Over the weekend I hiked in both Greene and Allegheny Counties where I concluded there are more leaves on the trees near Pittsburgh than in the rural areas south of us.
I suspect that’s because Allegheny County is more densely populated, has more pavement and heated buildings, and thus is slightly warmer.
Sugar maple leaves in Greene County were still in the bud on Saturday but I found these newly unfurled leaves at Barking Slopes on Sunday. They’re four weeks ahead of schedule.
I love how red and wrinkled they look.
It won’t be long before they’re green.
(photo by Kate St. John)
Hi, Kate! First I love your blog.
Second, I’m from Texas but my husband and I are here in PA on a temporary job assignment. We are living in Uniontown and I’ve been trying to find some good birding spots. I’ve been very fortunate to have some beautiful birds come to my feeder but I’d like to get off the beaten path and find maybe some other birds I haven’t seen. I saw my first Eastern Towhee at my feeder Friday, so that was exciting. I was hoping you’d have some suggestions of some places I could go in Fayette County.
Thanks!
Kathy
Kathy, Here are some of the places I go hiking/birding in Fayette County. Since I like to hike and look at plants some of these places are OK for birds but not great hotspots.
Bear Run Nature Reserve (http://www.paconserve.org/92)
Fort Necessity Battlefield (I’ve never gone birding here but it has a natural meadow)
Indian Creek Trail (http://www.3rbc.org/directions/indiancreektrail.asp)
Indian Head Bike Trail (http://www.3rbc.org/directions/indianheadtrail.asp)
Laurel Highlands Hiking Trail = Laurel Ridge State Park (*)
Laurel Summit State Park (*)
Ohiopyle State Park (*)
Quebec Run Wild Area (http://bit.ly/ILrHAC)
State Gamelands 51 (http://bit.ly/HvYO0u)
Youghiogeny Bike Trail (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Youghiogheny_River_Trail)
(*) The DCNR State Parks website is currently very odd looking but the info is still here: http://www.dcnr.state.pa.us/stateparks/findapark/where/west/index.htm
Another way to find birding locations is to login to eBird (http://ebird.org/) and pretend you’re going to “Submit Observations.” The first step for submitting observations is to specify County+State. If you put in Fayette+PA you’ll see the hotspots on the map.
Thank you so much! I was reading your blog this morning and put on my calender some of the birding festivals. I love how helpful you are. We went to Cedar Creek Park yesterday and though I didn’t see any birds up close I did see a beautiful black snake in a tree. Check him out on my Facebook page. He is huge! I got some pictures of blue bells and trilliums, it is a beautiful park!
https://fbcdn-sphotos-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-snc7/574743_10150607908271116_675886115_9380176_1556476015_n.jpg
https://fbcdn-sphotos-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-ash4/s720x720/292672_10150607926831116_675886115_9380218_1448630619_n.jpg
Impressive snake! I’ve always called them black rat snakes but they have several names: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pantherophis_obsoletus