Birding the Lakefront

It's been some time since I've posted a birding report here. Facebook has taken over much of the blogging world and few of the old bloggers remain. Some retain their relevancy and some newer ones attempt to maintain it, but blogs now take the second seat in this day.  Given that, I still try to maintain this one.

I hadn't been to the lake since late last winter, so on Sat, I decided to take a jaunt on over to see what I could find.

I started off at Grant Park on the south side of Milwaukee where I ran into a few friends; Rebecca Setzer, Seth Cutright, Paul Sparks, Joan Sommer and a few others.  They were gathered near the tennis courts where most of the winter finches had been hanging out.  As I arrived, they pointed out the five Red Crossbills that were partaking of the grand selection of cones in the area.
They proved difficult to photograph with the light, but I did get one decent shot:

Female Red Crossbill

Unfortunately, these were the only boreal birds in the area that morning save for a lone Common Redpoll.  It was better than nothing, but not the birds I was looking for.

Not a bird, but while at there, we saw two Bucks, staying safe from hunters in the confines of the city park. Both of them had large racks:

After birding Grant park and finding next to nothing (our only other notable bird was a flyover Rough-legged Hawk) I took off ahead of the group and headed north.  An Eared Grebe had been reported at Bayview Park just up the shore. Alas, all I could find were endless streams of Red-breasted Mergansers:

After checking Texas Ave, South Shore and Discovery World (only a few Greater Scaup here), I resigned myself to the notion that the Eared Grebe was either not present, or hiding.

North Point in Milwaukee turned out to be the most productive spot of the day. When the group arrived, I already had my scope on all three Scoters. Also present were: a Common Loon, two Long-tailed Ducks and an adult Bald Eagle fishing out on the lake.

Horned Grebes were present in several places in Milwaukee as well as farther north.

At the harbor entrance under the Hoan Bridge, I discovered a single Red-necked Grebe, though the light proved too difficult for any photos.  Two out of three isn't too bad.

After Milwaukee, I headed to Port Washington. Port was quiet, but a flyover Wood Duck was a surprise.
After grabbing lunch at the Dockside Deli (excellent sandwiches) I hopped on the highway to Sheboygan.  

Just south of Sheboygan is Kohler-Andrae State Park. It's actually two state parks right next to each other that are treated as one.  This park has had some pretty awesome birds in past years.  This time, the park was pretty quiet. There were zero passerines save for a few birds around the feeders.
I ran out to the beach and scoped the lake. A dozen Black Scoters were just offshore along with a few Horned Grebes and more Red-breasted Mergansers. Just beyond the heat shimmer was a large raft of Long-tailed Ducks. My minimum estimate was a thousand.  After picking through and finding nothing else of interest, I headed north to Sheboygan.

The Blue Harbor area in Sheboygan was largely devoid of birds. Most notably, the Snowy Owl that had been hanging out there.  I quickly ditched that and headed up to the marina where this Snowy Owl gave us awesome views:

While viewing the Snowy Owl through the scope, we heard the calls of Waxwings behind us.
Picking through some fruit trees across the street from the marina were about 50 or so Cedar Waxwings. Since Bohemian Waxwings had been seen in good numbers in the southern part of the state already, we gave it a go.  The lone Bohemian Waxwing in the group flew right past my head and landed up high in a nearby tree where I quickly pointed it out to the others. We all got scope views eventually. It was an awesome bird to end the day with:

This was not only a new state bird for me (WI #330), but also a new one for my Lower 48 list.


With the sun setting, I started the long trek back home.  Not too bad a finish after a slow start to the day.

It's sounding like it's going to be some pretty sweet birding this winter. We'll see what turns up in the next two weeks before I head out.

Til then, Happy Birding!

Update

Sorry! I haven't posted in over 2 weeks! I've been swamped.  Here's a summary of what's happened since I posted last: 

Jacob Cooper and I drove up to his house in CO for a relaxing 3 days. I drove up to Jacob Lake (west of Marble Canyon) and met him there. While I was there, we managed to do Sunset and then sunrise at the north rim of the Grand Canyon. That was pretty awesome! We hopped in his truck and headed north. Our first stop was Zion National Park where we picked up California Condor! 

Then we drove up to Grand Juntion, arriving late at night.  The next day, we slept in late, Jacob's mom made a full breakfast for us and we hung around the house most of the day which his mom did laundry, Jacob got some stuff done, ect. That night, we went to see the new Transformers movie.  The next day, we did pretty much the same thing except go to look for Gunnison Sage-grouse. We failed, but I did find my first Brewer's Sparrow in a loooong time. It was a good year bird. On our drive back home, we stopped in Ouray, CO where we picked up Cassin's Finch, Black Swift and Western Grebe. I also got my year Barrow's Goldeneye. 

