The Southwest Wisconsin Birder: Merry Christmas!!!

Friday, December 24, 2010

Merry Christmas!!!

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!!!

1 comments:

Andrea said...: Merry Christmas to you too, Chris! Have a good one, and happy birding in the new year!; December 25, 2010 6:39 AM

Local Guiding Services

In an effort to make up for my perpetual lack of cash and get some birding in, I offer bird guiding services for Wisconsin, the Duluth area in Minnesota, overnight trips to birding areas in central Iowa, and birding the Chicago lakefront.

I've birded these select areas quite a bit over the years.

Some of my specialty areas include the Upper Mississippi National Wildlife Refuge (which extends from the Quad cities to Minneapolis), Sax-zim Bog near Duluth, MN, Horicon Marsh, Devil's Lake and Wyalusing State Parks and Columbia County in WI during Shorebird migration.

My rates are as follows:

For a standard day of birding:

1-2 people: $15/hr plus mileage (to meeting location)

3-8 people: The standard $15/hr + $5/hr per extra person up to 8

Above 8 people, I have a flat group rate of $220 for the day plus mileage

For overnight trips, hotel cost is included with mileage.

If you want to go on a guided trip somewhere in WI, MN, IA or IL, you will have made a good choice. The birding here in Spring, Summer and Fall is excellent, although mid summer can slow down a bit. Winter birding is much more difficult, takes more time and patience, but many good target birds can be found. Especially in places like Sax-zim Bog.

I keep up with all local sightings and rarities as well as locations for harder to find species like Grasshopper Sparrow, Eastern Screech-owl, N Saw-whet Owl, Harlequin Duck, Upland Sandpiper, Short-eared Owl, Yellow-throated Warbler, Kirtland's Warbler, Great Gray and Northern Hawk-owls, Winter finches, rare arctic Gulls and many others.

So would you like to see the hidden things that the midwest has to offer? See double-digit species of Warblers in a morning? see the spectacular waterfowl migration on the Mississippi in spring and fall? Maybe sort out those confusing fall Warblers or shorebirds? or pick apart winter gulls? Or maybe you'd like to see the Gray Ghost of the Northwoods and experience Pine Grosbeaks, Boreal chickadees, Crossbills and Redpolls? Whatever you want to see, I'll do my best to find it for you.

If you'd like to hire me, you can contact me at:

Chris.w.birder@gmail.com

or call: (608) 475-9016

Bird listing totals

Note: Current number is first, the number that the list was raised from is second in parentheses
Clements World life list: 1343
ABA Life List: 610 Latest lifer: Smith's Longspur (ABA 600), ROSS'S GULL, IVORY GULL, GRAY-COLLARED BECARD!!, EARED QUETZAL! CRESCENT-CHESTED WARBLER!, PAINTED BUNTING!!!, SINALOA WREN!!, GREAT GRAY OWL, Sage Sparrow, White-tailed Ptarmigan, Brown-capped Rosy-finch, Lewis's Woodpecker, Mountain Plover
WI state list: 312 Latest state bird: Harlequin Duck, Ross's Goose, Thayer's Gull, Iceland Gull, Black-necked Stilt, Black-legged Kittiwake, Barrow's Goldeneye
Richland county list: 226 Latest species: Loggerhead Shrike, White-winged Crossbill
Yard list: 171 Latest YB: Common Redpoll, Tundra Swan, Red Crossbill
2010 Year list: 1226. Best species: ROSS'S GULL, DIADEMED SANDPIPER-PLOVER, WHITE-BELLIED CINCLODES, EYE-RINGED THISTLETAIL, BRAZILIAN TEAL, MARCAPATA SPINETAIL, RESPLENDENT QUETZAL, VOLCANO JUNCO, TIMBERLINE WREN, SMITH'S LONGSPUR (ABA 600), RAINBOW-BEARDED THORNBILL, Williamson's Sapsucker, Red-billed Scythebill,
2009 ABA area year list final tally: 547. Best species: IVORY GULL, GRAY-COLLARED BECARD, EARED QUETZAL, Painted Bunting, CRESCENT-CHESTED WARBLER!, SINALOA WREN!!, BUFF-COLLARED NIGHTJAR, FIVE-STRIPED SPARROW!, Rufous-capped Warbler, BROWN-BACKED SOLITAIRE, Plain-capped Starthroat, Tufted Puffin
2008 ABA area year list final tally: 475 Let's see how well I do in '09.
2008 Bigby list final tally: 139 No New species since early Jun. Let's see if I can do better in '09
AZ State list: 286 Latest: Sinaloa Wren, Buff-collared Nightjar, Five-striped Sparrow, Crescent-chested Warbler, Gray-collared Becard, Brown-backed Solitaire, Aztec Thrush
CA State list: 203
FL state list: 283
ND State list: 155
NJ state list: 203
TX state list: 146
Wyoming state list: 134

