Crested coua photographed by Josh Engel of Tropical Birding.
Last week, Josh Engel gave a dynamite talk on the natural history of Madagascar to the Evanston North Shore Bird Club. (As program chairman, I was amazed that 70 people turned out. I usually have to bribe people with food to get that kind of crowd.) As I heard Josh talk, I could not help but think of my own visit there in October 1987 with Phoebe Snetsinger. Some things have changed and some have not.
The most important emphasis must be on what has not changed: Madagascar remains a remarkable destination for anyone who loves nature. Something like 85% of all the species (that is an aggregate of all taxa) that are native occur no where else in the world. It is the fourth largest island in the world, having broken off from the Indian sub-continent some 80-100 million years ago. The long isolation has led to the extraordinary degree of endemism. Another way to express this is that the country hosts 5% of all the planet’s plant and animal species.
What is, in my mind, more amazing still are the biogeographic anomalies. For example, Madagascar has a boa constrictor, a snake that is otherwise an exclusive inhabitant of the Western Hemisphere. The tour I was with actually saw one. Another strange group of animals which we did not see is the tenrec or Madagascar hedgehog, of which there are about twenty species. Their closest relatives are the solendons (there are two species, one of which is paradoxus ). These bizarre looking critters are restricted to Cuba and Hispaniola.
Back in 1987 there had been only two recent bird extinctions: the snail eating coua which lived on a small island off-shore and the Madagascar pochard last noted in 1970. Two other species, the red owl and serpent eagle, were so rare their status was unknown. The last record for the owl had been something like fifty years before and in “deep forest reached by a 50 km hike west of Perinet.” (I told the group leader, that no matter what else we saw, I would be disappointed if we missed the red owl.) Josh showed us slides of massive deforestation going on in much of the country, yet there have been no new avian extinctions and the red owl and serpent eagle have been rediscovered. Further, it turns out that a tiny population of pochards has been recently found in a previously unexplored lake. At some point it would seem inevitable that loss of habitat will lead to extinctions but apparently there is enough left to support just about everything known to have ever been there. And increased scientific scrutiny leads to new discoveries on a regular basis.
So most if not all of the wildlife that was there in 1987 remains and much of it is easier to access, as tourism has grown over the decades. Twenty-three years ago Air Madagascar consisted of three planes leased from Air France. When I was there the president of the country decided he needed one, thereby reducing the total fleet by a third. This meant that we had to fly into the capital Antananarivo (Tana) every time we were shifting to a different part of the country. So in other words, from Tana to Berenty in the south, back to Tana. Then to Fort Dauphin in the north and back to Tana etc. There were only two hotels in the capital that catered to westerners- Hotel Colbert for French speakers and the Hilton for English speakers. Josh tells me that the number has now grown to about six and the Hilton is now the Carlton.
Sickle-billed vanga photographed by Josh Engel of Tropical Birding.
After landing in Tana, our first destination was a wonderful place called Ankarafantsika. Unfortunately, between necessary errands and bad roads, we did not arrive until late afternoon. But even at that less than optimal time of the day, the reserve was mesmerizing. I photographed a Van Dam’s vanga on the nest, which our leader said might be the first such photograph ever taken. (Vangas are a family related to shrikes that are endemic to Madagascar.) The sickle-billed vanga, which sounds like a baby crying, was easily found as it played woodpecker with its outsized beak. And then there were all the chameleons and lemurs: on our very first excursion I was seeing the treasures I had been reading about for years. It is one thing for a place to host exotic creatures; it is another to actually see them on your first leisurely stroll.
Ankarafantsika dripped treasure wherever we looked, so it was obvious we needed to spend the night to even sample what was present. The only two accommodation options were tents or a brothel. Now, I harbor no illusions here- a rural brothel in a desperately poor country would probably be indescribably depressing, but I thought it would make for a great story. In the end, Phoebe Snetsinger (this was her first trip to Madagascar and she had a spirit of adventure second to none) and I were outvoted by our more pragmatic compatriots. I wound up spending the night awake in my tent, anyway, attending to my camera. So it is likely that neither venue would have allowed much sleep, and I will concede that the nocturnal chorus of the forest is undoubtedly more edifying than the alternative. Josh informs me that there are now guest houses at Ankarafantsika so the consideration of off site lodging is no longer even necessary.
Two other highlights of the trip involved lemurs. At Berenty, on the south, ring-tailed lemurs have become so habituated to people they will run up your tripod. Being so close to wild animals, when such proximity provokes no alarm in either species, is always a rare treat. And at the end of our trip we visited the rain forest at Perinet, in the northeast of the country. The haunting visage of the forest, enveloped by heavy cloaks of fog, would have been special even in silence. But the screams of indri transformed the scene into something only remotely related to the world I knew. Try to imagine hump-backed whales singing in the muted light of a forest at dawn. It is not easy.
Indri photographed by Keith Barnes of Tropical Birding.
Ring-tailed lemur at Berenty photographed by Keith Barnes of Tropical Birding.
Snowy owl photographed by John Cassady.
