COLSP 6/22

  Beautiful day to be out today. After 3 consecutive days of 25-35mph winds, it seemed like nirvana to have a calm morning with lots of bird song. Mild temps in the 60's were nice as well.
  I started at the boat launch area to see if I could get Black Terns or Least Bitterns. Whiffed on both of those but had great looks at a pair of RED-HEADED WOODPECKERS which were probably nesting, though I didn't stick around long enough to confirm.

A big bonus at the same site was a "peet-zah!"-ing ACADIAN FLYCATCHER. Unfortunately I couldn't get a visual but the call was pretty distinctive and given multiple times.
acadian flycatcher
  Then I headed over to James Rd. behind the park office to the west. Every time I've been here since May (4 times) I have seen at least one WILD TURKEY and today was no different. Also heard a couple of ORCHARD ORIOLES orchard oriole song. Not much else of note, though, so I headed down the Goldfinch Trail. Along the trail I had a nice look at an OSPREY on the platform nest.

Not the best pic but you can see the black-and-white raptor on the platform. I continued further down the path hearing regulars like FIELD SPARROW and YELLOW WARBLER, but then I heard a call that I don't hear in the summer usually, the che-BEK! che-BEK! of a LEAST FLYCATCHER call. I actually heard 2 of them calling simultaneously on opposite sides of the trail. Very cool! A few more of the regular birds and then I headed over to the Deerpath lot to walk the Deerpath Trail. As soon as I pulled in I heard the song of the CERULEAN WARBLER song. I got out of the car and tried to find the little bugger. They have this annoying habit of singing at the very tops of trees, so it's really tough to see them usually. I got lucky this time and actually got a couple of decent pics:

Love that bird! I then headed down the trail toward the grassy marsh area and heard 4 SEDGE WRENS. I got a couple of nice looks but couldn't get good pics due to overexposure from the sun.

  The rest of the trip found more of the regulars but the number of AMERICAN REDSTARTS was phenomenal-12! Also good numbers of YELLOW-THROATED VIREOS (6), SCARLET TANAGERS (6), and ROSE-BREASTED GROSBEAKS (5).

Another great day to be birding!

 
 

Nemesis No More!

The "nemesis" bird is that one bird that you spend hours looking for but just can't seem to find even though everyone else around you can find them seemingly in your own backyard. Such has been the case for me with 2 birds in my short birding career: the Broad-winged Hawk and the Black-billed Cuckoo. The Broad-wing has been seen in Lake County by at least 4 different people since May and more than that since April this year. For some reason I can never seem to find them during migration even though my neighbor (literally!), Rich Biss, will report seeing over 100 of them streaming by his house! Since I started birding pretty seriously in '07, I have seen Broad-wings in Lake County twice, but not since '09. Interestingly, both of those sightings were at Grant Woods North. If I were smart, I would have concentrated my energy on finding them there this year as well. Those sightings were in the fall, though, so I wasn't thinking they would be around in the summer here. Well, Barbi Fotland and her husband, Skip, fortunately are ebirders and record their sightings on ebird. I was able to see Barbi's report, and so I went there this morning to see if I could find some Broad-wings. I got to the the Grant Woods North parking area at 5:24am and was on the trail quickly. I made the circuit once, heard a few good birds like a PINE WARBLER and an OVENBIRD, then got my bike and rode around back to the west to work off-trail. I stopped at an open area just past the bridge and parked my bike. I noticed a few birds in the air, mostly Tree Swallows and Ring-billed Gulls, but 2 of the birds looked a little different.....HAWKS! I got my bins on them as they circled overhead and had beautiful looks at 2 adult BROAD-WINGED HAWKS....WOOOHOOO!!! Finally, after tracking this bird for almost 3 years, I got some great looks. You just can't beat the exhilaration at that moment. I tried to get photos, but since I'm very clumsy with the camera, and the birds were steadily drifting north, I came up empty. Still a memorable experience. Thanks again to the Fotlands for posting their sightings!

