Montrose BURROWING OWL 10/6/12

Hi all,

I went out birding last Saturday, and it was an amazing day that I will always remember. I haven't updated my blog in a while, but I am making a new resolution to update it more often. I will be posting later this month about my trip this summer to the Cascades in Washington State. Anyways, last weekend looked really good for rarities to show up, mainly because the weather patterns developing over the week were prime material to push western vagrants to the east. I love chasing rarities, so I was really hoping for something like a Rock Wren or a Gray-crowned Rosy-Finch. But one bird that did not cross my mind was a Burrowing Owl. The last one seen in the Chicago area was on October 28th of 2008. I started birding in May of 2009, so none have been seen in northern Illinois since I became a birder. Before the 2008 record, the last one found up north was in the 1980s. The Burrowing Owl in 2008 was seen at Montrose Point, but was flushed so many times by birders that the local Cooper's Hawk got it. Many people were quite angry with that, since it was such a rare bird and they couldn't see it. But now many people up in northern Illinois got another chance:

Josh Engel and Onesmus Kioko picked me up Saturday morning at 6:40 AM. Kioko is from Kenya, and is currently working at the Field Museum with Josh learning how to prep bird specimens. Josh was leading a trip on Saturday for the Illinois Ornithological Society (IOS), and we were planning to meet at Montrose. We arrived at around 7 AM and began walking towards the beach. Already down there were Jerry Goldner, Rob Curtis, and some other local birders (Jerry had actually found the owl before us but we had no idea, and until he told us, we thought we had found it). Our group made it down to the beach and began walking towards the large Cottonwoods, walking towards the lakeshore. As we got up near the top of the hill, Josh turned to his right, saw a bird in flight, and called out, "OWL!" I frantically scanned to see where he was looking and saw a smaller owl that appeared to be a small Short-eared Owl. I only was able to see it for about 2-3 seconds before it landed on the ground. Josh and I exchanged glances, and he stated, "I think that was a Burrowing Owl." That sure got the adrenaline pumping...

The group began to formulate a plan on how to find this bird, but did not want to flush it, as it was sitting down in the dune grass. I saw Fran Morel walking towards the beach, and got his attention, asking him to come over quickly. I told him we had a "possible" Burrowing Owl and Josh called Bob Hughes to round up all the birders down by the water. Fran began to walk with our group of seven to see if we could view the bird from a different angle. Not even two seconds had gone by before Fran stated to us, "I'm looking right at the bird."I ran over to his side, and right in front of me, about 30-40 yards away, was a Burrowing Owl.

We eventually found a place a bit farther back in the dune to view this bird, ensuring that it was not stressed. We then saw Bob and his assembled group approaching us to look at it, and we directed them around the bird so the bird was safe. This bird was a lifer -- a bird one has never seen in their lifetime -- for some, and a state bird for the rest of the group. We begin to pass around the idea of posting to IBET (the listserv for Illinois), but decided to hold off for a bit. We were worried that if too many people came, the bird might get harassed and perhaps find its way into the talons of another Raptor again. On Saturday, the raptors at Montrose were amazing as well. Including the Burrowing Owl, we had 9 species of raptor:

Burrowing Owl
Short-eared Owl
Northern Harrier
Merlin (I missed it)
Red-tailed hawk
Osprey (I missed it)
Peregrine Falcon
Cooper's Hawk
Sharp-shinned Hawk

Eventually, we figured out that we were able to see the Owl from the Fishook Pier, which made the situation for the owl much better, and made it so we could tell the bird world. The Dune at Montrose is a fragile ecosystem, and the more people walking in it, the worse off it will be. We figured out that we could, indeed, see the bird very well from the pier, and make sure that nobody would walk through the dune at all while the bird was there. We then posted to IBET, and people began streaming in. I estimated that over two hours, over a hundred people came to see this bird, and people continued to visit throughout the day. This was one famous owl to say the least. Personally, it was my 304 bird in Illinois and my 9th species of owl in the state. This was even a county bird for Andy Siegler, one of the most notorious county listers in the state, and who has seen over 395 species of bird in Illinois. Below are some pictures of it, as well as some of the raptors present at Montrose. Also, there are a few photos of the birders watching the owl:

Burrowing Owl

Burrowing Owl

Northern Harrier

Birders looking at the owl

Birders looking at the owl

Short-eared Owl

Short-eared Owl

Short-eared Owl

Thanks for reading, and I will have another post soon!

