Conclusion of North Dakota Trip

Saturday, June 7th was my final day at the Potholes & Prairie Birding Festival. It was a windy, sunny day, but warm and perfect for the "Birdwatching for Beginners" tour I was signed up for. Our leaders for this trip were Bill Thompson, III, Katie Fitzmier (from Eagle Optics) and Sharon Stiteler (the Birdchick). (That's me with Sharon and Katie in the photo below--you can tell by our smiles that we had a great day of birdwatching!)

I got several life birds on this tour including Black-Crowned Night Heron, Virginia Rail, Marbled Godwit, and Chestnut-Collared Longspur. We missed seeing Whooping Cranes by one day (they had been spotted out on the prairie the day before.)

Marbled Godwit

Chestnut-Collared Longspur

When our bus arrived back at the festival headquarters (The Chieftain Conference Center), a bunch of us got to do the "Lifebird Wiggle" out in front of the giant Chieftain statue. I kind of got hidden in the back row, but the arrow should help you locate my head and left arm.
Before the evening's banquet, I prevailed upon Julie for a photo. She and Bill worked non-stop during this entire festival, which definitely helped make it such a wonderful experience for me and the other birders. Having "met" them through blogging, it was really neat to meet them in person and also their kids, Phoebe and Liam. Me, Julie Z, and Susie O'Quinn (who knew both of us through our blogs!)

(Photo taken by Phoebe L. Thompson)

Oh yeah, and one more thing, remember the shawl I knitted and donated for the silent auction at this festival? The last I saw it was draped around the shoulders of young Miss Phoebe Thompson as her dad Bill got the winning bid. It was nice for me to know this shawl was going to a good home!

I departed for home early Sunday morning and got to enjoy some fabulous sunrise views of birds and wildlife on the North Dakota prairie. For reasons unknown to me, the railroad tracks were very attractive to many of these early morning birds.

Railroad Rooster

Railroad Turkey

There were lots of deer out and about early this morning also.

And I was lucky enough to catch one more view of a lovely white-tail doe with her tiny little fawn trying to follow its mom through the tall grass.


I also got one more life bird for this trip: Short-Eared Owl hunting the roadside ditch. I was able to stop the car and get out for a closer look, but the owl preferred not to be photographed!

A few hundred miles later, I pulled into my driveway shortly before 4 PM, exhausted, but thankful for the amazing sights, sounds, and birding fellowship I had experienced for the last 4 days on the North Dakota prairie.

Oh yeah, and did I also mention that I got 30 life birds on this trip? As I keep saying over and over, it was an amazing trip.....

Sullys Hill National Game Preserve (Part 2)

Boy, it's tough getting everything done after being away for 5 days! 75 new e-mails in my mailbox at work, so things were busy there and then I had to take advantage of the sunny afternoon to get my lawn mowed after work today before more rain moves back into the region. I'm running late again tonight, but I want to try and get one more installment of my North Dakota trip posted. Before I get back to North Dakota though, I want to show you something exciting I found while mowing today. I usually check my bird houses as I'm mowing and I was quite surprised to find this bluebird nest with 5 eggs today! I've heard the male bluebird singing occasionally, but very seldom see him and I've never seen the female in the backyard, but apparently they've been busy, doing what bluebirds do best. This is the closest they've nested to the house in many years. I'll have to keep a close eye out to make sure the wren and sparrows don't bother this nest box.

OK, now back to Sullys Hill National Game Preserve. Just beyond the prairie dog town, was the winter feeding area where they provide hay as supplemental feeding for the resident bison, deer and elk. I was lucky to see a large bull elk nearby in this field. They are beautiful animals and he was growing a nice set of antlers, still covered with velvet. He wasn't real thrilled about me standing near the fence to take some pictures, but I tried to be still and he eventually seemed to ignore me.

Here's a little video of him walking through the pasture and enjoying some nice tender grass.

Also in this pasture were two turkeys--a tom and a hen. This is the closest I've been to a tom turkey this spring. This guy was pretty quiet and not gobbling or displaying for the hen at all. He was a nice big bird, but it looks as though he may have some sort of an injury to his wing (or maybe his feathers are just molting).

I made a stop at the visitor's center to see if they had a bird checklist for the park (yes!) and to purchase a souvenir sweatshirt. They had quite a few birdfeeders set up outside the center and I was surprised to see that they had several clay-colored sparrows and pine siskins at their feeders. They also had a couple of nectar feeders with hummingbirds visiting.

After leaving the center, I found this very large buffalo wallow. Because of the recent rains, it was almost full of water, but you could see plenty of animal footprints around the muddy edges. In this picture, you can also see the wildlife trail (white arrow pointing to it) that comes down from the woods directly to this wallow/watering hole.

I continued following the road which wound around through the beautiful oak/ash forest. There were so many birds singing in these trees and I was able to stop periodically and roll down the window to watch and listen. In one spot, I heard a thrush singing (WOW!) I knew it wasn't a wood thrush and the birding checklist I picked up earlier showed the park had 3: Swainson's, Gray-Cheeked, and Hermit. I took this little movie and if you listen really closely (right around the 3 second mark) you should be able to hear the thrush singing.