Wadley Wing Haven 6/19

I just recently had the pleasure of accompanying my birding friend, Donnie Dann, on a wetland survey at the residence of Searle Wadley and his wife. They live northwest of Antioch near the Fox River and have wetland and woodland edge habitat that is very extensive. Needless to say, the birding is good there, and Mr. Wadley and his wife are extremely sweet people. They both opened up their property to my birding adventures, so I took advantage of this yesterday and headed over there to look for cuckoos. Unfortunately, I wasn't prepared for the onslaught of deer flies that waged war on my head as I walked the grassy trail back into the woodland, so I headed hastily back to my car to grab my head net. By this time, I had been here an hour and wanted to check out the wetland, so I went there instead of back to the woods. Good move. The wetland was hopping with waders. I had 4 sp. of waders and there were over 100 GBHerons and GEgrets combined. Astonishing. I searched hard for a snowy but no luck.

As I was watching the waders, I heard the wailing call of a Common Gallinule. Now I have heard them before and seen one at Almond Marsh, but these birds are hard to come by, so any looks are good ones. A few moments later, 1 bird ventured into the open.

  I heard another gallinule calling a few minutes later, as well.

I also spotted a pair of RING-NECKED DUCK, which is rather odd for June. Anyway, another great morning of birding :)

Warblers, Waders, and Western Kingbird

Fortunately for me my in-laws live in Collinsville, IL, which is just outside of St.Louis and is midway between Carlyle Lake and the Shawnee National Forest. My wife and I, and sometimes our teenage kids, make the trip about twice a year usually- once in the summer and once around Christmas. Each summer my goal is to find all the southern breeding warblers that are really difficult to find in Lake County (Kentucky, Prairie, Worm-eating, Yellow-throated, Cerulean, Louisiana Waterthrush) and to see the waders that also are tough to get in N. IL (cattle egret, YC Night Heron, Snowy Egret, Little Blue Heron). In addition, there has been a nesting WESTERN KINGBIRD in Granite City that I try to find each year as well.
  This year I was pretty lucky and got all the birds I was looking for with the exception of Louisiana Waterthrush. I started on Monday morning 6/11 at 5:45am on a side street in the Shawnee that sounded good for warblers. I was right. In a few minutes I had nice looks at a YELLOW-THROATED WARBLER and a beautiful KENTUCKY WARBLER.

                                   Kentucky Warbler

                                 Yellow-throated Warbler
Also in this area were many WHITE-EYED VIREOS, CAROLINA WRENS, and a couple of SUMMER TANAGERS.
I then headed toward the Cache River and Michael Wolff wetlands to check for Anhingas. On the way I stopped at a shrubby area on Eden Rd. where I heard then saw a nice male PRAIRIE WARBLER.

Unfortunately the Anhingas were a no-show, but they don't usually come in until mid to late afternoon and it was still mid-morning so it wasn't totally unexpected for them to be AWOL. A nice day nonetheless.
  Tuesday morning I tried to hit Larue-Pine Hills, which is supposed to be a great place, but I turned on the wrong road and was driving a gravel road to nowhere for 30 min. Once I recovered from that mishap, I headed to Pomona and Natural Bridges Rd. This place is superb. There were warblers singing everywhere and this has been my most reliable spot for seeing WORM-EATING WARBLERS right next to the road.

Also singing here were Yellow-throated, Cerulean, Kentucky, and Prothonotary Warblers.
  Wednesday was wader and kingbird day. I started at Cahokia Mounds State Park which is also an amazing place. It doesn't really look like much of a natural area. It has a couple of ponds and a lot of open grassy areas. If the grass is being mowed, however, these grassy areas become egret magnets. CATTLE EGRETS love following the tractor around and eating the insects chopped up by the tractor.

Other than cattle egrets, there was also a SNOWY EGRET and a LITTLE BLUE HERON in the back pond.

From here I headed to Granite City to find the WESTERN KINGBIRD waiting patiently for me on a telephone wire right at the Niedringhaus 7/11 store.

It vocalized briefly, then flew down to a post:

 Nice! I still needed Yellow-crown, though, so I headed to Wilson Park to check on the nests. I saw none, so I decided to head back to Cahokia since that it is the only place that I know of to find them reliably. I drove in a checked the ponds. Nothing. I walked around a bit, took some NORTHERN MOCKINGBIRD photos, then checked the ponds again. There next to the road was a beautiful YELLOW-CROWNED NIGHT HERON!

Gotta love S. IL!