Nathan

Quito Botanical Gardens 3/18/12

Buenos dias!

Greetings from Ecuador! I am here on Spring Break right now with my family, and today was our first day in Quito. We decided to spend our day exploring La Parque de Carolina which is about a three minute walk from our hotel. Here, we visited the Quito Botanical Gardens. The birding was great knowing we are in a huge city. We only saw 9 species on this trip, but some were very interesting.

We arrived at the Gardens around 9:00 AM and I immediately found a very close and well lit Great Thrush, a very common bird in Quito.

Great Thrush

Upon entering the gardens, I was immediately entranced by the life buzzing around me. There were dragonflies everywhere and I was hearing the very loud chip notes of a Sparkling Violetear perched on a tree limb. I took a few minutes to get some pictures of the dragonflies. It turns out that I found myself two lifers. I emailed Dennis Paulson to see if he knew what they were and he was able to identify them for me:

Rhionaeschna marchali

Sympetrum gilvum

Our main bird targets  were Black Flowerpiercer and Black-tailed Trainbearer. We had success with both, although the Flowerpiercers were very flighty and hard to see well. We encountered the Flowerpiercers about five minutes into our walk.

Black Flowerpiercer

Black Flowerpiercer

From here, we continued on and found a Sparkling Violetear feeding on some flowers, glistening in the sunlight. I was unable to get any photos of it, but while watching, I caught a glimpse of a small gray bird flying over me. I followed it into a rose bed, and was able to refind it. I got some pictures of it and when I got back to the hotel in the afternoon, I found out I had seen a Southern-beardless Tyrannulet!

Southern-beardless Tyrannulet

Continuing on, I found one of the coolest birds of the trip: a Swainson's Thrush. This bird will be back in Chicago in about 2 months!

But in Ecuador there is always something else around the corner. After the Thrush, my mom soon found a Passerine in the top of the trees. I got a glimpse of it, and the first thought that popped into my head was that it was a Vireo. I took some photos and sent them to a few people this afternoon. It turns out it was a Yellow-green Vireo, my second lifer of the trip.

We continued on to find the part of the gardens that had the crops the Incan's had planted back in the 13th Century, but along the way we stopped again for a Black-tailed Trainbearer feeding

While watching this magnificent bird, I noticed two Rufous-collared Sparrows begging for me to take their photo:

Adult Rufous-collared Sparrow

Juvenile Rufous-collared Sparrow 

After we found the Incan portion of the Gardens, we were getting hot and decided to call it a day. Tomorrow I will be off to Yanacocha for some Hummingbirds and who knows what else! Hope you enjoyed this taste of Ecuador!

Nathan

Chicago Harlequin Ducks

Hi All,

On Tuesday, March 6th, I went to 31st St. Beach in Chicago to see if I could find an adult male Harlequin Duck that had been frequenting the area over the span of 3 days. I was able to get there in the early afternoon during a free period in school. Free periods are times where I have no scheduled class and can do whatever I choose to with my time. They have been very beneficial to chasing local rarities in Chicago. As soon as we got to 31st Street, we were able to find the adult male Harlequin Duck feeding about 30-40 feet off of the breakwall and it was allowing some amazing photo opps. Below are some pictures of this beautiful bird:

It was very interesting to see this male, since I had seen a juvenile Harlequin Duck over at Jarvis Bird Sanctuary in January, and again at Fullerton St. in mid-February. This individual is overall very drab except for its head patterning. I was fortunate to get some pictures of this bird which are below.

After viewing this bird, I made it my life's goal to see an adult male Harlequin Duck in Illinois before I leave for college, and now I have completed that goal! Perhaps I need a more difficult goal that will take more time to achieve (A Big Year anybody :D).

