Summer Birds Along Mill Creek

     There are a few easily accessible places along a three mile stretch of the upper, narrow part of Mill Creek about a mile south of my home in New Holland, Pennsylvania that I occasionally visit over the years to experience nature.  And in May of 2016, there seemed to be an unusual abundance of bird species along that part of Mill Creek, so I made an informal study of those spots in three trips of about an hour and a half each.  Meadows, some with tall grass and lots of blooming buttercups, a 20 acre patch of deciduous woods, hedgerows and Mill Creek itself, all surrounded by cropland, make lush, green oases of nature in that farmland.  Though serving people, those habitats are also wildlife sanctuaries, drawing a variety of birds and other creatures to them.
     I spot a small variety of water birds along the upper, thin section of Mill Creek each summer, including this one.  A belted kingfisher and a great blue heron catch minnows here in summer, but I've never known them to nest here.  However, a family of green-backed herons do hatch in a tree near this stream and their parents are busy catching fish to feed them.
     Every summer I see a brood of wood ducks along Mill Creek in the small, wooded area.  And I've already spotted a couple of mallard duck families and a brood of Canada geese along the creek.
     I've already noted a pair of spotted sandpipers along a muddy shore of Mill Creek and a pair of killdeer plovers in a short-grass cow pasture.  Both these kinds of inland-nesting shorebirds will hatch young somewhere in the pasture near the creek and ingest a variety of invertebrates.  Both species rear offspring in a variety of open habitats across most of North America.
     The high-grass meadows with a few tall trees scattered here and there, harbor a variety of summer birds that I have already seen for this year.  Barn swallows, tree swallows and purple martins zip over pastures and fields after flying insects.  Barn swallows nest in barns, while martins raise young in apartment bird houses in certain barn yards and tree swallows hatch offspring in tree cavities and single bird boxes in farmland.
     And already this year, I've seen a pair or two each of summering red-winged blackbirds, eastern kingbirds, eastern bluebirds and Baltimore orioles that will nest in different niches in the meadows.  Male red-wings are real dandies with jet-black feathering and scarlet shoulder patches that are quite visible when the males raise their wings while singing to proclaim territory and attract mates.  Female red-wings anchor their nurseries to tall reed canary-grasses in pastures, and the other kinds of birds raise young in the few and scattered trees, the kingbirds on limbs, but the bluebirds in cavities. 
     I often hear male orioles singing in the treetops before I see them.  Female orioles make beautiful and deep pouches of fibers and grasses they attach to twigs on the very ends of limbs, often over waterways or roads.  No other species of bird in this area shares that specific nesting niche with the orioles.  Those pouches are spotted mostly in winter when the foliage is down.     
     A few pairs each of permanent resident northern cardinals, song sparrows, northern mockingbirds, house finches and American goldfinches, and summering gray catbirds, chipping sparrows and willow flycatchers nest in thickets of shrubbery, vines and young trees along the creek every summer.  I can hear some of these birds singing while they are in the thickets, but they are not visible until they emerge from those tangles of vegetation.  Obviously, jungles of plants are wonderful for these birds and others to raise young in.    
     Summering wood thrushes and resident red-bellied woodpeckers, downy woodpeckers and Carolina chickadees are some of the bird species that rear youngsters in the hedgerows and small woods along Mill Creek every year.  All these birds eat invertebrates and all of them, but the thrushes, nest in tree hollows; the woodpeckers chisel out their own. 
     Wood thrushes sing lovely, flute-like songs that sound like "a-o-lee" or "e-o-lay".  And like their cousins, the American robin, some wood thrushes nest in mature suburbs with their many tall trees, young trees and shrubbery.
     Every year, several kinds of birds hatch babies in various habitats along Mill Creek.  And I enjoy seeing as many of those beautiful and interesting species as I can during spring and summer.