Rare Bird - Kirtland's Warber

If you thought that the Nerds went to Ohio and stopped there, you are mistaken. We left Magee Marsh on Sunday and headed out to Michigan (another 4 hours in the car) to see a very rare bird - the Kirtland's Warbler. There are only about 2,000 of these birds in the world. The bird is rare due to it's limited geography for nesting and wintering sites. The warbler winters exclusively in the Bahamas and nests ONLY in certain pine forests in Michigan. Although it would probably be really cool to see one in Bahamas in January, Michigan is cheaper so we went to Michigan.

Nerds in Michigan

The best way to see the bird is to join an Audubon tour which takes you out to the nesting grounds. The tour starts at the Hartwick State Forest visitor center where we watched a short film about Kirtland's Warblers. It was eye opening. The film showed forest destruction by timber companies and fires devastating the landscape. All of which turned out to be GOOD for the warblers! Why? Because they only nest in areas where pine trees are between 5 and 20 feet tall. Once the trees get taller, the warblers won't breed there. They also rely on big territories of this habitat, which logging and fires provide. Here is a view of the nesting area. Not what you would expect for a warbler.

Jack Pine regrowth area

We went out to the field with the Audubon Naturalist and immediately heard a few Kirtland's singing. It was difficult to spot them but this guy popped into a bare tree for a bit. Can you see him? He is sitting on the left side.

Kirtland's Warbler

Here is a cropped shot. The photo is lousy, but you can see the bird singing. I would have liked a closer look but at least we saw one of the 2,000 remaining birds.

Kirtland's Warbler

The good news here is that the forest service is actively managing habitat for the warblers and the logging companies are making money too. A win-win situation. A few Kirtland's Warblers have even found nesting sites in Wisconsin and Ontario which is the first time ever recorded outside of Michigan. Both of those locations also have managed logging programs in place. Hopefully, this little warbler will continue to thrive.

Lori's Version of Heaven

Our whole trip to Magee Marsh was precipitated by Lori's obsession with warblers. She really can't get enough of the little buggers. She goes to local parks like Peace Valley. She goes to Cape May. Everywhere she goes, she hears the same thing - "if you want to see warblers up close, you gotta go to Magee". So, she planned the trip and off we went. You already saw some photos from our first day. Here are some more from the boardwalk.

Bay-breasted Warbler - Male

Bay-breasted Warbler - Female

Chestnut-sided Warbler

Black-throated Blue Warbler - Male

Magnolia Warbler

These birds were really close. I mean so close that Lori was running around taking photos of warblers with her iPhone. Check these out:

Here she is trying a "selfie" with a Prothonotary warbler. Barbara took this one. You can see the warbler in the background.

Lori and friend

Here is the photo that Lori took at the same time.  Look how happy she looks!

Lori and Prothonotary Warbler

Heaven, pure heaven. You can't do this at Higbee. You can't do this at Peace Valley.

Warbler Quest

The Nerds have been talking about going to Magee Marsh in Ohio for a few years but could never get the trip together. Thanks to Lori's persistence, we got the trip scheduled for this weekend. Only 3 of us could make it - me, Lori and Barbara - the nut jobs.

The three of us worked all day on Friday, met at my house at 8:30 and drove all night to the shores of Lake Erie in Ohio so that we could be there Saturday morning.  Let me tell you about our luck - we arrived at 4:30 AM  in the pouring rain! We can't catch a break.

Soggy Magee Marsh

We stood under a canopy looking at Thrushes with the Amish. Oh, you read that right - the place was crawling with Amish all decked out in their black oil cloth coats and pants and plastic rain guards on their straw hats. Don't be fooled - they all had really high end optics. Who knew the Amish were birders?

Amish mingling with the English (Barbara and Lori)

I was giving up hope of seeing anything but then, I remembered what Scott Whittle told me - Magee is great in the rain. The rain let up around 8:30 but the leaves were still dripping - warblers that is. The whole place was filled with birds. What a delight!

The birds were all over the place. They were really close. Here are just a few photos from the day.