COLSP and Grant Woods North 6/10

I haven't really done extensive birding at COLSP in the summer, so I was kind of excited about the possibilities today. There are 4 birds that I still need that have been found in the past at COLSP, so I figured it would be a good place to go this morning.
  I started at James Rd. which runs from the park office lot due west. There are some hedgerows, forest tracts, and open fields along this little used road so there exists the possibility for some varied species. At first nothing but your common varieties, but then I saw a WILD TURKEY standing out in the open of this big field. It's about my 7th turkey this year. Amazing. As I continued down the road it entered a forested area with lots of undergrowth. It was here that I heard, then saw, a male CHESTNUT-SIDED WARBLER. Beautiful bird and difficult to find during the summer.

I then headed down the Goldfinch and Sunset Trails where I had 3 ORCHARD ORIOLES at various spots.....

3 Rose-breasted Grosbeaks

2 Yellow-throated Vireos

and a RING-NECKED PHEASANT that I heard calling twice from 2 different locations.
  The highlight of the morning, though, came as I was biking to the end of the Deerpath Trail. As I was getting ready to cross the main road near the Pike Marsh North lot, I heard the zee-zee-zzz-ZEEEE of a CERULEAN WARBLER! One of my favorite birds, and one that I had not yet seen this year. Shortly after hearing him sing, he found his way to the outer branches and I was able to get some nice looks. Moments like these are what make birding truly awesome.

I finished the morning off with nice views of a singing SEDGE WREN

and a flyover OSPREY.

I still had a little time so I headed over to Grant Woods North and took my bike around the trails quickly. In the pines area I heard/saw a male PINE WARBLER

and heard 3 singing OVENBIRDS. singing ovenbird
At COLSP I also had 10! singing AMERICAN REDSTARTS. singing redstart
Pretty stellar morning of birding!

IL Lifer #317

Seeing as I'm doing a Lake County Big Year, the chances of me doing any birding outside of Lake County this year are pretty slim. However, the chance to get a state lifer that's fairly close, would be one of those rare occasions. So today I ventured out to North Branch on Keystone Rd. in McHenry County to find that rare bird. Now, it is important to know here that I'm horrible at finding other people's birds. Notoriously bad. Pathetic even. My success rate is probably 25%. It's so bad, in fact, that it often prevents me from even trying. I'm probably the only lister in Northern IL that didn't even attempt to go find the Black-throated Gray Warbler that was at Elsen's Hill last year or the year before. It was there for 2 WEEKS and I couldn't get myself to drive out to DuPage Co. because I was convinced that was the day it would be gone. Anyway, I went out today thinking this one might be easier than most because other people had just seen the bird and it was an open grassland with no trees to hide behind. Wrong. As I'm walking up the hill to the sacred birding location, I'm met by Paul Sweet and Jenny Vogt who tell me that they just saw the bird about 10 min. ago. So I'm thinking it's in the bag. Paul graciously volunteers to show me the spot and look with me for a few minutes before he heads to cooler climes. Unfortunately we see no bird. 30 minutes later I still have not seen or heard the bird. I should have known this would happen. It's about this time that I start thinking about how long I'm going to stay. At that same moment I see Steve Bailey and Darrell Shambaugh walk over the hill into view and the target bird immediately flies up into the air calling! Great looks at IL Life Bird #317 LARK BUNTING!

Next time I'll just call Steve and see what time he's coming :)