We arrived back at the Grand Canyon where I spent the night. Then I drove back home the next morning. 

When I hit Tucson, I picked up my friend Andy Johnson from the airport and we drove to Willcox, AZ and twitched the Pacific Golden-plover that was being seen there.  

Andy and I then spent Sun, Mon and Tues birding around the Chiricahuas. He picked up all the lifers that he had missed last year including the high elevation birds like Olive Warbler and Short-tailed Hawk.  We also saw the now resident Flame-colored Tanagers and a nesting pair of Berylline Hummingbirds. 

On Wed, Andy and I took off for the Huachucas. We arrived mid morning and started at Ramsey Canyon. Not much there. A quick jaunt into Miller Canyon produced the usual hummingbirds at Beatty's. White-eared, Berylline, Broad-tailed, Broad-billed, Mag, ect

Mary Jo's in Ash Canyon had both male and female Lucifer Hummingbirds.

 Thurs, we hit San Pedro in the morning for Tropical Kingbird and then ran to Patagonia where we had excellent views of the Sinaloa Wren! 

 Paton's feeders had the usual Violet-crowned Hummingbird and Thick-billed Kingbird.  

On Fri morning, we birded Patagonia Preserve and added Beardless Tyrannulet to the list. Fri afternoon provided a fruitless search for Rufous-capped Warblers in Florida Canyon but we did find the lone Five-striped Sparrow that has been hanging out by the Sycamore tree there. 

Fri night, we planned on camping at Catalina state park. When we arrived in Tucson, the rain was coming down so hard, that you couldn't see the road in front of the car. Water was pooling on the road and people were hydroplaning everywhere. We drove into the state park, but when we came to the first wash, I took one look at the amount of rain coming down and quickly nixed the idea. We ended up camping in a hotel parking lot. 

Sat morning, we went back to the state park. The wash was covered with about a foot of sand. If we had camped in there the night before, we would have been stuck for a few hours. 

Having nothing to do at the park, we drove down to Sweetwater Wetlands where we talked to some people, saw a few water birds and then saw a family of Burrowing Owls: 

Then I dropped Andy at the airport and drove home to Portal. It was an amazing two weeks! 

Since then, I've been birding around the Chiricahuas, looking for new work and waiting until tomorrow. 

Tomorrow, VENT's Camp Chiricahua will be in town for the week! Camp Chiricahua is an ecology camp for high school aged kids. Although, the primary focus of the campers is birds, they do many other things too. It's an amazing camp and one I highly recommend. 

The leaders are Dave Jasper and Rob Day. Rob is an excellent cook and Dave is the most amazing trip leader ever! I could swear that he knows by name every living thing that resides in the Chiricahua mountains.  If you have a chance to go to this camp, do it! it's worth it! 

Til next time, Happy Birding! 

Two weeks later.......

I've started a post several times but something always happens. Hopefully, I'll get this one in. 

Let's start with what I've been up to for the last 2 weeks.  

I attended the WSO Sheboygan field trip where I picked up several species of ducks for the year and finally added Harlequin Duck to my USA list!  Also had a few Glaucous Gulls and 3 Red-throated Loons. 

Fast forward, I birded Columbia County with one of my friends. We quickly discovered that Okee Bay on Lake Wisconsin is an excellent Gull spot right now.  we picked up 6 species of gulls including two of my nemesis gulls.  Iceland and Thayer's!! We also had 3 Lesser Black-backed Gulls among all the Ring-billed and Herring Gulls. We had found a Bonaparte's earlier in the day along with all 5 WI Geese in one field. 

Jump to this past Sat, I and some friends attended the WSO Columbia county trip.  It was a fun trip.  Had about 30 cars in the caravan.  We found all 5 WI Geese and my year American Pipit! 

I had to cut out early, but managed to get back to Okee Bay later in the afternoon where I managed to find my 7th species of Gull for the day!!  I had 1st cycle Iceland, 1st cycle and adult Thayer's, 2nd cycle Glaucous, adult Lesser Black-backed, Ring-billed and Herring all within 5 minutes of each other.  A single winter adult Bonaparte's from earlier in the day provided 7 gulls for the day.  

Had a Richland County Bird and Nature club field trip yesterday. We found a bunch of Ducks at Bakken's pond and both Yellowlegs together.  