Personal Birding milestones

Anna's Hummer in WI
Buff Bellied Hummingbird as lifer #400!!!
Chuck-wills-widow in WI!
Crescent-chested Warbler!! Pinery Campground, Chiricahua Mountains, Portal, AZ on May 14th 2009, 538th lifer!
Curlew Sandpiper
Eared Quetzal! Chiricahua National Monument, Lifer #550,
Flame-colored Tanager as my 500th lifer!!!!!!!!!!
Green-breasted Mango in WI, 386th lifer!
In 2010, passed the 1000 lifer mark. Also passed 1000 species seen in a single year! Life list up around 1400. Year list around 1100
Lark Bunting, Cordilleran Flycatcher and Lazuli Bunting on our WY trip. summer '07
N Goshawk as a county bird
PAINTED BUNTING!!!!!! FINALLY!!!!!! Palo Duro State park, Amarillo, TX on May 9th 2009! 536th lifer!
Rufous Hummingbird in WI
Slaty-backed Gull in WI, 374th lifer
SNOWY OWL!!!!! finally. on 2/27/08 in Pierre SD! (and finally one in Green Bay WI on 3/13/08!, 392nd lifer
Worm-eating Warbler as a yard bird

Bird quotes.

"The beauty and genius of a work of art may be reconceived, though its first material expression be destroyed; a vanished harmony may yet again inspire the composer; but when the last individual of a race of living things breathes no more, another heaven and another earth must pass before such a one can be again."

(From William Beebe's "The Bird: Its Form and Function," 1906)

"The most exciting phrase to hear in science,
the one that heralds new discoveries, is not
'Eureka!' (I found it) but 'That's funny...'"
--Isaac Asimov

Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one's lifetime.
-- Mark Twain, Innocents Abroad

"I once had a sparrow alight on my shoulder for a moment, while I was hoeing in a village garden, and I felt that I was more distinguished by that circumstance than I should have been by any epaulet I could have worn." --Henry David Thoreau

"God loved the birds and invented trees. Man loved the birds and invented cages." --Jacques Deval

"Birds sing after a storm; why shouldn't people feel as free to delight in whatever sunlight remains to them?" --Rose Kennedy

"No bird soars too high if he soars with his own wings" --William Blake

"A wise old owl sat on an oak; The more he saw, the less he spoke; The less he spoke the more he heard; Why aren't we like that wise old bird?" --E.H. Richards

"A bird doesn't sing because it has an answer, it sings because it has a song" --Maya Angelou

"When thou seest an Eagle, thou seest a portion of genius; lift up thy head!" --William Blake

"He clasps the crag with crooked hands;

Close to the sun in lonely lands,

Ringed with the azure world, he stands.

The wrinkled sea beneath him crawls;

He watches from his mountain walls,

And like a thunderbolt he falls."

--A.L. Tennyson, "The Eagle"

"This monument, perched like a duckhawk on this cliff, will scan this wide valley, watching through the days and years. For many a March, it will watch the geese go by. For many an April, it will see the redbuds come and go, and for many a May the flush of Oak-blooms on a thousand hills. Questing wood Ducks will search these basswoods for hollow limbs; golden Prothonotaries will shake golden pollen from river willows. Egrets will pose on these sloughs in August; Plovers will whistle from september skies. Hickory nuts will plop into October leaves and hail will rattle November woods. But no pigeons will pass for there are no pigeons, save only this flightless one graven in bronze on this rock.
Tourists will read this inscription but their thoughts will not take wing."
--Aldo Leopold ("on the monument to the pigeon". A Sand county almanac)