Late Winter Birding Drive

After what seemed to be a fairly mild winter earlier in the season, February and March have decided to make up for the winter snows and  weather we didn't receive in December & January.  The winter blues are really starting to set in so a couple weeks ago, we decided to take advantage of a sunny Sunday afternoon to go for a birding drive (with a stop at the yarn store, of course).  It's a good thing my favorite yarn store is in Winona & right on the Mississippi River as that gives us a good excuse to take my favorite birding drive through the Whitewater Wildlife Management Area for waterfowl viewing and then up the river road on the way home for eagle watching.  Here are some of the pictorial highlights from our Sunday afternoon drive......

A pair of Tundra Swans have spent the winter again in the Whitewater Wildlife Management Area. They were in exactly the same area as last winter.  Pretty cool!

There were some ducks in this little patch of open water also.  I was excited to see this Northern Pintail as it's been quite a few years since I've seen one.

Driving along the Whitewater River I saw these tracks along the riverbank.  I was thinking they were probably made by otters.  What do you think?

As we were driving past this one little patch of open water, I was scanning for waterfowl when something dark caught my eye in the ditch.  "Back up," I ordered Mr. Johnson.  As we were backing up, I got my camera ready and started snapping pictures as soon as we got past this little critter.  Once I got home and started editing the photos, I was able to ID this furry little creature as a Mink.  Woo-Hoo!  I've never seen one in the wild before and felt extremely fortunate to be in the right place at the right time.

Farther down the road we spotted a large hawk perched in the top of a tree, thinking it was maybe another of the numerous red-tails we'd been seeing all afternoon, I got out of the car and started walking towards the tree with my camera ready for a possible flight shot.  The raptor didn't disappoint me.  I was even happier when I was reviewing my shots and found out this wasn't a red-tailed hawk at all, but a Rough-Legged Hawk who only visits Minnesota in the winter!

Down in Winona, there was a small patch of open water on one of their lakes going in to town.  We stopped there to see if there might be any interesting waterfowl besides the usual mallards and Giant Canada Geese and there was!  Here are several nice Canvasbacks, plus a Lesser Scaup.

I was really surprised to see a Coot hanging out with these ducks too.  Then I read a birding report later in the week indicating that some of these ducks are already starting their spring migration.  I'm glad they decided to hang out at this nice spot in Winona on the day of my visit!

There were even some pretty interesting looking mallards mixed with the regular ones.  Obvious there's been some duck hanky-panky going on here!

The mallard hen seemed pretty happy with her dapper looking, multi-colored mate.  And I was happy with how nicely they posed for my camera!

It was getting late in the afternoon and close to sundown by the time we finally started up the river road towards home, so the light wasn't the best for pictures anymore, but I did manage to get this one shot of an eagle fishing for its supper in the Mississippi.  There were so many eagles in this area, but most of them were hanging out on the ice at the far side of the open water, and beyond the adequate focus reach of my 300 mm camera lens.

Train tracks also run parallel to the river road, and we usually see at least one train.  This day's train was a long one and the engines were working pretty hard to get all the cars up this gradual incline. 

And of course, Holly had a great time.  Even though the temps were only in the 20s, we were going slow enough that she was able to have her head out the window.  She loves the wind in her face and being able to smell all the wild things outside.

I see by my ticker at the top of this blog that there's only a few days until the first day of spring.  Hard to believe it this year, especially with the 20+ inches of snow we've already received in March and much more predicted for the next week.  I'll be very happy when spring weather and birds finally arrive this year!

Early Spring Birding

It looks and sounds like spring has certainly arrived early in Minnesota this year -- after a record-breaking mild winter. We took advantage of nice weather the past two Sundays to drive around southeastern Minnesota and see what kinds of early migrants we could spot. Last Sunday, we were super fortunate to find this beautiful Bald Eagle perched in a tree right along the Mississippi River near downtown Wabasha. I was able to get out of the car and walk right up to this magnificent raptor and he didn't even budge. How lucky was that?

(Sorry, I love this eagle photo so much, I'm making you look at it in another blog post!)