When I started blogging last May, I feared that inevitable moment when nothing I had done over the week warranted a blog posting. I knew this would arrive sometime in the winter and by golly here we are. I have been working almost exclusively on my passenger pigeon book the past month, which limits being outside anyway. I told Andy Sigler I had to go out in the field, and his response was that everyone feels that way, but when they spend all day in problematic weather and don’t see anything worthwhile, they regret having made the effort. (It is good having such supportive friends.)
So far this winter has been marked by absences. I have commented before that the white-winged crossbills last year kept a lot of folks entertained for months. Kelly McKay told me one was seen this past December on a Christmas count in northwest Illinois, but otherwise I have not heard of any winter finches except a handful of pine siskins at a feeder near Waukegan. Then there are always the bald eagles on the Mississippi River. Not real close, but a few hour drive to see hundreds of these magnificent birds is worth doing at least once a winter. This year, though, people have been lamenting the low numbers.
Up until a few years ago there would usually be a snowy owl or two on the lakefront. Indeed, every snowy owl I had ever seen was on the shores of big water- either Humboldt Bay in northern California, Lake Michigan, Lake Calumet, or Lake Superior. But most recently the snowy owls have lingered inland. Two winters ago, I was minding my own business on the computer when I checked IBET (the Illinois birders listserve) to discover that a snowy owl was perched on the roof of a religious tract store in a shopping center five minutes from me. After hunting for it a bit, I spotted the bird on the ledge of an apartment building. Several people managed to see it, but unfortunately not Andy, for whom it would have been a county bird. But here we are at the beginning of February and nary a snowy owl anywhere.
One winter the hot bird that kept people excited was a gray colored gyrfalcon that Cindy Alberico found in LaSalle County, Illinois. The bird foraged on waterfowl drawn to the area by a nuclear power plant cooling lake. It would be a state bird for me so I drove down five times. On my second to last excursion I pulled into the open parking lot by the cooling lake and began scanning the dike that surrounds the water. In a little while, an official utility truck pulled up and a man emerged with an automatic rifle. He informed me that I was trespassing. I suppose I could have responded by singing the famous Woody Guthrie song that explores property rights, but doubting the efficacy of that tact, I merely left. (Heavily armed men can afford to me insensitive to the nuances of folk music.)
The day proved bittersweet. The larger world recalls February 1, 2003 as the day the Space Shuttle Columbia exploded on its reentry into the earth’s atmosphere. (It was not a good time to be a rocket scientist, no matter how smart they are. But then the failures of brain surgeons rarely receive international attention.) I listened to NPR’s coverage of the disaster as I slowly cruised the nearly empty snow-covered roads. And then suddenly there it was, perched on a small mound in the middle of a wind-swept corn field. I jumped out of the car with the scope and had a very quick but adequate view of the gyr. I decided to walk across the frozen ground to get closer, but did not want to leave the car with its open windows and key in the ignition. I turned my head for a brief moment to extract the keys, and when I looked back into the scope the bird had vanished. I never saw it again. And for that matter, no one else did either.
![W.B. Mershon's personal rail car on a hunting expedition to North Dakota in the 1890s (Courtesy of Geneology Collection of Saginaw [Michigan] Public Library)](http://www.birdzilla.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/mershon-jpg.jpg "mershon jpg")
W.B. Mershon's personal rail car on a hunting expedition to North Dakota in the 1890s (Courtesy of Geneology Collection of Saginaw [Michigan
Earlier I wrote of my trip to Saginaw to examine the papers of William Butts Mershon, who among many other things was the first great historian of the passenger pigeon. He loved the out of doors, and pursued hunting and fishing with all the vast resources at his disposal. He was a self-admitted “game hog”, back in the day when few people knew any better. He bought a railroad car and took it on hunting trips; this photo depicts such an outing to North Dakota. (The photo is used with permission of the Public Libraries of Saginaw, MI, Local History and Genealogical Collection). But when it became clear that the profligate slaughter engaged in by “sportsmen” and market hunters alike was ridding the country of its wildlife, he became a passionate proponent of conservation measures. (In fact, many of those involved in the last-minute effort to save the passenger pigeons from extinction had a history of shooting them.)
Well it turns out that most of Mershon’s papers are not in Saginaw, but rather at the Bentley Historical Library at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor. (I accidentally learned that fact in the course of perusing a 1954 doctoral dissertation.) So that is where I headed recently. It only took me three and a half hours to get there, and the motel was only five minutes from the library.
One of the pleasures of this ppigeon project has been the people I have encountered in my searches for information. Don Gorney is a birding friend who lives in Indianapolis and likes the historical aspect of natural history. (Several weeks ago, I stayed at his home and he accompanied me to Bloomington, IN where we spent a day combing the files of Amos Butler, the father of Indiana ornithology.) It turns out his sister Terry is also a very accomplished genealogist and nature historian. She has provided me some excellent ppigeon accounts that she has unearthed in her research. I casually asked if she wanted to spend a day doing research in Ann Arbor (she lives in Ft. Wayne) and it turned out she was able to join me. So we were set to meet at the library when it opened on Monday morning.
The trip to Ann Arbor also provided the opportunity to meet a friend of longstanding whom I have not seen in well over a decade. Darlene Friedman, a birder who grew up on the north side of Chicago, is a veterinarian who lives about twenty miles from Ann Arbor. We met at my motel and then had dinner at a neat place called Zingerman’s, which at its roots is a Jewish deli but whose capacious shelves and coolers now hold numerous olive oils, cheeses, and other comestibles desired by today’s cosmopolitan gourmet.
