It was a magical evening. Standing on the edge of an overgrown field in Exeter last month, my wife, her cousin and I prepared for an unusual performance.
The daytime birds were wrapping up their springtime singing for the day. A prairie warbler burst forth with one more buzzy, upslurred note; a towhee whistled its “drink your tea” call; and a gray catbird chattered as dusk approached. In the distance, a turkey joined the chorus.
After the sun set and the sky turned to a mix of peach and violet, what I thought was a barking dog turned into a howling pack of coyotes, yipping and yapping until a second pack responded from the opposite direction. Then a barred owl chimed in, demonstrating its classic “who cooks for you” call. The performance had already reached a high point, and yet the stars of the show hadn’t even arrived.
At exactly 8:12, a chuck will’s widow blasted us nearly off our feet with its first of hundreds of calls. It must have been just a few yards away from us, hidden in the brush or a nearby tree. The unusual bird, a member of the nightjar family, is only found in this one place in Rhode Island, and it only sings for a few short weeks. And what a song. That’s what we had come to hear.
Its name comes from what some early birdwatcher thought its call sounded like. It starts with a sharp “chuck” note, followed by a shaky whistled “will’s widow,” then repeats it on and on. It was still going when, three minutes later, its cousin the whippoorwill — another bird whose name is derived from an interpretation of its song — started calling about 100 yards away. A second whip joined in from across the field.
And then the chuck went silent. We stared toward the tree we thought it was calling from, and then it started calling from a different direction. Was it a second bird, or did the first one move without us noticing? Almost certainly the latter. But how did it move without us seeing it? It had to have flown very close to the ground to avoid our eyes.
We remained enraptured by this unusual performance until darkness had nearly enveloped the area. As we nodded in silence that it was time to go, we remembered that there was still one performer we hadn’t heard yet. Just seconds later, the distinctive “peent” of an American woodcock, a chunky shorebird that never spends time at the shore, resounded nearby. His odd call, repeated every 10 seconds or so, concluded an amazing hour of birdwatching.
Yet we didn’t actually watch anything. Not one bird did we see. It was an entirely auditory experience. But that sure didn’t detract from the show. It may have even made it more special.
The excitement of the experience was a fitting conclusion to my 50 years of wildlife observation in Rhode Island. Soon I’ll be moving to the West Coast to seek and learn about the wonderous wildlife the opposite coast has to offer.
It also means that this is my last Backyard and Beyond column. I’ve enjoyed writing it for the last seven years, and I hope you’ve been inspired to pay a little closer attention to what goes on in the natural world. There is so much we can learn from the wildlife in our backyards and beyond. All you have to do is keep your eyes open for whatever may be around. I know that’s what I’ll be doing.
This article first appeared in The Independent on June 9, 2022.
