North Carolina county #78 San-Lee Park
This week I set out for another round of county birding, hoping to finish all the counties surrounding the Raleigh area. I figured three days (two nights away) would be more than enough to finish the seven counties that still remained like a hole in the middle of my progress map.
The first stop was San-Lee Park in Lee County. This is a county run park with hiking and mountain biking trails, a lake for fishing and boating (including rentals), campsite and picnic areas, and a Nature Center that is just opening as I write this. It is quite a nice park with well-marked trails and I enjoyed my visit very much.
As you can see, it was a gloomy day – dark and very humid with a slight misty drizzle at times. The birds were not very active except in a couple of pockets during my hike, but it was not too hot and I enjoyed my walk.
I walked across the lake to the other side and followed a trail that looped around it. It was difficult to get good looks, but I spotted an American Redstart in the trees. One nice thing about birding is that a bird that is sometimes common can be a fun surprise at a different time of the year, and that was the case with my first of the season Ruby Kinglet. I haven’t seen one in six months and it was great to see that they are coming back.
I walked the trails for a little less than two hours. I would have stayed longer if I didn’t have more counties to cover, and I am starting to look forward to next year when I will come back to some of these locations in a more leisurely and thorough fashion.
Towards the end, I went to take a photo of a bird and my camera would not respond. I figured the battery ran out without me realizing it was getting low, so I headed back to the car to get my spare battery. Unfortunately, it turned out that my camera was broken.
ebird checklist