Darlene has been an avid birder since I first met her in June 1973 (some day I will go into my spiel on the rarity of young female birders). She is a serious state lister but over the last couple of years has devoted a lot of effort to photography. That seems to be a common development among birders. Once you have seen just about all there is in your area, your emphasis changes. If you have the resources, you can chase birds all over the world. Or you go in the other direction and become a county lister like my friend Andy Sigler. Some folks are captivated by temporal lists, most particularly one’s annual total or big days. Especially with the forgiving medium of digital cameras, many like Darlene have become serious photographers. Another local birder, Donnie Dann, devotes a lot of his time to conservation issues. My birding has also changed over the decades. I have a greater interest in broader natural history and I obviously am enthralled by ecological changes, particularly those wrought by people.
The white-winged crossbill invasion last winter is a perfect example of how different birding orientations manifested themselves. Andy and his fellow county listers searched the internet, seeking the locations of central Illinois cemeteries- a land use type likely to have conifers, the required food of the crossbills. At one place, Andy and Mike Baum sat by a cemetery looking and listening for a good long while, and were ready to leave when Mike heard something fall from a tree. It was a chewed up cone, and further scanning yielded the crossbill. Darlene, on other hand, spent many hours in places that she knew hosted the crossbills and took many hundreds, if not thousands, of pictures, including the beauty that appears here.
Crane Creek in northwest Ohio is a location Darlene targets often, in that it affords wonderful opportunities to photograph the myriad of migrants that have given the site a national reputation. In fact, she laments the growing crowds of birders, who make effective photography more challenging. But you can see by the results, it remains a terrific spot. One evening was hardly enough to catch up on so many years, but we did resolve to keep in touch on a regular basis (hopefully, that will be more than my constant noodging for blog photos).
Bright and early Monday, I was in the parking lot of the Bentley Library waiting for it to open, when a car with IN plates pulled in next to me. It was Terry and we hit it off immediately. (Indeed, several times during the day, we were admonished (some what unfairly we, think) by librarians to keep our voices down) There were many boxes of Mershon’s material, which you order one at a time. Ten or so boxes contained “letter books”, an early attempt at making copies. As I understand it, typed letters were pressed onto special onion skin-like paper that held the writing. The other boxes contained other kinds of material, including letters sent to him. Terry started looking at the box that covered the years he began researching his 1907 ppigeon book. I began with the letter books, and despaired that it would take probably weeks to go through them all. But after a few hours, being the highly observant individual I am, I noticed lettered tabs at the end of the volume. Could it be? Yes, next to each tab were the names of the various people to whom he sent letters and the page on which it appeared. They were indexed! So what was going to take forever was now doable in hours.
The specific thing we were looking for was correspondence between Mershon and Henry B. Roney, the music teacher who visited the last great pigeon nesting in 1878 in Petoskey, MI in order to stop the killing. Both men lived in Saginaw at the time, and I strongly suspect Mershon helped finance Roney’s mission. Soon thereafter, however, Roney, moved to Chigago, where he worked as a music director for a large church and then organized his boy’s choir that traveled the world to great aclaim. I wondered if they kept in touch and whether Roney retained his interest in conservation. Terry hit pay dirt first- finding a letter from Roney, with its distinctive letterhead promoting the choir. A brief correspondence ensued, sparked by Mershon’s request for a copy of Roney’s article on the Petoskey nesting. I found a few letters that Mershon wrote, and was confident that by the following day I would have been able to complete the letterbooks (the other boxes, I was forgoing). Terry returned to Fort Wayne, and I headed back to the motel fully expecting to finish up the next day. Unfortunately, the threat of bad weather prompted me to cut my trip short. But another excursion is in the offiing.
White-winged crossbill photographed by Darlene Friedman.
American redstart at Crane Creek State Park (OH) in May 2008 photographed by Darlene Friedman.
Tags: Ann Arbor, boys choir, Henry B. Roney, W.B. Mershon, white-winged crossbill
Frank Abderholden of the Waukegan News just sent me these amazing photos of a black-billed magpie, golden eagle, and red fox, purportedly taken by a hunter in Montana using a camera phone. The photographer is unidentified.
Accipiter versus robin (photo by Tim Wallace on Jan 1, 2010)
My last surviving parent died last January. I talk occasionally to my sister in Arizona and I keep in touch with one cousin who lives locally. Otherwise, the longest continuous thread in my life is as a birder and particularly my participation in Christmas Bird Counts. I went on my first CBC in 1967, a year after I started birding. It was the Evanston North Shore Count, and by 1969 or so I was covering the same basic territory I do today. So I can not help but feel nostalgic when CBC time comes around and afterwards I think about the changes.
Maybe six years ago, I was with Caroline Fields when we were checking the remnants of what had once been a highly productive conifer plantation in Lake Forest (west of Route 43, between Half Day and Old Mill Roads). I commented that on one cold day we had a northern goshawk there on the count. She asked when that was. Forced to think about it a moment, I sheepishly replied, “1968.” Houses now surround the site, and though there are still some pines left, they have been so thinned I no longer even make a visit.
