The Reluctant Twitcher by Richard Pope

which several passing birders insist is just an Eastern Wood-Pewee.
    Margaret Atwood. Seen on the north road on Pelee Island carrying laundry to a car. More easily found by searching areas where the garlic mustard has been savagely uprooted — the fresher the uprooting the better. Seventh year in a row. It’s a tick.
    Fred Bodsworth. This year’s Island celebrity birder, and only eighty-eight at this time, seen in a restaurant bar finishing his second beer at 9:00 p.m., surrounded by his exhausted daughters and son-in-law whom Fred has had on the go since about 6:00 a.m. and who can’t wait to get to bed. Fred comes over to Felicity and me and asks, “Say, do you guys know any good spots for evening woodcock display?” I do — on the far end of the island. Fred says they will definitely give it a try. I ask him not to reveal to his family who told him about the spot.
    M OST C RUSHING D ISAPPOINTMENTS
    When you go to the Pelee area in May with 182 species under your belt, it is harder to get new birds than it is when your list is more modest and, of course, it gets harder each day to add new species. But you still have to run around like mad trying because you have to get as many of the birds you have counted on seeing as possible while they are all crowded into this one small area and to save having to chase these birds all over the province later. Among my more disappointing misses are: Least Bittern (especially since I think I actually saw one); Sora (I do not even hear one at Hillman’s); Eastern Screech-Owl; Olive-sided Flycatcher; Acadian Flycatcher; Yellow-throated Vireo; Gray-cheeked Thrush (usually hard to miss); Louisiana Waterthrush; Golden-winged Warbler (I nearly always am lucky with this bird, as Joan Winearls and Barbara Kalthoff can attest, even though it has an obscenely quiet song — quite unforgivable really); Orange-crowned Warbler; Le Conte’s Sparrow; Whip-poor-will; Kentucky Warbler; and Yellow-breasted Chat (even at the old cemetery I do not so much as hear one, though both Hugh and Margaret do). Missing Kirtland’s Warbler is only a disappointment because on Pelee Island practically everyone I run into has just seen one or more, sometimes many. Somehow Rob Tymstra and I miss all of them, no matter how quickly we check them out. Hmmm.
    I at least give the Le Conte’s Sparrow a good run for its money. It is reportedly in a grassy field with low shrubs just north of the Park. Hugh and I try for it several times and then enlist the help of some young hotshots, Gavin Platt and Andrew Keaveney, and we go after the bird in earnest. We all get glimpses of an extremely elusive small sparrow, but none of us can identify it for sure. Finally, we see it dart into an isolated clump of shrubs. I say in jest that a real birder would go around the field, come up on the shrubs from behind, get down on the ground and do the wiggly-worm through the shrubs, thereby flushing the sparrow out so we could all get a good look. Andrew immediately begins a long, slow lope around the field, comes up to the shrubs, drops onto his stomach, and begins to work his way through like a snake. His girlfriend, who up to this point has perhaps not fully comprehended what she is getting herself into, looks on in consternation. Nothing, of course, flies out. Oh, the bird is there. So, doubtless, are others, but they are all too terrified by this hideous anaconda to fly. But like I said, I gave it my best shot, even if it was Andrew.
    P ELEE A REA H ARVEST BY D AY
    May 7 (193). Eleven new birds, including Cerulean Warbler at Rondeau and Black-bellied Plover, Short-billed Dowitcher, and American Pipit at Hillman’s Marsh.
    May 8 (211). Eighteen new birds, including American Golden-Plover at Hillman’s and Red-headed Woodpecker, White-eyed Vireo, Worm-eating Warbler, Northern Waterthrush, Hooded Warbler, Wilson’s Warbler, Summer Tanager, Grasshopper Sparrow, Henslow’s Sparrow, and