MacArthur Woods: The Pileated Haven

   I do breeding bird surveys for the Lake County Forest Preserve every summer and keep track of Short-eared Owl numbers at Rollins  for the fall and winter, so I correspond often with Gary Glowacki, the LCFPD wildlife biologist. At the end of May, I gave Gary a list of the birds I was looking for this summer and asked him to let me know if he found any of them. Well, he immediately told me that he scared up a Pileated near data point 104 in MacArthur Woods earlier in the month. I should tell you a little about MacArthur.
   MacArthur Woods is a beautiful forested area along the Des Plaines River and lies just to the north of Daniel Wright/Half Day FP. The differences between these places are vast, however. Whereas DWright has many amenities to make the area more attractive to people, MacArthur is very wild. It has no trails. It does have fallen timber everywhere and a lot of it is buried beneath herbaceous ground cover. I literally tripped my way through the woods as I moved to the river and then again as I made my way back to the car. It's not a fun hike. You also need either a compass or a GPS to find your way around safely. You can't see the sun well usually, so it's easy to get disoriented. I had no compass or GPS this morning, and nearly got lost. It was the first time that I've ever been out hiking where I actually didn't know where I was. Fortunately I was able to find the sun and make it back to the car.
   Anyway, I decided to follow up on Gary's sighting and venture down to the river to see if I could hear anything. So I walked due west from my car for about 15min. to the Des Plaines River. As I was nearing the riverbank I heard the characteristic descending hammering of a Pileated.....and it was very close! I have never actually seen a Pileated in Lake County before so that was exciting.
I immediately pulled out my iPod and played the Pileated call. As soon as it started playing, the woodpecker began calling from across the river. calling pileated A second later it flew right over me for great binocular looks. I played the call again, it flew over me again. It flew by a third time after that. Tremendous! That was a great bird for me to get this year. Too bad others could'nt have seen the Pileated as well.
Maybe next time :)

The Odyssey

I feel kind of like I'm on a journey that's taking me through various twists and turns to teach me life lessons along the way as I search for 1 bird....a Black-billed Cuckoo. Birding provides moments of great exhilaration and accomplishment mixed in with many other moments of frustration, disappointment and humility. I have not seen a Black-billed Cuckoo in Lake County in 4 years, and then it was only 1. So in all the time I spend birding in the spring and summer, I've seen 1 Black-billed Cuckoo in Lake County in my life.
This is tough in and of itself, but when you combine it with the fact that many other birders in the county have seen one, it starts to get personal. What am I doing wrong? Why can't I find this bird?
So for right now, birding has become all about finding the cuckoo and seeing where these adventures take me and what people and circumstances are brought before me. I'm looking forward to it, but I hope it doesn't last too long! That may be one of the main life lessons I learn from this: it's the journey and not the conclusion that is the most important in birding. Enjoy the moment.
Tomorrow I go to MacArthur Woods and DWright/Half Day FP.
Wish me luck!

The Long Weekend 6/1-6/3

   It wasn't really a long weekend "technically," but since my summer officially began at 11:00am on Friday, I included it. I had some great birds this weekend  to celebrate.
   It started on Friday around lunchtime. Amazingly, I still had not seen a hummingbird yet this year, so what better place to look for one than at a friend's hummingbird feeder. Good friend Lynda Toner graciously allowed me to sit in her gorgeous backyard and watch the orioles eat oranges and grape jelly while I waited. It wasn't long before the female showed up, but I needed a male to solidify the ID even though there's really only 1 species of hummer you would probably see at this time, or any time, in the eastern US. In any case, the male showed up after about 15min. and gave nice looks.

   On Saturday, I headed to a private location that I have been told not to make public. It's a great wetland site, and I was able to hear 1 calling Least Bittern, see 2 Black Terns, and hear YB (Year Bird) 

# 236 COMMON GALLINULE calling twice right in front of me off the path.

common gallinule

   Today was even better. This morning after small group I met Jim at Daniel Wright FP. I have tried on numerous occasions since the beginning of the year to call in a Barred Owl with no success. Jim has gotten them at least once, so I asked for his help. As usual, Jim delivered the goods with his calling skills and we had great looks at 3 BARRED OWLS calling and flying around us. Very cool. Then we headed over to Ryerson to search out a Broad-winged Hawk. No luck unfortunately. Jim had to get home, so we headed out. On the way out I was driving slowly with the windows down and music off so as to listen to birdsong. As I was driving out to the main entrance rd. I heard a flute-like warble with a slight up-and-down cadence so I initially was thinking it was a Rose-breasted Grosbeak. After hearing it again, though, it sounded too short and I heard a couple of burry notes. It was definitely a tanager, and sounded too clear for a Scarlet. I have experienced some variation in Scarlet songs, though, so a visual was definitely needed. The bird was singing in the dense foliage at the top of the tree next to me. No visual, though. I walked around the front of the tree and saw the bird fly to the next tree. Then I heard it singing from a tree across the road, so I walked back out to the road and saw the bird on an exposed branch right next to my car. There on the branch was a beautiful male SUMMER TANAGER singing his heart out. Awesome! I was hoping to find one here soon, so that was a great bird for me.

summer tanager