Driving through the Whitewater State Park Wildlife Management Area, I also spotted the first Killdeer of 2012. Glancing down along the river bank, at first I thought this was a bit of trash, but when we stopped and got binocs on it, we could definitely see that it was a shorebird of some kind. A quick glance in the field guide confirmed Killdeer by the two dark breast bands.

This afternoon, we loaded Holly up in the car to drive around the Rochester area and see what we could find. We managed to finally see our first wild turkeys of 2012 and also several Eastern Bluebirds who declined to be photographed. We again saw several Bald Eagles and I managed to get one decent shot during a fly-over. I never get tired of seeing these raptors flying around.
The warm weather and strong southerly winds of the past few days have helped get lots of the ice out on ponds and lakes in the area. We headed out to the landfill reservoir west of Rochester where we had found some good waterfowl last year. It was a wise choice again this spring. As we were walking up to the reservoir, we could see plenty of waterfowl flying in to land. Check it out! These are mostly Greater White-Fronted Geese with a few Snow Geese in the mix too.

Here's some more! The ice was mostly out on this reservoir, at least all around the edges. There was still some in the middle and many of these geese (including some of Rochester's Giant Canada Geese) were just hanging out on the ice.

Before heading for home, we drove around to the other side of this reservoir to see if we could get a closer look from that side. There were more ducks over on this side, including this little group of American Coots.

Here's one look at the ducks. My duck ID skills aren't the best, but through my spotting scope, I managed to see and ID several species, including Northern Pintails, Northern Shovelers, Mallards, Green Winged Teals, Ringnecked Ducks, and Canvasbacks. I'm sure there were others I missed, but that will give me a reason to head back to this reservoir on another warm spring day.......

There were also several Trumpeter Swans on this reservoir. You can see two of them in this photo below. (BTW, remember you can click on any of these photos to make them bigger!)

Here's another look at all the Greater White Fronted Geese with some other ducks and geese mixed in. See that white one over to the left? That's the white adult Snow Goose. (I think the white bird over to the right is a gull.)

One last stop before heading for home was the County 9 Wetlands just east of Rochester. That lake was still mostly covered with ice, so nothing really noteworthy there except for the juvenile Bald Eagle that flew from a dead tree nearby. You can tell that the geese were not at all concerned with this eagle's presence. And see the houses right in the background? Sadly, the City of Rochester is rapidly encroaching on more wildlife areas.

I hope all of you are enjoying some early spring weather and chances to get outside and see who's flying into your area! Have a good week!

My Holiday Day

Since last Friday was a regular working day at IBM, today was our day off for the New Year's holiday. It was nice to be able to sleep in for one last day and also to have another day for taking pictures with my new camera. These little Pine Siskins at the thistle seed feeders on my deck were good models.

Later on in the morning, I switched from tiny birds to a really big bird! This is one of the Bald Eagles from the pair that has the nest just up the road from our place (we call it the Fleet Farm Eagle because the nest is across the highway from the big Fleet Farm store). It was perched on this branch, but I asked Mr. Johnson to try driving a little bit closer so I could get out of the car and take a few more pictures.

I actually was hoping this eagle might decide that it didn't like us getting so close and decide to fly away.

Which it did! (and in case you're wondering, it wasn't too disturbed because it only flew about a hundred yards away to another tree farther away from the annoying person by that car)

I like the continuous shooting feature on this camera which enabled me to get this series of shots as the eagle flew past me.

I especially liked this shot! Click on the photo to enlarge it so you can see the beautiful detail on this raptor's feathers.

I look forward to taking more pictures of this pair of Bald Eagles in the spring when they're ready to occupy their nest at the edge of this woods and raise another family.

A Sunday Afternoon Drive

We have been on a Yellow-Headed Blackbird quest for the past couple of weekends. I haven't checked one off my Minnesota bird list for several years and Mr. Johnson has never seen one, so last Sunday afternoon and this Sunday afternoon were spent searching for this bird at some local state parks where there's ideal yellow-headed blackbird habitat.

Our search today started at Whitewater State Park in Winona County. Driving into the park, I spotted this deer......can you see it?