Later in the evening at our wine tasting reception, I replayed this movie for Sharon (the Birdchick) and she positively identified the thrush as Swainson's. Thanks Sharon!

My last stop before leaving the park was the Devil's Lake Vista. Again, this must be a fantastic view on a sunny day, but still quite a nice sight even on a rainy day. Even from up here, you could see all the whitecaps on the lake from the strong wind that was blowing.

It was getting late in the afternoon, so I decided after leaving the park to run up to the city of Devil's Lake and find a little lunch. The road to town runs right along this lake. I almost changed my mind about proceeding down the highway when I saw this sign:

Fortunately, there was no water on the road and I had an uneventful drive into and back out of the city of Devil's Lake.

I got back to Carrington just in time to attend a seminar called, "The Ten Most Important Things You Can Do for Birds and Bird Conservation." It was a good talk presented by Paul Baicich. I learned that some of the things I'm already doing, but also a few new things that will be easy for me to start doing.

Later that evening we walked over to the wine tasting and appetizers event at the Historic Putnam House near downtown Carrington. It's a beautifully restored home that was built in the early 1900's. We were also treated to music by Bill Thompson, Julie Zickefoose and some of their equally talented friends (who just happened to also be attending this festival). As we say here in Minnesota, "A good time was had by all!"

I hope to post the final installment of my North Dakota trip tomorrow night. I hope you've enjoyed these stories and pictures enough that you will think about maybe trying to attend this festival next year (or another year in the future). It was a well organized festival and the groups were small. Everyone was very friendly and some of us had the added benefit of already knowing people when we got there (through blogging). As you know, it's so nice to go someplace where you already know people.....

North Dakota Trip-Day 3 (Part 1)

Friday was Day 3 of the Potholes & Prairies Birding Festival. I was scheduled to be on the 5 AM birder's bus going to Chase Lake National Wildlife Refuge. Friday's weather forecast was calling for lots of wind (20-30 mph) and rain (up to 1") so when my alarm went off at 4 AM and I peeked out my motel window, that's exactly what I saw. Since I've already admitted I'm NOT a hardcore birder and I knew even wearing my rainsuit wouldn't make the trip any more comfortable, I decided to skip the tour and went back to bed till 6:30.

The wind and rain finally let up a little bit and I decided to head up to Devil's Lake (about 54 miles) to see what that area had to offer. Fortunately for me, I found Sullys Hill National Game Preserve right along the south east shore of Devil's Lake. Because there was so much to see there and I took a whole bunch of pictures, this is going to be a 2-part post because it's getting late and I just can't get everything organized tonight.

The cost for getting into Sullys Hill was $2 per car and that was definitely a bargain for a bird & nature lover like me plus I pretty much had the whole park to myself because the weather was so crappy and not too many other people were out and about.

Because of the diverse habitat in this refuge, there were lots of different birds--I got a total of 39 and 1 lifer--Swainson's Thrush.

My first stop after entering the preserve was the Woodland Wetland. Because it was still raining, the birds were a little hard to see as they weren't flying around much (and if I looked up with the binoculars, they would get covered with raindrops). However, here's a little video clip of all the birds singing around me at the wetland overlook (the faint "ticking" sound you hear is raindrops falling on my jacket)

I continued on my drive and came upon this little flock of eastern wild turkeys just crossing the road. I managed to get a couple quick photos as they scurried up the hill. I was continually amazed to see wild turkeys in this part of North Dakota--I thought it would be too cold for them, but the local folks told me turkeys (and white-tailed deer) were thriving.

My next stop was Sullys Hill Vista. As I was driving over there, I spotted this small buffalo herd just hanging out at the edge of the woods. There were several little ones staying pretty close to their moms. That mama seems to be giving me the hairy eyeball--I suppose because I had stopped my car to take these photos. I'm pretty sure she's way bigger than the Toyota Corolla I was sitting in!

Here's a big ol' bull that didn't seem to be bothered by the weather at all. When I first saw him, I thought it was a huge, mossy boulder till I looked a little closer and noticed the horns!

Here's the "Stairway to (birder's) Heaven!"

In case you're wondering, I did not make it to the top without stopping, but only because there were lots of birds to look at on the way, so it was necessary for me to stop often.

Here's the view from the top--WOW! Too bad it wasn't a sunny day. This viewing platform was actually above the tree canopy, and from here I got to see the Scarlet Tanager and Eastern Towhee--two birds I haven't seen for many years.

Sullys Hill also has a Prairie Dog Town. I stopped by there thinking I might get to see a Burrowing Owl, but there were only prairie dogs present this day. They are such cute little buggers. Several of them were out trying to tidy up the top edges of their holes, but because of all the rain, they were mostly just getting dirty feet and faces.
While I was standing there watching, a prairie dog right by the viewing stand stuck his head up from the hole, spotted me and immediately sounded the "alarm" for all the others. I was lucky he was so close so I could shoot this little video so you can hear him.

Stay tuned for Part 2 of Sullys Hill National Game Preserve featuring more large mammals, birds and nature scenes from this beautiful spot in North Dakota.