Otherwise, nothing too spectacular going on right now.  I've been working on finding a car. Not easy let me tell you. I found a pretty nice Jeep Grand Cherokee Laredo, but it had some engine problem. Actually thought it was going to die on me once. Not good for a trip to AZ. 

Next! 

Anyway, til next time, Happy Birding! 

A week of birding

Well, there goes my resolution to post daily. Might even have to toss out the weekly one too.

Seriously, nine days between posts..... ouch!

Anyway, here's a report on what I've been up to.

Feb 3rd (last Tues) I went on a fruitless search for White-winged Crossbills in Crawford County. Crawford is the county just to the west of Richland. It is certainly not known for Spruce stands. I was able to find only a few stands of White Spruce. No Crossbills though.

I did see some pretty cool birds. Down in Soldier's Grove, I spotted a Sharp-shinned Hawk sitting in a tree in someone's back yard.

Driving south along the Kickapoo River, a Northern Shrike flew across the road in front of me and landed in a tree not too far off. I managed to squeeze off a couple photos before it flew. I still haven't been able to get a really decent shot of a Shrike. Northern or otherwise.

A Bald Eagle completed the day. It was rather dark though so my photo didn't come out as well as I would have liked.

Jump ahead a day.  I scoured the southern part of Crawford County for Crossbills. Again with no luck.  They have yet to be reported from that county. The WSO is trying to go for a full state invasion year so they need Crossbills reported from all 72 counties in WI. They have 14 to go. 

Anyway, I somehow made it all the way to Prairie Du Chien where I found a pair of Wood Ducks in with all the Mallards.

 

I somehow missed the Black Ducks that I was later told were hanging around there too.  I also found another Bald Eagle feasting on a carcass. It was probably a 3 year old bird. Not quite a full adult yet.

Fast forward to Feb 6th.  I was watching the 30+ Common Redpolls (no Hoary yet) at my feeder when a Sharp-shinned Hawk blew through. He paused only long enough to have his portrait taken before he took off for better hunting grounds. 

Jump ahead to Feb 10th. Yesterday.  I took advantage of the 55 degree, sunny weather and ran an 11 hour, 250 mile birding marathon triangle from Richland Center to Prairie Du Chien to La Crosse and back.  

I started out at Wyalusing State park where I spent less than 15 minutes between entering the park and leaving it. It was way too windy for passerines and the river was still pretty frozen. 

The road to the boat landing did have a mixed flock of Robins and Cedar Waxwings though.  

The boat landing had only ice fishermen. 

Then I headed south to Bagley where I picked up my only White-winged Crossbill of the day. 

A Backwards loop through Patch Grove proved futile except for a flock of Snow Buntings and some Horned Larks. 

Stopping at the Villa Louis again, I quickly picked out 3 Wood Ducks among all the Mallards and then took the time to find the Black Duck too.  Out by the bridge, I picked up Common Goldeneye, Hooded Merganser and Canada Goose. 

Over at Dennis Kirschbaum's house, I picked up a flock of Common Redpolls and was attempting to find a Hoary when a Sharp-shinned Hawk breezed through at flushed everything. 

Figuring it was pointless to stay, I headed North.  Mostly ice-covered river, a few Gadwall, 200 Bald Eagles and not a single Crossbill later, I arrived at Goose Island in La Crosse. All the water was frozen though and it was pretty pointless to stay.  I turned North again and headed up to French Island to check out another Hoary Redpoll (thanks for the directions Dan). Finding the feeders devoid of birds, I cruised around in search of the flock. No go. They were gone. Since it was getting pretty late, I headed home. 

On County ZZ, about 5 mins from home, I spotted my 3rd species of Owl for the year sitting on a snag, silhouetted against the quickly darkening sky. 

I don't think I have any need to tell you what species it is. The photo says it all. 

Happy Birding! 

Catching up

Man, I am waay behind on posts these days.  It's only likely to get worse too.  Since I'll be gone so much this summer, I be able to post only when I have a chance. Who knows how often that will be.  So while I'm catching up here......

I've gotten through the state birds I got at the convention. Here's some random pictures from the convention:

First this N  Parula:

I managed to catch him flying:

Yay! A Black-throated Blue Warbler!!

Chestnut-sided:

You guys know this one right? 

Blackburnian!

Again:

And again!: 

Lastly, this Magnolia: 

The WSO's 69th annual convention was a blast!  I'll be posting the rest of my pictures on my website soon. I'll post the link when I do.