Mount Greylock

View from Summit of Mt. Greylock

In the Berkshires for the weekend, I had a taste for early morning birding on Mt. Greylock. I convinced Lily it was worth getting up at 5 a.m. to get there at sunrise.

Jones' Nose Trail

I'm not going to say I won her over to the joys of mid-summer sunrise birding, but she warmed up when she saw her first close-up Indigo Bunting.

Indigo Bunting,  Jones' Nose

They were singing, everywhere, loudly.

View from Mt. Greylock summit

Then it was off to the summit to see if we could find rare Massachusetts breeders. We were not disappointed. Blackpolls and Yellow-rumps, visible and singing. And juncos, so odd to see in the summer.

Dark-eyed Junco, Mt. Greylock

The highlight of the day: we were tracking down a Blackpoll Warbler when suddenly out popped what I thought was a Cape May Warbler, a longtime nemesis bird of mine. I caught a glimpse of cheek and pin-striped yellow breast before it zipped away but I was afraid to call it, being color-blind and all. "Was its cheek red?" I asked Lily. "Yes, it was red," she confirmed. We celebrated all the way down the mountain. Lily was happy she'd come, and I was too. For many reasons.