OK, how 'bout now? Yeah, you're right....the head always makes a deer so much easier to spot!

But wait, there's more! A few more miles down the road we had to stop to allow this pretty doe and her 2 adorable fawns to cross the road. Fortunately, I had my camera ready and was able to get some good photos.

Buh-Bye!

We left the state park and headed out into the Whitewater Wildlife Management area. Check out this ideal yellow-headed blackbird habitat. Plenty of water and marshy areas all surrounded by cattails. But did we ever spot a yellow-headed blackbird? No, not a single one!!

And even though we never did find that elusive yellow-headed blackbird, we were rewarded with plenty of other beautiful sights along the way.

Lots of colorful wildflowers

Wood ducks hanging out on a nesting platform

Great Blue Heron patiently searching for lunch

And check out all those beautiful water lilies in the background. I believe they're American Lotus and there were thousands of these blooming all over in the ponds.

Another Great Blue Heron (they're such cool birds!)

Bald Eagle fly-by

If any of my southeastern Minnesota readers can give me a tip about where I can head to next weekend on another yellow-headed blackbird quest (within an hour's drive of Rochester), I'd really appreciate it.

Have a great week everybody!

Project FeederWatch Season Concludes

April 9th marks the conclusion of the 2009-2010 Project FeederWatch season. I haven't been very faithful in my FeederWatch activities for the past few weeks, but decided since I was off work yesterday I would make an effort to watch for and document the birds visiting my backyard birdfeeders. I even filled the peanut feeder for my bluejays who rewarded me with their presence less than a minute after I'd hung the peanut wreath back outside. I know there are some people out there who like bluejays as much as I do, so enjoy these photos!

One of my fondest wishes would be to have a bluejay take peanuts from my hand, but my bluejays are much too shy for that. I even have to be careful to avoid any sudden movements near the window when I'm taking pictures from inside the house.

Although I'm not a fan of the Common Grackle, they find my backyard habitat and food offerings particularly appealing, so unless I stop filling my birdfeeders and cut down all the evergreen trees, I just try to tolerate them for a few months. If nothing else, they're interesting to watch.

And I'm always on the lookout for something unusual to show up, like a Rusty Blackbird or Brewer's Blackbird. The blackbird on the right side of this tray was a little bit different looking than the others on the feeder at the same time, but I think it was either a late juvenile or maybe a "bronzed" Common Grackle. And as much as I hate to admit it, the iridescence of their feathers is really quite beautiful.

Cardinals continue to visit the feeders throughout the day. I haven't noticed any males and females paired up yet and there still appears to be quite a lot of territorial battles taking place among the males. Fortunately (for me and my camera), this handsome male was able to enjoy a few minutes of peaceful dining at the feeder outside my dining room window.

I haven't had a chance to clean out my little backyard pond yet, but the leaves and debris still in the pond doesn't seem to bother the birds. I was delighted to see Mrs. Bluebird stop by for a visit to the pond (apparently she hasn't noticed the 6 other clean birdbaths strategically located throughout the backyard!)

The nice thing about the long FeederWatch season is that there is usually some overlapping between the winter and summer birdie visitors. I saw the little Red-Breasted Nuthatch at my feeder yesterday morning and still have a few Dark-Eyed Juncos hanging around too.

Red-Winged Blackbird is also a summer bird for us here in Minnesota. I previously recorded my first one for Project FeederWatch on March 10th. I usually think of them as grassland and wetland birds, so I'm always happy to have them come to the birdfeeders close to the house. I never get tired of hearing their pretty call and seeing that showy patch of color on the male's wings.

The Goldfinches are really starting to show their summer colors again now. He's especially beautiful in the sunshine, don't you think?

When I was editing the pictures for this post, I found this one I had taken last week when we were out looking for ducks at the reservoir. There was a Bald Eagle across the lake that had just caught and was eating this huge fish! We could see through the spotting scope that the fish was still alive and squirming around, so the eagle was really having to hold on tight to the fish and the branch at the same time. It was really neat to see this and the eagle managed to eat that entire fish in about 10 minutes.