May 19 2019. Red River Gorge, Kentucky. This is Day Six of our road trip to Ohio and Kentucky. Ohio is behind us and we have three target birds yet to find: Swainson’s and Worm-eating Warblers and Louisiana Waterthrush. I’m enjoying the many and somewhat different plants too, I am familiar with some, maybe most, of the trees we see but wish I could summon up a botanist companion to help with the puzzling ones.
The Red River Gorge lies within Daniel Boone National Forest, it has plenty of tourist facilities, rock-climbers especially find lots to tackle and there’s tons of green space. It puzzled us for a while to see cars parked overnight at the side of wilderness roads with no sign of owner or trailhead, no apparent reason for leaving a car. But so-called Dispersed Camping is allowed in some areas, that is to say that if you can find a spot you can pitch your tent and enjoy the wilderness solitude. I suppose we could have saved a couple of night’s hotel cost.
With some on-line help we were able to identify a marked trail where Swainson’s Warblers had been seen. We started early, at the trail-head by about 7.15 and followed the steep trail down. I had committed to memory the Swainson’s song and it wasn’t long before I heard one, it was close, perhaps 20 Metres away but in hopelessly dense understory. We never did manage to see it and moved on.
We followed the trail down to the clear river and managed a couple of happy sightings, a Worm-eating Warbler and a Louisiana Waterthrush; that took care of two out of three of our target birds. Without needlessly drawing it out, what followed was a very straightforward sequence of events. Quite simply we were directed to another spot and with no trouble at all found a Swainson’s Warbler. For a reputedly secretive bird it was surprisingly front and centre and obligingly let me take a few reasonable photos. It’s quite possible that it was concerned about our proximity to its nest so, more than satisfied, we left it in peace.
Oddly, finding that Swainson’s pretty well wrapped up our trip. The day was becoming warm, campers and hikers were up and about and it was time to head back to the hotel where the birding was unusually good for hotel grounds. Perhaps the hotel’s general state of neglect and consequent low occupancy meant a family of Northern Mockingbirds, an Orchard Oriole or two and a singing Eastern Meadowlark had nothing to fear.
