Searching for Whip-poor-wills and Chuck-will's-widows in the Chalk Hills and Manifest

  Whip-poor-wills are one of those birds that everybody knows of, but few really get to know. Admittedly, this is a species with which I have very limited experience. For us Louisianans, the Whip is a bird that can only be expected to be present during a narrow window each spring and fall, when they pass through our state going between their breeding grounds and their winter homes. Given that they are nocturnal and much more often heard than seen, the best time to try for them is during the spring migration when they are gearing up for breeding season and likely to be vocalizing. Moonlit nights just at nightfall and again before daybreak are said to be the best times to hear them. Inspired by another, more experienced Louisiana birder's successful attempts to locate migrant Whips, Beth Willis and I decided to get out in the woods and try for ourselves on the night of the full moon with hopes of filling in some of the gap in the locations where these birds have been recorded.

Habitat along Posey-Webb Camp Road.

   On April 3rd Beth and I set out to find Whip-poor-wills in the Chalk Hills of northern Catahoula Parish. The birds should start singing around dusk, so we took the opportunity to do a little daylight birding on the drive along the back roads that would take us to an area of what I thought could be potentially good Whip-poor-will habitat that I had picked out. Though we didn't find anything too unusual, there were some highlights worth mentioning. In woods along Posey-Webb Camp Road and Posey-Webb Camp Highway there were a total of four singing Black-and-white Warblers.

I managed to snap one pic that had one of the Black-and-white Warblers in it.
The bird is center-left, tail in the air, head behind a limb.

 Further along Posey-Webb Camp Highway we found a Broad-winged Hawk. The hawk was first heard vocalizing from a perch somewhere in the pine trees, but it took us some time to finally see the bird. In the past I/we have seen multiple individuals and pairs of this species in this area during the summer, so this seems to be a local breeding hotspot for these hawks.

A fumbling attempt at photographing the Broad-winged Hawk before it flew.

   Birding was somewhat lackluster as we drove further north, eventually reaching the area I had picked out just around sundown. The location, a (unnamed?) gravel road north of the upper end of Rawlson Creek and south of Old Columbia-Harrisonburg Road, is in the Chalk Hills. The starting point had a cutover with numerous standing trees on one side and young pine woods on the other. The route, traveling back west and south, soon enters woods of pine with a strong mix of hardwoods thanks to the numerous hardwood gullies that head-up near the road. I had first visited the location a few years ago and had such species as Wood Thrush and Hooded Warbler on that trip.

Moonrise as we approached the point where we'd turn around and begin night birding.

 

   At our first stop we had a pleasant surprise. Our first of season Chuck-will's-Widow! This close relative of the Whip-poor-will is a common summer resident in our region, where it breeds and fills the evening and pre-dawn woods with its repetitive call. A short distance further along we stopped to get a closer listen to the bird, who was down in the thick pines. At another stop not far away we had not one but two Chucks calling somewhat close together, one noticeably closer to us. Once into the larger woods with the promising Whip-poor-will habitat we heard one more Chuck. That would be the last we'd hear that evening. Despite using a recording of Whip-poor-will's call and making frequent stops we struck out and heard none of our target species. This did not mean that we had a bad trip, and in fact the Chucks were a treat, coming as they did on the leading edge of when we'd expect the species to appear in our area. We did make some more stops on the drive back south, but with prime Whip and Chuck time drawing to a close for the evening and the forecasted storm front already flashing distant lighting to our west, we didn't linger long in any area.

Moonlit locations in the area where we tried for Whip-poor-wills.

 

   Back on P-W Camp Highway we had an rather intense frog chorus in a small swampy patch where the road crossed a tributary of Hawthorne Creek. The vocalizations of numerous Spring Peeper, Cope's Gray Treefrog, Green Frog (Bronze), and Fowler's Toad combined to make quite an impressive ruckus!

Full moon from Posey-Webb Camp Road.

   That trip ended with mixed results, but we were quite happy with it. Another trip was planned for Monday, 4/6/15.

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   On the April 6th trip we were joined by Tom Pollock and, as before, decided to bird some of the area in daylight first. This time we had chosen to check for Whips and Chucks at several locations around the Manifest community, south of the previous Friday's area. Among the daylight finds were some recently arrived Cattle Egrets along Highway 8 and a Wilson's Snipe flying over and landing in a marshy area off of Highway 126 south of Hwy 8.

Since we had time, we decided to do a short trip to the area of Bushley Bayou Unit of Catahoula NWR accessed from Hwy 126. Expected species, such as Prothonotary Warbler and Eastern Towhee were common, and Loggerhead Shrike and American Kestrel were nice additions to the day's list. It was getting time to head back to our potential Whip-poor-will locations.

   Suffices to say that we struck out again. But this time, there were no Chuck-will's-widows either. We stopped at a number of locations along Highway 8 and Highway 126 north of Hwy 8 and played audio of Whip-poor-will and Chuck-will's-Widow at each. No luck. No luck with Eastern Screech-Owl or Barred Owl either. Despite the failure to locate any of the target species, it was an enjoyable outing.

   With the full moon not close by and the string of days with high rain chances in the coming week, it may be unlikely that we'll get back out and search for Whips again soon. But perhaps we could find time for at least one more trip before they will have departed from our area.