Magnolia Warbler (aka Maggie)

 Prothonotary Warblers are named for some Olde English notary who wears a yellow hood.

Prothonotary Warbler

American Redstart

 This Scarlet Tanager sat and preened for over 10 minutes. The red was blinding in the overcast lighting.

Scartlet Tanager

 Tennessee Warblers are usually hard to photograph, but not at Magee Marsh boardwalk.

Tennessee Warbler

 Wilson's Warblers are easy to identify with their black yamakas.

Wilson's Warbler

 Yellow warblers were literally everywhere along the boardwalk.

Yellow Warbler

I am overwhelmed with photos and stories to share from our trip. More to come soon.

World Series 2014 - A New High

Frankly, there were a few new things this year including a new team member.  Unfortunately, Barbara and Tara couldn't make it this year but Harvey stepped up in their place. Unbeknownst to Harvey, he was going to be on the team anyway we just had to find the right way to hook him. We used some good bait. No, not the kind of bait that women use on men. The kind that birders use on other birders. The kind that fun people use on other fun people. We used the oldest ploy - the "we're shorthanded and need help" ploy. He never saw it coming. He certainly didn't see it on Friday when I texted him about scouting shorebirds. He didn't see it at 3 AM on Saturday when he picked us up in HIS VAN!

WSB - Philly Bird Nerds 2014

He started to get wary when we gave him the camo bucket hat that Barbara and Di got him with the team logo on it. I think he started to so come to his senses around 3 PM. He was delirious by 7. We ended the day at 9 M with a new high total - 147. Di and Lori were both terrific all day. They had plenty of energy, kept Harvey laughing so he would keep driving, picked out a ton of birds AND didn't want to quit until we got an owl - which we finally did at 8:30 PM.

As usual, the day before and the day after the World Series was great. Great weather and great birds. The actual day was overcast with wind and periods of rain which made tallying the birds difficult.

We started slow in the wee hours and then picked up steam with a ton of warblers at Higbee. On any other day, we would have been tickled but on the Big Day the only thing we think about is what we missed. We didn't get Bald Eagle. We didn't get Killdeer. We didn't get Cedar Waxwing. We didn't get 2 ducks that we found easily the day before. But we did try new things (ask the others about 5 Hour Energy), we had a ton of laughs and got a new teammate ( oh yeah, we'll rope him in again next year).

You'll notice no photos from the day. The pace was too fast, we got alot of birds by hearing them rather than seeing them, and the weather was terrible. Here are some photos from Sunday morning which was an awesome migration day, awesome weather, and cooperative birds.

Indigo Bunting (with floss?)

Prairie Warbler

Scarlet Tanager

Feel free to sponsor the team with a donation. Send me a check. We will forward them on to a conservation fund later. We haven't picked one yet but we will soon.

Cinco de Mayo - Only 5 Days to World Series

May is finally here and yet I'm wearing a jacket. We just opened the shore house this weekend. Normally, we would have been down there already but not in this cold. The birds are coming - slowly. The nerds were in Cape May this weekend and had some new arrivals. Yellow ones like Prairie Warbler.

Prairie Warbler

And this odd ball - singing female Oriole. I didn't think females sang but here she is.

Female Oriole - singing? 

And blue ones like this Indigo Bunting. I found this guy hanging on to some tall grass. He is so brilliant!

Indigo Bunting

This Blue Grosbeak is supposed to be just as blue as the bunting but - not so much. He must be a young male who hasn't gotten all of his blue feathers yet but he certainly had his song going. He sat there singing away. What lady would cozy up to this guy?

Blue Grosbeak

Another blue bird is this Bluebird - get it? Blue bird, Bluebird? Huh? Here is he singing away at Villas.

Bluebird

Along with the Bluebirds, we also saw an Osprey show. We watched a pair of Osprey "dance" around in the air above the lake. This one crossed paths with a Purple Martin. You can tell its an Osprey by the pattern under the wings.

Osprey and Purple Martin

He swung around and looked right into the lens! He looks pissed but Ospreys always look pissed. They never look happy even when they are dancing.