Then there was the horse farm I checked out during the Waukegan Count. One year we found eight Brewer’s blackbirds, a very rare bird on CBCs in northeastern Illinois. Amazingly, they showed up again next year as well. The third year, however, they were gone- but so was the farm, replaced by a subdivision that retains the name of the farm. (My late friend Hollis Baker once said that there ought to be a prohibition against naming a development after something it destroyed. I still bristle at names like Egret Acres or Oak Knoll Estates)
It is not surprising, of course, that vegetation gives way to the inexorable oozing of anthropogenic structures across the landscape. But the unexpected still happens. I mentioned in the blog that on the North Shore count we park at one end and then walk towards cars at the other along a narrow bank squeezed between backyard fences and the channel of the West Fork of the North Branch of the Chicago River (as far as I know, that particular river system does not have any named twigs). One year we parked in the regular spot, just south of Lake-Cook Road. We then drove to our northern parking location to begin the hike. Imagine the surprise when we followed the channel to its intersection with Lake-Cook only to find the car a quarter of a mile west of where we were expecting. The river course itself had been altered over the intervening year.
Although more ephemeral, the people I do this with have changed greatly as well. When I started participating in the North Shore CBC, the team leader was Richard Horowitz, the person who started me birding in November 1966. He would drop me and whomever else was unfortunate enough to be along at a point along the West Fork north of where we go today: there were places along that route where you literally had to drop to hands and knees to avoid sliding into the water. Of course, being teenagers, we found the task to be merely a bit challenging and not the impossibility it would be today. Richard has long since left this area, and has been on the staff of the Philadelphia Academy of Sciences for his entire career.
Tim Wallace, a veterinarian, has been a great companion in recent years on the Waukegan count when he is not scheduled to be on standby at his clinic. He is also a regular on North Shore but he covers a different portion than I do. Indeed there are times when I assign possible comrades to other areas needing people, thereby leaving me worrying if I will have anyone. And for the ferrying operation, I do need at least one other person for a minimum of an hour or so. Fortunately the Willinks eagerly agreed to come. Last year it was Jennifer Schmidt, who over the last few seasons has managed to make either North Shore or Waukegan.
Given the role that the CBCs have played for me, I am a little concerned that they don’t generate the excitement they used to. It seems every year the burden of compiling gets a little bit more unpleasant. For the Waukegan CBC, permission to cover various areas requires contacting eight different entities- forest preserve district, US Navy, electric utility, state park, two different corporate sites, private park, and religious college. (It is true that some of those entities are used to us by now and permission is easily granted and a number of the team leaders are now making direct contacts themselves.) The birds aren’t as good as they used to be, and it is more physically demanding to cover some of the same ground. Maybe that is at the heart of my malaise- the counts remind that I am getting old. So what else is new?
Owlers Tim "Andean llama herder" (or Heidi wannabe)Wallace and Jennifer "I am not frozen yet" Schmidt with blue moon over her left shoulder on Jan. 1, 2010.
Rich Biss, Gary Hantsbarger, and Joe Suchecki at the Waukegan CBC countdown on Jan 1, 2010.
Incentives for completing CBC regardless of the weather (Waukegan CBC countdown)
After two very wet CBCs, I was quite pleased that the Waukegan count, held on January 1, would be dry. But there was a catch associated with this, my final count fo the period: the day was bitterly cold. When I met my group, Tim Wallace and Jennifer Schmidt, to go owling at Old School Forest Presaerve, the temperature was 5 degrees. A full moon (indeed a blue moon) made it seem a tad warmer but more in hind sight than at the time.
Owling is a sure way to get chilled on a cold night- you go in and out of the warmer car and stand around as, in my primitive case, the cassette recorder plays screech owl sounds. While strong winds can be a killer for both one’s personal comfort and the ability to induce the owls to respond, even a calm night might prove fruitless. Fortuanetly, we heard one owl and then had a bigger treat when a pair began calling over our heads. They flew around a bit and we had as good a view as possible in the dark without a light,
My territory on this count encompasses roads on either side of the Des Plaines River, from Route 120 on the north to Route 176 on the south, For many years, we would start walking along the river at the southern end and go all the way to the north, arriving seven hours after we began. For those who agreed to accompany me, it became known as the killer march. Now we walk only the southern third and access various points to the north by car. If enough people participate, we generally divide into two groups, one on either side of the river. (Mike Solomon, on his second and last time as a participant, enthusiastically proclaimed that the walk is more fun than a colonoscopy.)
The walk has had its trying moments. One year, I did the west side myself and assigned my two companions the east side. While one was searching for a winter wren discovered by the other, she slipped on the frozen bank and slid into the river. The bank was undercut so she could not climb out; nor could she move latterly because the bottom was so soft. Paramedics were called and they rescued her. I did not know any of this was happening so imagine my surprise when as I approached the end, I heard my name being shouted through a loudspeaker. I quickened my pace to see a police officer standing by the side of the road calling me. He explained that Margo had fallen into the river and was currently at a hospital, but she was all right. He took me there and Margo was indeed ok. In fact, when she was released she drove home to change and was back in the field to join us for our final hour of the day.
