This is an excerpt from a story that first appeared on the Santa Clara Valley Audubon Society website.

BARRY’S STORY

For the Pen & Quills Birdathon Ginger and I hike the Smith Creek Trail at Joseph D. Grant County Park, revelling in the wildflowers and the riparian woodland and the burbling waters all the way to the fork of Sulphur and Smith Creeks. Forest birds make every turn of the trail a delight, from the Northern Rough-winged Swallows alighting on the telephone lines above the parking area to the House Wrens singing and carrying nesting materials down along the creekside near the trail’s end.

They turn mastering
The air with each brief wingbeat,
Then freeze on a wire.

The Warbling Vireo is aptly named, as I spend much more time hearing its short sweet Warbling than I ever do viewing the Vireo. That little melody lends a flavor to the forest and causes me to frequently look up through translucent leaves that are struggling to achieved summer fullness. The filtered light colors and covers the forest floor and the Warbling Vireo flavors that light with its song. Certain birds make a forest magic; this is one of them.

Skulking behind leaves,
Warbling Vireo, you
Shout from everywhere.

Then we find the warblers above the stream. I am amazed at the patterns and colors these birds concentrate on the miniscule canvas of their feathers. The Black-throated Gray Warbler’s palette is black, gray and white, with yellow accent-dots above its eyes. The Townsend’s Warbler's fills the gaps between its jet-black streaks with radiant yellow. The yellow of the Yellow Warbler’s underside is clawed with slashes of red. The Wilson’s Warbler sports a bright yellow gown accented with a severe black skullcap. All these birds are here, resplendent, and yet it’s still so hard to catch even a glimpse.

Brilliant yellow fire,
Stark black, bright white, this warbler
Remains elusive.

We stay in that one spot for far too long; we stay in that one spot not nearly long enough. There are six warbler species over the creek and under the trees: Orange-crowned, Wilson’s, Black-throated Gray, Hermit, Townsend’s, Nashville. The Warbling Vireo is there, as is the Cassin’s Vireo: you can’t miss the constant announcements of their presence, with the calling of Pacific-slope Flycatchers interrupting the silences between vireo bursts.

Cassin’s Vireo
Sports tiny spectacles and
Complains endlessly.

When it comes to empidonax flycatchers, the call is all-important, because they all appear so visually similar. Of course you need to scrutinize bill size and color, look at the shape of the eye ring, check the projections of the wingtips and the length of the tail, but you won’t be certain until it opens its beak to tell you for sure.

Show your eye your wing
Let me watch you claim your perch
And hear you whistle.

There is a chipping in low bushes: wild roses and snowberries. I wonder if it is a Fox Sparrow or a Hermit Thrush or even just a Dark-eyed Junco. But it feels different so we stop and we peer through the underbrush hoping for a glimpse. Ginger gets out the recording equipment and points it toward the sound. The invisible bird seems to be flitting around in the bush as the sound keeps moving. Then suddenly out it bursts, landing on a branch across the trail. Binoculars on him for only a second show a gray head, yellow body and white arcs above and below the eye. MacGillivray’s Warbler! A first for the county for us! In that instant my mind harkens back to our previous MacGillivray’s, two years ago at Cerro Alto Campground in San Luis Obispo County. Local birders brought us to its patch and we waited and it came out singing and giving us glorious unforgettable looks and plenty of time to get photographs. This time all we have is a second or two, but it is all we need.

A microphone aimed
At chip-calls in underbrush
Captures a wonder.

After about half a mile, the trail seems to end, but if you look across Smith Creek you’ll see it continues on the far bank. The creek is fast and the rocks are slippery, so in previous hikes we have always turned back here. This time, we ford the creek and continue on trail new to us. We reach a point where even over the roaring stream we hear a bright song, clear and pure, from a bird moving quickly along the creekside. My first thought is American Dipper! The habitat is right, although I’ve never heard of there being a Dipper here. We rush back along the path following the song and eventually a House Wren pops up, holding a stick for nest-building and repeats its varied melody, ending the mystery.

How do you hold a
Stick and still sing so sweetly
Tiny little wren?

The alders along the creekside are abundant near the trail’s end and many of them have rows of thousands of holes from sapsuckers who spend their winter months in this valley. The sapsuckers are all gone this time of year, headed north to breed. Next winter they’ll come back to this place, a haven with a plentiful food supply. I plan to pay them a visit if the creek is not too high to cross.

Red-breasted Sapsucker
Your grid of holes betrays you
I know you were here.

The confluence of Sulphur Creek with Smith Creek is so mesmerizing that I have to stop birding and just sit and take in the rushing waters, the boulders and the faint sulphur smell from the creek that mixes with aromas of bay and maple leaves. The stream is louder than any bird calls, but peaceful-loud, calming-loud. The water cascades over rocks surrounding the boulder on which I meditate and collects before me into a deep, calm pool that reflects the alder leaf canopy of this sanctuary. Around me low poison oak shrubs glisten. Ferns drip down the left bank while rounded river rocks contain the stream on my right side. In front of me, a great sycamore leans away from the creek, its roots diving deep beneath the streambed and its branches reaching up and out and away. Steady, still, full of peace, I feel part of the forest, planted upon the earth with my arms stretching out to the sky.

Rooted on the bank:
Alder, maple, sycamore,
I too am a tree.

24 species total along Smith Creek. All photos taken while on the Birdathon.
ebird Checklists:
• https://ebird.org/checklist/S67902137
• https://ebird.org/checklist/S67902151