Osprey

 As for early scouting for World Series of Birding - one Red-necked Grebe is still hanging around. I hope he stays put for another 5 days before flying north. He's a beaut!

Red-necked Grebe

Get those checkbooks out. We have an unusual team this year - me, Diane, Lori and a new addition - Harvey!  We expect to get alot of birds for the competition and hope that you can support us with a pledge for bird conservation!  More scouting reports to come.

The Rest of the Crazy Weekend

As I said in the last post, this past weekend was filled with birding events. We started on Friday night with a warbler workshop. The authors of The Warbler Guide - Scott Whittle and Tom McPherson presented a workshop at John Heinz Refuge about identifying warblers by their song. It was a good presentation. 80 people attended.  Some of us met at Belleplain State Park in Cape May County on Saturday morning for the second part of the workshop. Scott and Tom took us through the park listening for warblers. We used some of the skills that we learned to identify the birds. It went pretty well although there weren't many varieties of warblers in the woods yet. I think it is still too early for them. We saw and heard a ton of Black and White Warblers. This one caught a bug for breakfast.

Black & White Warbler with bug

 We also found this little toad which is kind of cute.

Toad - Belleplain State Forest

After the field trip on Sat, I went to Delran NJ to count Great Blue Heron nests. I had  sites to go to. The first one was totally clear cut for a new housing development - no birds there. The second spot was behind someone's house. I knocked on the door and the homeowner gave me permission to go slogging through the swamp to look for nests. No nests there either. The third location was a little island in the Delaware River just off of Dredge Harbor. Success! I counted 62 nests in the trees and saw 25 Great Blue Herons either sitting on or near a nest.  Whew, I was starting to think I wouldn't get to count any. You can kind of see the nests in the trees.

Amico Island Heron Nests

This Cooper's Hawk flew over head with half of a meal still in it's talons. You can see a little bird foot dragging behind the wing. Yuck, but the hawk has to eat too.

Cooper's Hawk with lunch

As part of the workshop series, the DVOC asked me to help lead a bird walk at John Heinz Refuge (Tinicum) on Sunday. I was glad that they decided to have me, Patty and Steve lead a photo group. That is more up my alley than trying to identify a ton of birds for birders.  We had a small but enthusiastic group. We saw some good birds and I think they had fun. We found some easy to photograph birds like these swallows.

Tree Swallow

Barn Swallow

We photographed some birds in the air like this Osprey and Turkey Vulture.

Osprey with nesting materials

Turkey Vulture

We photographed some signing birds like this wren and blackbird.

House Wren

Rusty Blackbird

And we also tried to photograph little flitty birds in trees. This is the most difficult. The first photo is Blue-gray Gnatcatcher sitting on her new nest. Look at how she puts her long tail straight up in the air since it doesn't fit inside the nest.

Blue-gray Gnatcatcher - on nest

Here is one of the many Yellow Warblers that we saw along the trail. They were flying around so fast that we hardly had a chance to snap a photo. This guy cooperated for a few minutes.

Yellow Warbler

I think some of the group learned a few techniques, like move to another position if the bird is blocked by a branch and move closer if possible. Here is Patty imparting some wisdom.

Photo group - Tinicum

All in all it was a good day. And then I found the owls which was the icing on the cake.

Fun With Owls

This weekend was packed with major birding events. It started on Friday night with a Warbler Workshop followed by a field trip to Belleplain State Park on Saturday and another field trip on Sunday to Tinicum. I'll tell you all about that in the next post. This post is all about what happened after the big weekend when I was supposed to be casually visiting my friends in Elkins Park. I borrowed a sump pump from Tim so that I could drain and clean the pond - which I did in between all of the bird events.

I stopped over to Tim and Amy's around 6 PM. I was telling them about how we saw a Great Horned Owl nest on our field trip. Amy said that she had never seen an owl. Now, I know that they have owls in their neighborhood because I've heard them hooting. Just then, we heard a bunch of crows going crazy. I boldly said - you wanna see an owl? We walked to the end of the street in the direction of the crows and there is was - an adult Great Horned Owl being harassed.  Man, I looked like a genius! Luckily, Barbara's scope was in the back of the car, so I set it up on the sidewalk so that Amy could get a good look at the owl.

