everyone is a birder
After the excitement of spring migration, nest watching, and fledgling spotting, watching birds in the summer can seem a little less exciting.
But we want to assure you. With a fresh perspective, summer birding is far from boring!
North Carolina is home to hundreds of species of birds over the summer, many of them rare, interesting, or common, but full of interesting quirks that perhaps you haven’t noticed.
Whether you’re an avid or a novice, we want to shed some light on a few noteworthy birds to make it a great few months of birding for you. From backyards to backroads, we’re going to help you make your summer wonderful with the NC Birding Trail Summer Bird Series: a highlight of several beautiful North Carolina avian residents.
Part 1 of the Summer Birding series is for the rare and uncommon. We’re giving you four hard-to-find birds, and we’ll provide insight on how to find them, from their songs to their habitats to birding trail sites they’ve been spotted at.
If you are looking for the most up-to-date information about bird sightings, we encourage perusing the eBird website, where bird watchers (including you!) can post sightings (you will have to create a free account, but it’s certainly worth it).
We’re counting down from four, beginning with our most common of the least common:
Our first bird may be the easiest to spot on the list, but it’s still an unusual find. Currently, there are just under 3,000 logged eBird sightings of the Painted Bunting in our state.
Painted Bunting have been spotted across North Carolina, but you’ll likely have to visit the southeastern coast if you want any chance of seeing one. They like dense, shrubby maritime habitat you’ll see in and outside of your favorite beach town, but you’ll have to be patient as you wait for them to emerge.
The good thing is, you likely won’t misidentify this bird since it’s a unique sight to be seen! Males are vibrant, exhibiting a collection of colors unparalleled by other similar North Carolina songbirds.
The one thing that might trip you up is the female Painted Bunting is less distinguishable. She will have yellow and pale green feathers, resembling a much more common female Indigo Bunting (Indigo Buntings will be browner and have bars on their wings, whereas Painted Buntings will be more yellow and not have bars) or other more common birds. If you hear the chaotic, whistle-ly song of the Painted Bunting, it will certainly help increase your confidence. Female Painted Buntings don’t sing, but perhaps you’ll hear a nearby male.
Try to engrave this song in your memory. That way, even if you can’t get a good enough look, you can be certain that you’re in the presence of this rare bird!
Our next bird clocks in at just over 2,600 eBird sightings in North Carolina, making it third on our list! These birds are unique and resourceful; they are cooperative breeders, meaning several family members assist in raising young. They are also the only woodpecker that creates cavities in live trees, enabling a creative way to keep away predators – pecking holes that cause the trees to leak pitch which keeps the snakes away.
Habitat is the name of the game when looking for the Red-cockaded Woodpecker. You’ll be more likely to spot these guys in the southern Piedmont and Coastal Plains where their preferred habitat of Longleaf Pine forest is more abundant. Consider visiting a national wildlife refuge or national forest, where preservation of the specific habitat these woodpeckers need to live is a priority. Look for open woodlands and large old pines with very little understory growth. The less dense the growth on the trees, the better!
Unfortunately, Red-cockaded Woodpeckers are rare due to population declines. They were once thriving in the southeastern states, but they’ve seen an 86% population loss between the years 1966 and 2014 (see All About Birds), bringing their global breeding population down to just 15,000 individuals (estimated by Partners in Flight). This decline is largely due to habitat loss, as the old pine forests they live in are often lost due to logging. Red-Cockaded Woodpecker families often live in the same area for generations due to the extensive work that comes with carving out new excavation cavities, so when habitat is lost, family units can rarely relocate.
Reversal of population declines in a variety of bird species like the Red-cockaded Woodpecker due to habitat loss is a long process, and one way we can contribute is by being informed. To learn more about human impact on bird population decline, visit 3BillionBirds.
