuff and drove to our closest park, Brush College City Park which is probably only a mile away as the crow flies. This is a very small park, squeezed in between a busy street, a school and houses. Yet with a stream and an abundance of trees it offers a quiet convenient oasis to walk and bird. The tall canopy of trees were alive with warblers, and other small birds.  Our forty minute amble resulted in a list larger than normal for this birding spot. The most significant sighting was this Western Wood-Pewee, a member of the Flycatcher Family.  I was not even thinking of flycatchers when I zeroed in on this distant bird, so I had to sort of change gears to come up with what I was looking at.  It's too early actually to be expecting flycatchers.  When I looked in eBird when I got home the earliest they have been seen in Polk County is the 8th of May.  So here we have one more example of the birds and bees and flowers appearing earlier than normal this year.