Then I remembered that I had the iPhone adaptor, so we took some video to show to Evelyn (HH) who was preparing dinner for the gang. Click on the video to play it.

You can imagine that 3 people with a spotting scope on the sidewalk in Elkins Park PA would draw some attention. It did. We showed about a dozen people the owl as they walked past with dogs and kids. People stopped their car to ask us what we were doing.  It was fun to show the kids an owl. But it got even more fun when we found the nest hole with a fluffy baby owl sitting in it!

The baby was a crowd-pleaser for sure. The neighborhood kids couldn't get enough of the owlet. The dads couldn't get enough of the scope with the iPhone attachment. Here is a photo of both.

Enthusiastic Owl Watchers - Elkins Park PA

The baby never did take his first flight while we were there. He wanted to. He should be out of the nest today. I'm going back to check on them and will keep you posted. Thanks again to Barbara for allowing me to keep the scope in my car. This would have never been a success without it.

Texas Round Up

Final Texas post. We made it back to Philly last night after a long day of traveling. Here are a few final photos from the trip. Here are a few non-avian critters. This butterfly landed on the hood of the van while we were at the San Antonio Botanical Garden.

Butterfly

This one is a little more icky. A Diamondbacked Water Snake with half his lunch still hanging out of his mouth. It looks like lunch was a perch.

Diamondback Water Snake - with fish

I walked right past this iconic critter of the south - the Armadillo. Lori spotted it digging for ants just off the trail. This is a life critter for me and really cute.

Armadillo

Believe it or not, the trip included non-birding activities. The girls took a trail ride one day that I will let them tell you all about. I didn't go. Horses and me don't mix. I think I inherited that from my mother.

On the trail

Connie and I spent the hour and a half that they were riding in the antique shops in the local town. I thought they might want an ice cold beer after the ride. They appreciated every drop!

Ice Cold Beers!

We also went to Austin for a day so that Di and Barbara could visit a friend who moved there. The rest of us did some sight seeing. One of the sites not to be missed is the Congress Ave Bridge which crosses the river right in the middle of town. There is nothing unusual or spectacular about the bridge itself except at dusk when over a million Mexican Free-tailed Bats come pouring out of it. This is a nightly occurrence that is attended by hundreds of people. This video is just a snippet. It went on like this for 20 minutes.

After the bat cave - we made the long drive back to San Antonio but not before stopping at the famous "Buc-ees" rest stop. We had a rundown of Buc-ees attractions from the owner of Warbler Woods (don't ask). She told us all about the private bathroom stalls, and how you can order a sandwich from a computer, and get gas, and they have all kinds of snacks. It all sounded like a Wawa to us. We giggled until we actually saw the place. It is HUGE. They have over 120 gas pumps and the 3rd cleanest bathrooms in the country (now I want to see #1 and #2). Here is a shot of the gas pumps.

Buc-ees Gas Pumps

Here is a shot of about 1/4 of the stalls in the Lades Restroom. You really get an individual stall.

Buc-ees Bathroom

Oh, you must ask Barbara about her new Detroit Redwing friend and the written warning she got after leaving Buc-ees without turning on the headlights to the van.

Detroit Redwings fan (left), Flyers fan (right)

A few more bird photos round out the trip. The first is a Bewick's Wren that popped up to scold me when I was waiting for the girls to get mounted up on the horses.

Bewick's Wren

Here is an Eastern Phoebe waiting for us to move off of the deck at a local Nature Center so that she could feed the babies in the nest that she built above the door.

Eastern Phoebe

There are Crested Caracara all over Texas. This one hung out on a utility pole at Mitchell Lake.

Crested Caracara

Another encounter with one of our target birds on our last day and the best photo of them all.

Golden-cheeked Warbler

Final photo is female Scissor-tailed Flycatcher in flight - unmistakable!

Scissor-tailed Flycatcher

We rounded out the trip with 162 species. No bad.