Golden Eagle field trip

Dan Jackson and I went along on the Golden Eagle trip today led by Scott Mehus with the National Eagle center in Wabasha MN.
A total of 8 hardy, or foolhardy I should say, birders met in Cochrane WI at 1:30pm. We quickly headed up into the hills to see the Golden Eagles. Scott quickly pinpointed two adult goldens before a half hour had passed.






Dan and I cut out at about 3:00 to head up to Prescott to look for the Harlequin Duck. Alas though, it was not to be.






This beautiful adult Golden Eagle, 45 mins, one wrong turn and a 4-foot snowdrift later, we ended up right back where we had started.












We finally made our way to 35 to head north, but by the time we got there, it was too late the head up to Prescott. instead, we backtracked and picked up this very cooperative N Shrike:








This pic shows the tail quite clearly:




Across from the National Eagle center, we found these Trumpeter Swans:





all in all, a good day. 23 species despite the frigid cold and 3 new year birds and 1 new state bird.

Mute Swan, Trumpeter Swan and Golden Eagle were new year birds and Trumpeter Swan was a new WI state bird.