I trusted that my new knee was strong enough so I decided to climb up into my blind 12 feet off the ground.

I should have watched the local forecast because as dawn approached a dense fog rolled in an out for at least an hour.

I was hoping to get some photos of either some deer, a bear, or of the coyote that has been coursing through that field lately.

I knew the fog would limit my photo opportunities but it’s still a good bird migration time so I had something to fall back on.

As I walked to the blind, I heard a distant great horned owl calling. I didn’t hear a response so maybe a female wasn’t in the vicinity.

But as the sky brightened the bird activity increased. The robins that left our backyards in late July/early August are flocking together and feeding heavily to make their migration to areas to our south.

A few remain here in the Times News region all winter but most head to some of Pennsylvania’s southern counties or neighboring Delaware, Maryland, or Virginia. They were very active and hard to count but I’m sure a conservative estimate of about 75 robins were feeding all around me. Some landed in the field picking up some insects but most fed on berries. Pokeweed must have had a banner year and the multitude of those plants all around the field edge and forest clearings were feeding many robins.

I observed two forest floor birds, the eastern towhee and Swainson’s thrush. The latter was a nice find since they nest in Canada. In fact, I was surprised at the number of towhees. There were probably nearly a dozen towhees feeding nearby with most also eating the pokeweed’s fruits.

Two tiny birds were feeding in the nearby Chinese chestnut trees, the golden crowned kinglet and ruby crowned kinglet. They were grabbing some leaf eating “bugs” and one was close enough that I saw it snatch a small spider from a twig. The Carolina wren that nested here this summer, was singing on and off, almost in concert with the fog that crept in and out.

Most of the blue jay migration is complete but a small flock of about a dozen jays landed in trees at the field edge. Minutes later, one by one they flew across the field continuing their journey. Later, three blue jays flew back and forth across the field and they are the local jays that I’ll see throughout the winter.

Black-capped chickadees, tufted titmice, and a white-breasted nuthatch fed near me in the two hours of nature watching. I saw three different woodpecker species this a.m., the downy, red-bellied, and hairy woodpeckers.

As could be expected, two late migrating warblers also “dropped by,” a palm warbler and a black-throated blue warbler.

I had another reason to sit for a while today, I hadn’t seen any northern juncos yet this year and usually by the end of September I have recorded one. Sure enough, two fed alongside some white-throated sparrows as both of these species find this area’s winter less severe than their breeding area farther north.

An eastern phoebe, a flycatcher, made numerous little flights to grab some flying insects. He’ll depart soon as the cooler weather reduces the flying insects. Last week I saw five phoebes in this same area. Maybe this one is the hardiest of the group.

I didn’t get any large mammal photos this morning but I did spend some quality time at least watching some interesting birds. We have all this around us, soooo, get out there.

Test Your Outdoor Knowledge: In this column I noted that the Swainson’s thrush nests to our north. Which of these thrush species nests in the Times News region? A. hermit thrush B. wood thrush C. veery D. all of these E. none of these

Last Week’s Trivia Answer: A bar-tailed godwit was tracked recently in migration flying 237 hours without stopping. (Amazing things happen in migration) .

Email Barry Reed at breed71@gmail.com