You’ll have to head to the beach to see the second rarest bird on our list! Currently, the Piping Plover has just under 3,000 logged eBird sightings in North Carolina. Although there are more eBird sightings in North Carolina for Piping Plovers than for Red-cockaded Woodpeckers, we declared these guys rarer due to their stealth and their lower global population count.
Piping Plovers are difficult to find due to their low numbers but also because of their mastery of camouflage. Their sandy colored feathers make them difficult to spot in soft beach areas where they like to hide out.
Like the Red-cockaded Woodpecker, Piping Plovers are an at-risk species. They are listed as federally endangered, and they only have around 8,400 breeding individuals left globally (see Partners in Flight and All About Birds). Their population decline is due to a variety of factors, including beach habitat loss, water level changes, and human disruption.
Thankfully, there are small actions we can each take to help Piping Plovers, including giving them space if we see them—or fenced-in areas that contain them—keeping our dogs on leashes, and not leaving any trash behind on the beach. You can learn more about Piping Plovers and how you can protect them through this US Fish and Wildlife Piping Plover fact sheet.
These guys’ conservation status is important to note before we get into how to know if you’ve found one because we want to stress the importance of respecting their space. Since they’re endangered, it’s imperative we each be extra cautious to not bother or disturb them if we’re anywhere near them.
Misidentifications are most likely to occur by simply mistaking another type of plover to be a Piping Plover. Wilson’s Plovers (another great rare find!) will have dark legs, rather than yellow legs, and a longer bill. Snowy Plovers (highly unlikely to spot in North Carolina) have darker legs as well and a more narrow bill. Semipalmated Plovers (more common for NC) are darker than Piping Plovers and have a complete neck band around their neck, unlike the incomplete band of Piping Plovers.
Using sound to confirm your identification is a bit challenging since many of the plovers listed above have similar calls. You might need to study the nuances of each of their calls to learn the distinctions of the Piping Plover, and to give you a head start, check out the soft peeps that males and females both use to call to each other and their young:
To spot the rarest bird on our list, you’ll likely have to head to the mountains (and find yourself with LOTS of luck!) As of May, 2020, there are only 363 recorded observations of the Northern Saw-whet Owl on eBird. It’s not simply low population numbers in our state (they are more prevalent in the northwest) that contribute to such few sightings; it’s also that they’re extremely shy, great at hiding, and incredibly still.
But they are a sight to see! Small. Bright yellow eyes (as the photo above illustrates perfectly).
Since they are so difficult to spot, you will need to rely on clues to know if they’re nearby. You might be able to hear one. They have a distinct call, little repeated toos.
Another thing you can look for is odd behavior in any nearby birds. Songbirds will wrec havoc if they find a roosting Saw-whet owl during the day, calling frantically until they can convince it to leave!
Luckily, there aren’t many chances for misidentifying this bird as long as you can determine the differences between the Northern Saw-whet and the Eastern Screech Owl, a much more common bird in North Carolina. The Northern Saw-whet is a little smaller than the Screech Owl, but the biggest difference is that Screech Owls have ear tufts and Northern Saw-whets do not. So if you spot ear tufts or hear a trilled call rather than the Saw-whet’s toos, you’re likely observing an Eastern Screen owl instead.
So you’ve got the four birds, now what’s the challenge? This summer, we challenge you to spot one of these. If you see the Painted Bunting or the Red-cockaded Woodpecker right away, then congratulations! But then perhaps see if you can find one of the others, maybe even the Northern Saw-whet Owl.
And you must ovbserve our only two rules:
This summer, we’d love to see what your birding adventures entail. Whether from a stroke of luck or the perfect habitat, you spot one of these uncommon birds in your backyard, or you head to a specific sites to see one of these, we hope you’re graced with the surprise presence of a bird you don’t get to see much, maybe even if it’s not a bird on this list. Hopefully it will remind you of the sheer diversity of species in our state as you think of the hundreds of species and thousands of individuals we encounter in our daily lives.
With that, we hope you’ll catch our next post in the series: 4 Fascinating Birds to Spot this Summer. Coming soon!