Nothing nearly that dramatic happened this time. We were joined at day break by Frank Abderholden, a reporter for the News-Sun newspaper who has become a friend. Among his other duties at the paper, he writes an outdoors column and usually does a story on the count. I decided that we would bird as a group rather than splitting up, in part because the east side would be difficult given that the river was in flood. We walked along the formal bike trail, but at one point it too was so inundated it looked impassable. In thirty years we have never had to go back because of water and I was prepared to wade on through if necessary, letting my companions, all endowed with far more sense, meet me at the next accessible spot. But there had been just enough freezing temperatures to make it possible to find solid ice as we made an arc away from the river.
Two days earlier I had scouted the section and had located a pair of yellow rumped warblers, but they failed to appear. I played my tape recorder and brought in the usual suspects of chickadees, nuthatches, cardinals, robins, and cardinals. The best bird that we lured in was a brown creeper. A flock of robins feeding on berries, included a few cedar waxwings. We also found the results of an interaction between an accipiter and a robin. Although the river was still open, all it produced were small numbers of mallards and Canada geese. We usually get a great-blue heron or kingfisher.
When we arrive at Route 137, where two of the cars were, we took a detour to cover some pines where I had seen a great-horned owl during my scouting outing. But just like the warblers, the owl had vamoosed. (I actually hate finding good birds when scouting- it makes missing them so frustrating. And if the bird is really unusual, I can burn a lot of time looking for it, as I refuse to leave.) But the longer trek proved worthwhile because I spotted a dark rough-legged hawk circling overhead. That is a bird often missed, but during the countdown, we learned that several others were also seen. It seems the frigid weather drove the birds south.
Frank left us when we arrived at the cars and Jennifer stayed for one or two more spots. Tim and I found the day to be kind of slow. Our best bird, and the only one seen by any of the eight other parties, was a northern shrike at one of the species most reliable locations- a cemetery that generally hosts one every second or third year. We also wound up with two sharp-shinned hawks (but not one of the far more common Cooper’s) and a kestrel. We ended the day at a robin roost. Hundreds of robins begin swarming in a small wooded area around 3:30. The only other species to join them are starlings and, on this day, a sharp-shinned hawk. We totaled over 800 robins.
This count also has a dinner and count down. Spouse Cindy and I spend December 31 cooking, and she schleps everything to the countdown venue on the first. So when counters begin showing up they are greeted by a spread of my chili, Cindy’s ham and macaroni and cheese, deserts (my apple crisp, chocolate pate, and white chocolate cheese cake garnished with pomegranates, and her cranberry-walnut pie and gingerbread cake), and assorted dips and other noshes. Only ten counters showed up so we have been living on leftovers, but the count did reach 70 species, including American pipits, eastern bluebirds, black scoter, glaucous gull, bald eagle, and eastern towhee. There are also 70 feeder watchers, but so far nothing new has been added.
Just 350 or so days left before my next CBC. . .
Cedar waxwing seen on Waukegan CBC January 1, 2010 (photo by Tim Wallace)
Tags: cedar waxwing, owling, screech owl
Jolynn Willink scans a Des Plaines River backwater on the Evanston North Shore CBC on December 26, 2009 (Photo by Phil Willink)
The temperature decreased significantly over Christmas night but unfortunately the heavens continued to discharge fluids at an annoying rate. The rain that plagued us on the Chicago Lakefront Count turned into the snow that challenged us on the Evanston North Shore Count. The snow lasted all day, varying only in the size of the flakes that fell. The two days were a study in the various kinds of precipitation possible at this latitude in this season.
The north shore count circle is centered at Routes 68 and 41. My territory is the northwestern third of the circle, with Lake-Cook Road on the south and Rt 41 on the east. It is a big area so it is divided between three groups; everyone meets around two at Ryerson Woods to compile our list before joining the rest of the count participants in the evening.
I met my small group, Jolynn and Phil Willink, at 6:45. We were minutes away from our first stop, which is a water treatment plant that sends it outflow west through a channel that feeds into the Des Plaines River. For thirty years coverage of the site requires lying flat on one’s back to get under a fence. (We quickly separate the dilatants from the true masochists.) Amazingly, however, this year the gate was open so we were spared the squeeze (every year I worry that my untreated Kwashiorkkor will prevent me from fitting). Usually, the channel is filled with ducks which fly towards the river when we flush them. This year, though, there were few ducks in the stream but over t he hours or so we were there hundreds of ducks flew towards us from the west. By the end of the day our section yielded over 950 mallards, hundreds more than any other area.
Soon after getting out of the car I heard a kingfisher, which is a pretty good bird. As the three of us scanned the channel in the muted light, I spotted an odd stump-like shape on the bank. It raised its head and proved to be a sad looking great-blue heron (the first of four for the day) that had been hunkered down to perhaps maximize the heat from the outflow. It then took off on droopy wings, before settling down in a wooded area downstream. Right across from where the heron first stood was the equally forlorn kingfisher. Since Phil is an ichthyologist, it is not surprising that kingfishers are his favorite group of birds.