Thanks for reading, and I hoped you enjoyed the comparison shots of two individual Harlequin Ducks.

Nathan

Illinois Young Birders Trip 3/3/12

On Saturday, March 3rd, the Illinois Young Birders took a trip into DuPage County, Illinois to try and find some owls. We started near Naperville, Illinois, but went all over the county on our quest. There was one special bird that our trip leader, Jeff Smith, was going to share with us. It blew my mind when I found out what it was.

He had found a Barn Owl on private property, the first known in DuPage County in over 30 years. This is a remarkable find and perhaps shows that they are expanding their range northwards. For the safety of this bird, I can only say that it was on private property at an undisclosed location. We watched this individual for over 30 minutes and I was able to get a picture of its feet and half of its face. Over half of the bird was concealed, but this was probably because it was 30º outside, and very windy. Below are my two best photos:

At this location, we also had my FOY White-crowned Sparrows:

Jeff then took us out to see a Great-horned Owl sitting on a nest, which according to him, was created by a Red-tailed Hawk.

After this, we went to try and find some Long-eared Owls, but they were at their usual location. From here, the group split up, and the remaining 8 of us traveled to the Morton Arboretum to go look for a Barred Owl, Pileated Woodpecker, and White-winged Crossbills. These birds are known to be in the Arboretum, but did take some time to find.

We arrived at the Barred Owl location in the Arboretum and played a few snippets of tape to see if we could usher a response. After about five minutes, we heard a Pileated Woodpecker respond. We gave up after another five minutes, and walked back to the cars to play a louder tape from Jeff's car. From here, we got a response from the resident Barred Owl. Unfortunately, these birds were heard only, so no pictures were possible.

From this location in the Arboretum, we traveled over to Hemlock Hill to try and find the Crossbills. I had read that they had been feeding on some cones that had fallen to the ground, supposedly offering great looks. We were not disappointed and as soon as we got to the right location, we found 14 feeding on the ground, about 10-15 feet away from us. Standing behind a tree, I was able to get some amazing pictures of them, and some came within 3-5 feet of me. Here are some of the pictures I was able to capture:

How many birds do you count in this photo?

At one point, while observing the crossbills, my mom called to the group that she had found an American Mink. I was unable to hear her and after it dove back into the water, she came and got me. I rushed over to see if I could re-find it. Sure enough, it did resurface and climbed back onto a little island, but as soon as it came out of the water, it ran to the other side, only to dive back in. Here are two shots I got of it running away from us:

Overall, this was a great trip, and I really enjoyed myself. Jeff is an amazing trip leader, and I hope to go birding with him more often. I would like to thank the Illinois Young Birders for setting this trip up, and to Brian Herriott for originally creating the group.

Thanks for reading, and good birding!

Nathan

Frolicing with Prairie Falcons and Hooded Cranes

Hi all,

Well, this blog has been inactive for some time. I have been trying to post, but each time I tried, my photos would never show up, causing me to get fed up and move on. Turns out I was in HTML format and was corrected by my friend Sam Fason in Texas... Oops...

Anyways, here is a little redux of my recent birding adventures:

On February 12th, I traveled about 4 hours round trip with Ethan, Aaron, and Eric Gyllenhaal to see if we could find a Prairie Falcon in the state of Illinois. They have spent over 20 hours of their lives looking for a Prairie Falcon on 5-6 separate occasions.

This year, there had been a bird frequenting some hay bales in Champaign County. We decided to try for it that Sunday (the 12th) as it was seen the day before, and with some frequency during the past week.

