This thousand-acre property encompasses everything from upland pinewoods and steep bluffs with a dense understory of mountain laurel to corn fields, brushy edges, and swampy lowland forest along the floodplain of the James River near its confluence with the Hardware River. Birders usually also venture into adjacent areas along the two access roads, which feature second-growth scrub, a recent clearcut, and a section of open farmland.
The property has two eBird hotspots--one at the boat ramp and one at the trailhead at the State Route 611 entrance. Birders should usually use the boat-ramp hotspot, which is labeled Hardware River State WMA. If you are birding only the trail and State Route 611, use the other hotspot. Using the boat-ramp hotspot, which has no specific location qualifiers in its name, makes more sense when tallying birds up and down the four-mile length of Hardware Road and even on River Road, which goes well beyond the WMA property. The prime time to bird Hardware River runs roughly from the beginning of April into summer. It is a great location for a variety of spring migrants and also hosts the largest number of breeding birds of any single hotspot in the county. Of course, breeding birds become much more difficult to detect as the summer wears on, so the WMA isn’t a particularly interesting spot in later July or in August. Given these caveats, the following description of how to bird the area focuses almost entirely on birds seen in spring and summer.
Hardware Road access and boat ramp area: The patches of deciduous woods found from the beginning of Hardware Road all the way down to the boat ramp can host migrant warblers after a good migration push in spring and Blue-headed Vireos in early April. The best way to look for migrants in these woods is to drive as slowly as traffic allows, listen with windows down for warblers, and pull off near deciduous tracts to work the forest edge along the road. Shortly after turning off of River Road, you will see a recent clearcut (2017-2018) on the left. Here, Red-headed Woodpeckers can be heard calling and sometimes seen in flight near the distant treelines.
Not far after the cut lies a small open field that has held a single meadowlark territory and small mixed flocks of blackbirds during icterid migration. Farther down Hardware Road, on the left, a deciduous forest with an understory of mountain laurel reliably hosts at least one Hooded Warbler on territory.
From here, the road drops to the floodplain of the James, crossing a train track and a small bridge over the Hardware River before reaching the parking lot. In spring and summer, the riverbank sycamores and the large island out in the James are alive with the songs of Yellow and Yellow-throated Warblers, Northern Parulas, both oriole species, and Warbling Vireos. The forest to the left of the parking lot, which floods on occasion, is a good location for migrant Northern Waterthrush and summering Prothonotary Warbler.
The corn fields on either side of the road, which still hold stubble in April and May, should be checked for Vesper Sparrow in early spring. During icterid migration, this floodplain habitat sometimes holds large blackbird flocks, which can include Rusty Blackbirds. After a significant rain, muddy puddles form in the fields, and in season they should be checked for Solitary and Spotted Sandpiper, or perhaps, after a particularly heavy storm, a yellowlegs. Wood Ducks breed in the area, and in early spring they can regularly be seen flying along the James River. Double-crested Cormorants can also be seen along the James throughout the spring and summer, including during the height of the breeding season, although no evidence of breeding in the region has been found.
State Route 611 access: At the turn-off for SR 611 on River Road, an expansive farm field provides a good spot for Eastern Meadowlarks year round and for Blue Grosbeaks and sometimes Grasshopper Sparrows in the breeding season. A martin house on the left side of 611 is often occupied, and if the martins aren’t home they may be foraging over the field.
After another mile or so, shortly after Berea Chapel, the road splits. Though it seems that one should turn right here, the way to access the trail is to turn left. Here, the road turns to gravel and passes through a couple of open gates. Avoid turning onto the long driveway that extends to the left as the road passes by a tract of private second-growth scrub filled with autumn olive. In spring and summer, this patch is alive with the songs of many Prairie Warblers, Eastern Towhees, and Indigo Buntings, and one or two Yellow-breasted Chats, Blue Grosbeaks, and White-eyed Vireos.
At the end of the road lies the parking lot for the trail. The beginning section of the trail isn’t usually the most exciting to bird, but as you walk down it in spring and summer you’ll hear Yellow-throated Vireos and Scarlet Tanagers singing from the canopy. As a steep slope down to the Hardware River appears left of the trail, you’ll start hearing the songs of Worm-eating and Hooded Warblers, American Redstart, Northern Parula, and Louisiana Waterthrush. These species may be present from here all the way to the end of the trail, and a Kentucky Warbler has been reported in summer from the trail’s end. Sections of the trail that pass through mixed forest are thick with the “teacher teacher TEACHER” songs of Ovenbirds, and decent views of this often-skulky species are often possible in April when males are fighting to establish territories right near the trail. As you return from the end of the trail to the lot, keep an eye and an ear out for a broad-winged hawk perched in the woods or circling overhead. Blue-headed Vireos are expected along the trail in early spring, and in irruption years, the pines can be full of wintering Red-breasted Nuthatches. You might also hear screech owls along the trail if you are there during crepuscular hours.
Accessibility: Parts of the WMA are easily birded by simply parking one’s car and stepping out, but other areas require some walking. The trail at the western entrance totals three miles out and back and includes some moderate inclines but is reasonably smooth and not difficult for individuals with good balance and decent stamina. By sometime in May, both the trail and the areas near the boat ramp tend to be quite overgrown with grass, and both get thoroughly muddy after a rainstorm. In addition, when birding the floodplain area or the trail from May through the summer, one should be prepared for an abundance of mosquitoes. Without protection, one typically experiences a decidedly unpleasant number of bites within minutes.
Owner/Manager: Virginia Department of Game and Inland Fisheries
eBird Hotspot: Hardware River State WMA
—Shea Tiller