Our next stop was also a water treatment facility and the stream through which its heated emanations flow. This stream, though, has a name, almost as long as the channel is wide: it is the West Branch of the North Fork of the Chicago River. Most of our walk here is along a very narrow bank between the river and fenced in backyards. Many of the residents consider this linear pathway as a garbage dump for them to discard Christmas trees, lawn waste, and other trash. As we gingerly made our way, we encountered another great-blue heron and added our first and only black duck. At one point, I played my screech owl tape and we drew in a nice flock of chickadees (10), three kinds of woodpeckers, white-breasted nuthatches, and robins. Nothing unusual, but it beefed up our numbers. (In my mind, screech owl recordings are an essential tool in conducting CBCs. A seemingly lifeless wood can suddenly burst into activity after just a few owl whinnies. And the birds that do respond often sit and scold inches from where you stand.)
We headed back to the Des Plaines River and checked various spots. Because the river was in flood stage, it was difficult in places to get as close as we usually do. And the snow carpet left you wondering what was underfoot: dry land or water. Early on, I stepped on what I thought was the former only to get both feet drenched. We did see a common goldeneye on the river, a duck for more at home this time of year on Lake Michigan. But there were no hawks flying and even the land birds were inconspicuous.
The last thing I do before joining the others is to drive around some subdivisions checking for feeders. It is a little discomforting to be playing a screech owl tape in front of some mansion, but it can be very productive. This particular area used to be the best in the circle for tufted titmice, but they are largely a thing of the past here. But at one overgrown lot, I played the tape and almost immediately a hermit thrush flew up in plain view. Later we were to learn that it was the only one seen on the entire count.
At Ryerson we met our colleagues and heard that they had added such species as eastern bluebirds (a good number were recorded by other groups as well), yellow-rumped warbler, and Cooper’s hawk (not rare, but hard to discern through the snow). For the final two hours of the day, we walk along a broad marshy swale that meanders through a corporate complex. We saw yet another great-blue heron and our first kestrel.
The swale is the only significant habitat that remains on the large tract that used to be covered in grasses, marshes, and a few wooded patches. Over the years I have watched that habitat be whittled down to the remnant that remains (and the swale is only there because land use laws require that developers have do something with the water that falls on their property).It was here that the ring-necked pheasant made its final stand within the count circle. For several years, there was a pair. Then, the female disappeared, leaving behind her mate in a world where he was the sole survivor. He hung on for a while, but by the third count, he too was gone.
One of the highlights of the Evanston North Shore Count is the dinner and countdown afterwards. The countdown is conducted in an unusual way: we read off the list from the most to least common to build suspense. And the participants know the etiquette. If asked how your day was, you reply with something like, “Oh, it was all right,” or “Kind of slow. You know, with the snow and all.” You hold your goodies close to the vest. Unfortunately, this year nothing very extraordinary was seen. The total tied last year’s record low (last year we were treated to continuous rain) of 58, but in the days following we picked up a monk parakeet at a feeder and one of the field people reported back with a savanna sparrow. Sixty sounds so much better than 58, don’t you think?
Black-capped chickadee taken by John Cassady.
A riled up Lake Michigan as it lashes Chicago lakeshore on Dec 25, 2009 (photo by Ethan Gyllenhaal)
I hope all of you had an edifying holiday season. Computer problems here at your Blogger’s high tech multi-hundred dollar facility precluded a blog last week, a situation for which I am sorry. Hopefully, though, blogging will now be able to proceed according to schedule.
While the Hanukah candles do generally get lit (although spouse, aka IT-Gal, and I missed some this year, being that we spent three joyous evenings at the Compu Serve store dealing with the aforementioned computer failings), the holiday season for me is really the Christmas Bird Counts (CBCs). Spouse spends Christmas with her family in Ohio or Florida (as was the case this year) so I am left alone to obsess over the three counts that I compile, or help to compile.
The first of my counts this year was the Chicago Lakefront. While adhering to the 15 mile diameter circle required of all nationally sanctioned counts, coverage is largely restricted to the Chicago lake shore and harbors, including Jackson Park on the southern edge and Montrose area on the north. Besides the unusually limited habitat of the count, it is one of the very few that is actually held on December 25. I used to joke that it is for people without family or friends (we actually had an all Jewish count back in 1972, although we only had four participants) but over the years we have built up a following of birders who spend half a day counting birds and then heading off for more traditional Christmas celebrations. We have two main groups- mine meets at the south end and works north, while Geoff and Chris Williamson meet at Montrose and work south. They quit mid-day while my group continues to Montrose. (It is easy to keep separate lists at all the spots, so there is no double counting.) While I don’t have the exact number yet, this Christmas we had around ten participants. My group consisted of the three Gyllenhaal’s (Aaron, Ethan, and Eric), Tim Wallace, Kelly McKay, and Caroline Hertzberg.
Holding Lakefront on Christmas Day, it turns out, has real advantages for a count that focuses on the downtown portions of America’s third largest city. Lake Shore Drive, the count’s principal thoroughfare, is almost empty. You can drive onto the usually very crowded Navy Pier without harassment, and there is no one to shoo you away from McCormick Place as you scan the lake. It would be nigh well impossible to cover the territory as thoroughly on a week day or holiday weekend.
Another attribute of this count is that it draws media attention like no other local birding event. The idea of birdwatching early Christmas morning must seem so weird that it merits coverage, particularly on a day that rarely generates news. There weren’t any stories this year but three years ago I was interviewed by a radio station that ran a few snippets focusing on our best bird of that day, a mockingbird. A newspaper reporter heard the piece and called me up for yet another interview that was the basis for a story ran on a Wednesday, Staffers at our local public radio station read the article, and contacted me for a third interview that they ran on the next day.
