Last Sunday, we got the word — Bruce Hill called Joe to let him know that he sighted a Loggerhead Shrike as he was wrapping up a walk at the Banshee Reeks Nature Preserve.
It flew into the top of a tree near the Visitor Center where it interacted with a Northern Mockingbird.
Bruce last saw it flying away in the direction of the Dulles Greenway Wetlands Mitigation Project.
Loggerhead Shrikes are a State Threatened species so this is an exciting siting. We’ve had one in the Leesburg area in past years off and on (photo shown here). It would be great if a population of them became established.
Learn more about Loggerhead Shrikes and their interesting behaviors here:
http://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/loggerhead_shrike/id
A small gray, black, and white bird of open areas, the Loggerhead Shrike hardly appears to be a predator. But it uses its hooked beak to kill insects, lizards, mice, and birds, and then impales them on thorns to hold them while it rips them apart.