The drive was 2 hours from Chicago, and we got there at about 8:00 in the morning. As we pulled up to the hay bales, Aaron immediately called out that he saw a raptor perched on one. We got out and looked at it with our binoculars at it. Even in the horrible lighting, we were able to figure out it was indeed the falcon, but we really wanted to get it in better light and perhaps in the scope. As we pull forward to attempt seeing it in better light, it decided to fly. We stopped the car as fast as possible, and I attempted a few photos. Here was my best:

From here, we moved on, and decided to chase the Hooded Crane near Linton, Indiana. For those of you that do not know, this is the first Hooded crane in the USA that has a very good chance of being accepted by the ABA, and is causing much debate on its origin in the birding community. We arrived at Goose Pond FWA, where the Hooded Crane was being seen, after a two hour drive from the Prairie Falcon. Along the way, we found a few nice birds perched or flying along the roads, for example two Turkey Vultures and a beautiful Red-shouldered Hawk:

When we arrived at Goose Pond FWA, we pulled onto a small country road to get to the viewing area for the Crane and where it was last seen. We knew we were in the right area purely by the amount of people there:

Here there were also a ton of Sandhill Cranes, but this is only a small portion of the birds that were present in the area:

We got out of the car and asked around if the Hooded Crane was there. Many people replied that it had been seen about 15 minutes ago but it had walked behind a ridge. It might be viewable from the county road on the other side of the field, although people were not sure. After about 10 minutes, we decided to give it a shot. After about 20-30 minutes of waiting, Michael David of Pennsylvania called out that he had the bird. We all got distant looks through the many scopes present, but it was a really far away look, and the bird was behind trees and bushes. We stayed and watched it for over 30 minutes, when it decided to start walking back up the ridge, and we scooted back around to see it in the open and in better light at the original location. Here was where I attempted to get a photo of this awesome bird:

While at Goose Pond, we heard about the 19-20 Whooping Cranes that had stopped there on their Migration up to Wisconsin. We made an effort after watching the Hooded Crane for a bit to go and find these birds. The first one we found was sitting in a huge group of Sandhill Cranes:

We kept moving to a spot where there were supposedly 16 Whooping Cranes, and we were not disappointed. Here is one picture I took of one Whooping Crane:

We moved on to our last stop of the day and got to see a ton of Greater White-fronted Geese:

There were also a few of Bald Eagles fishing in the area, but not much else of note. Before we left, I felt obligated to take a picture of the entrance sign for Goose Pond FWA, for we had seen some amazing birds there:

I must thank the Gyllenhaal's immensely for the amazing day, and hope that we have more of these great adventures and birding days soon to come.

__________________________________________________________________

On Feb. 18th, I attended the yearly IOS Gull Frolic. Only this year, there were barely any gulls. The day was actually spent lakewatching. Before the Frolic, I went with Josh Engel, Chris and Geoff Williamson, and my mom to an undisclosed location in Cook County to go find a Northern Saw-whet Owl that Josh had found with his friend Jason Weckstein (who will be employing me this summer at the Field Museum). This would be my first wild Saw-whet (my mom and I went to the Indiana Dunes State Park to band them earlier in the year), and Josh was nice enough to share this one with us. We arrived at the spot and found it immediately teed up in a tree. It was sleeping, but I was able to get some nice shots of the face:

From this location, we moved on to Winthrop Harbor, the location of the Frolic and immediately were told there was a Surf Scoter in the harbor and Snowy Owl on the breakwall. I rushed over, and made sure to see them before the 9:30 AM talk on gulls by Amar Ayyash, one of our resident larophiles. Here is a picture of the Scoter:

And here is the Snowy Owl:

Overall, there were not a lot of Gulls to look at at the Frolic, but we had a great lakewatching day. 250 Long-tailed Ducks, 10 White-winged Scoters, an Iceland Gull, and a Lesser Black-backed Gull were a few of the highlights of the day.

From the Frolic, I traveled home with Josh, Chris, and Geoff, and we stopped at Waukegan Harbor. As soon as we stepped out of the car, we set up the scopes and found 4 Red-throated Loons and this Thayer's Gull:

Overall a very enjoyable day, and some great birding. One Lifer (Northern Saw-whet Owl) and a state bird (Red-throated Loon). My goal for the year is to hit 300 birds for the state of Illinois. I'm at 290 as of right now, and am missing a few really easy birds that I hope to get this year. I had a great day at the Frolic, and got to see many great birders from all around Illinois.

Thanks for reading, and hope to get this blog up and running again!

Until next time,

Nathan