And then there is Kelly McKay, a birder from the Quad Cities area of western Illinois. Kelly has become famous in the world of birders by subjecting himself to Christmas Bird Count marathons. This year the Christmas Count period begins on December 14 and ends on January 5: there are 23 days on which CBCs can be held. Kelly, for the third time, is planning on attending 23 counts, which are scattered across WI, IA, and IL. He birds all day and than drives to the next location (or home if the next count is in that direction). But since only one is held on Dec 25, he pays us a visit. To fill in gaps, he compiles five or so counts himself, including the only one scheduled on December 24.
Ring-billed gulls on Chicago Lakefront CBC on December 25, 2009 (photo by Tim Wallace).
December 25, 2009 was marked by unremitting rain and winds of 25 to 35 mph. The temperature was in the high thirties. Waves crashed into the lake wall and exploded like geysers. Not only do such conditions preclude effective scanning of the lake, it means that notebooks become soggy and optical equipment fogs up. Now for the good news: areas that have few people on Christmas morning even during the best of weather were completely deserted in the face of heavy rains. Even the shivering foreign tourists in their summer clothing who usually flock to such destinations as Adler Planetarium and Shedd Aquarium for photos of the skyline were absent.
Despite the adverse weather, we actually did pretty well. And that has not always been the case. The fewest species seen on the count occurred on a frigid day when the lake was still open, conditions that created a thick impenetrable layer of fog over the water. It was impossible to see anything smaller than a swan, and none of those were around. My mother and I, the only participants on the last day of the count period, logged six species, a total that exceeded no other North American count south of Yellow Knife, Northwest Territories.
Our first stop was at LaRabida Children’s hospital. The harbor yielded a nice group of ducks including such unexpected species as canvasback (2) and red-head. That started us off on a productive duck roll- over the course of the day, we also saw ruddy, gadwall (a damaged wing highlighted the white patch), and all three mergansers. The best duck was a male harlequin at North Avenue. With its harlequin pattern of irregular white blotches, this is one stunning looking bird. It was riding the waves full of debris as they smashed into the pier; but the bird was able to maintain a safe position and even dive into the cresting wave. This is a species of the northeast coast and northwestern rivers, so raging water is its home and conditions were perfect for it.
American pipits have been hanging around in various places on the lakefront so it was not surprising that we added this species to the count list for the first time. Geoff and Chris saw nine at Montrose and we had one fly over at McCormick Place. It was a first for the count. Northerly Island produced a short-eared owl, which attracted the attention of a persistent crow. Northerly Island used to be the home of Meigs Field, until Mayor Daley decided he’d rather have a park there. When the airport operated and the land was off-limits to people, snowy owls would often linger. It was probably the best place in IL for the species but not so since the area has become accessible to pedestrians. On the other hand, short-eared owls appear more often, perhaps because there is no where for them to hide from mobile searchers. A few snow buntings also flew over.
Need to get home to dry out the boots and coat for tomorrow’s Evanston North Shore Count . . .
Short-eared owl photographed by John Cassady.
Tags: Chicago Lakefront Christmas Count, Christmas Bird Count, harlequin duck, short-eared ow
Red-throated loons photographed off Beverly Shores (Porter County, IN) in November 2007 by John Cassady.
The Illinois Beach State Park hawk watch shuts down Thanksgiving weekend and the same is generally true of the Miller lake watches. The idea is that the bulk of the migration is over by then, and whatever procrastinators remain don’t warrant the effort. But this fall, there never really was a great flight day on the lake. We had not yet experienced the frigid blasts that drive the hardy birds south. A number of us were convinced that one good cold front could still prove exciting. And December 3 seemed like the day.
Despite the years that I have been birding it seems inevitable that I am never quite dressed warm enough for the first cold spell. After a summer and fall, I am usually one item shy of what I need. It might be the heavy sweater, a second pair of gloves, or the gator. And Miller is especially challenging. I am known by friends as one who rarely if ever gets chilled. I have been out in minus 25 degrees without a problem. But generally, when out in the field one is neither stationary, nor facing into the wind. After a few hours of sitting, however, the discomfort eventually begins to creep in. Two years ago during a windy and snowy lakewatch in late November my hands became so cold I had trouble manipulating my fingers at the level necessary to open the car and turn the heat on. Fortunately, the car was not very far away and there were other people around, but that kind of chill is disconcerting.
With all that in mind, I had long underwear and jeans topped by insulated pants (so many layers over the nethers means that caffeinated beverages should be avoided- indeed all fluids should be avoided) and five layers over my torso. I was going to be ready. I arrived at Miller at 6:15, forty-five minutes before sunrise. A half-hour later the first birder showed up. It was the gentleman I wrote about in an earlier posting who suffers from that strange malady that only strikes during autumn cold fronts. I will call him Arthur, or Art, for short. He had a two hour drive and had also spent time thinking about the right apparel for what promised to be a windy raw day. Jeff McCoy and Ken Brock arrived soon thereafter. Eventually. Michael Topp and John Kendall appeared as well. Great minds think alike (or great masochists throb alike). Yep, some really good birders assembled with visions of alcids, pomarine jaegers, and eiders dancing in their heads.
Let us start with the positives. Hypothermia was never an issue, as the temperature was not as low as predicted nor was the wind as strong. As for the birds, I would not call the day a total flop, although Ken did not deem the results worthy of posting. We had 50 common loons and 11 red-throated loons, of which there was 1 adult, 3 juves, and 7 not aged. (At one point I swore I heard someone yell, “Jew.” In response, I yelled “Missouri Synod Lutheran.” It sounded that way to Art as well, but he concluded correctly that the word being shouted was “juv.”).
Red-throated loons on the Indiana lakefront have increased substantially over the last 23 years as illustrated by a graph provided by Ken Brock (but which I seem unable to transport into this post). From 1986 to 1995 there were never more than 20 and in some years none. Over the next five years the annual count jumped to around 50 birds, except that in 1999 there were 75. Since then, the increase has been in steps from around 100, to over 175, to this past year when red-throated loons reached an amazing high of 425.
I asked Ken why he thinks the red-throated loons have become more common here. He has thought about it a good bit but has arrived at no satisfactory conclusion: “As this pattern slowly developed (over the years) we thought it was simply more birder experience (i.e., being able to identify the loons in flight), more birders on the lakefront, and/or better optics. Although these factors might well have contributed to the increase, I am convinced there are more loons today than in previous years. However, I cannot explain where they came from. Red-throateds might have altered their migration path (or wintering grounds, as we get lots in December) or perhaps the population has actually increased.”
The best bird of the day was red-necked grebe. Jeff spotted one close in to shore flying to the west and an hour or so later someone else found a bird flying in the opposite direction. Ken treated the sightings as having involved the same individual. Other noteworthy totals were 114 redheads, 82 greater scaup, 124 lesser scaup, 7 dark-winged scoters, and 11 horned grebes. By eleven am, the birding group began to break-up, knowing in their hearts that the birds were still to the north somewhere.
Post script: And they were correct. The first severe winter storm of the season hit on Wednesday December 9. Ken, Jeff, and another birder did venture out and were treated to a massive movement of waterfowl estimated at over 10,000 ducks. Ken posted what they saw on IN-BIRD: “The morning temperature was 11 degrees F with west winds at 20-25 knots. The lake was decorated by rising steam, the local equivalent of Arctic sea smoke, which limited visibility. However, hoards of ducks were migrating through the steam. We counted almost 2000 ducks, but able to identify only about 20 percent of the passing birds.” Unfortunately, among the birds they did identify, there was nothing particularly noteworthy.
Late summer scene at McGinnis Slough (Cook County) by Wes Serafin.
Usually at least one good bird shows up over the Thanksgiving weekend, due, I suppose, to the large number of birders loose over what is for many a four day holiday. This year a dovekie was found dead in Van Buren County Michigan, the county just north of where the ancient murrelt tarried. Birders were trying to figure out if there was any pattern in the presence of the two alcids. But given that one species is from the Pacific and other predominantly from the Atlantic ( a very small number of dovekies do breed in Alaska), it is hard to come up with anything. My own personal theory is that as the ancient murrelet was flying east it collided with the dovekie headed west, causing fatal injuries to the latter. I predict that a necropsy of the dovekie will reveal massive trauma to the head, while it is likely the murrelet suffered but a glancing blow. (Well, prove me wrong)
But a bird corpse in Michigan hardly satisfies one’s need to go birding so Cindy and I headed out on Sunday morning to the Palos region. This is an area of moraines, lakes, and waterways in southwestern Cook County. Fifteen thousand acres of it is public land held by the Cook County Forest Preserve District. The district was created in 1913 and the Palos area was targeted early, for its scenic value was undeniable. During the period of most recent glaciation, the region was an island (named Mt. Forest Island, by geologists), surrounded by the Des Plaines River and old Lake Chicago, referring to Lake Michigan when it bulged to the south and west due to ice in its upper basin. The rugged topography is heavily forested, with lakes, artificial and natural, scattered about.
Focusing on waterbirds, we headed to Saganashkee Slough and McGinnis Slough. The light was awful at Saganashkee but we could make out lots of ducks at the far end. When we moved to a more advantageous spot we identified rafts of mostly hooded mergansers. With their white crests outlined in black, the drakes are among t he most handsome of ducks. Although not as colorful, the hens have a ragged hood that makes her distinctive as well. There is often a bald eagle perched on the line of trees along the least accessible portion, but nothing that particularly morning.
McGinnis Slough offered many more species of waterbirds, including several flocks of cranes that greeted us upon our arrival. Many of the birds were quite distant but it was possible to pick out more hoodies, black duck, canvasback, redheads, ring-necked duck, and black duck. Three horned grebes dove actively, making them somewhat of a challenge to show Cindy.
On the way back to the car, I looked down and spotted a garter snake, just inches from where I had stepped. It was a chilly morning, and the snake was not moving very quickly. Indeed, it looked almost frozen. With the exceedingly mild fall, it might be possible for a Homo sapien to forget that winter was not too far off, but the snake knew. And it was a strong reminder to us.
Hooded merganser (male) photographed by John Cassady.