Sax-Zim Winter Birding Festival

Have you checked your February birding schedule yet? How about a visit to northern Minnesota for the Sax-Zim Winter Birding Festival! February 17-19 are the dates and they'll be ready to welcome birders again.......
Need to check a Great Gray Owl off your life list? There's a pretty good chance you'll see one -- I took this photo in The Bog last winter.

How about a Snow Bunting or two? Pretty sure they'll be there for the festival also!

Ever seen one of these? Sometimes we see them in southern Minnesota, but you're guaranteed to see several Common Redpolls at this festival -- maybe even flocks of them at a feeding station with a Hoary Redpoll or two mixed in that flock.

There's still time to register for one of the "coolest" birding festivals in the U.S. I'll be there and I hope you can make it too!

2011 Midwest Birding Symposium - Day 1

Today marks 2 weeks since my visit to the Midwest Birding Symposium. An insane work schedule, getting caught up on stuff at home and looking for a new doggie has been keeping me super busy. But I finally have a day off today, so I'm almost caught up on the laundry and an adoption form has been filled out for a new furry child to arrive late next week, so I took advantage of some extra time to get my photos edited and get started on my blog posts from the Midwest Birding Symposium. So I'm going to do it in chronological order, starting with day 1.

My best birding friend Lynne arrived Wednesday afternoon (Sept. 14th) and stayed overnight at my house so we could get an early start for our long drive to Lakeside, Ohio for the symposium. We backed out of the driveway right on schedule at 5:30 AM as we figured it would take us at least 10 hours to make the 700+ mile drive. Now I gots to tell ya, there is a very short list of people I would want to share a 12 hour road trip with, but Lynne is definitely at the top of that list. Amazingly enough we never ran out of things to talk about. The trip was exciting from the very beginning -- Lynne barely missed hitting a coyote who was stupid enough to dash out onto the highway in the darkness. We stopped every couple hours for snack and potty breaks and to switch drivers. Lynne handled the drive right through Chicago like the seasoned Twin Cities driver she is. We talked and laughed so much that we almost forgot to stop for gas! Good thing Lynne's car reminded us it was time or we would have been stranded somewhere on the Ohio turnpike and missed our boarding of the boat for the Sunset Boat Cruise.

We got to Lakeside, Ohio and the Midwest Birding Symposium with only minutes to spare for joining our friends on the Sunset Boat Cruise. It was really nice to hop on the boat and let someone else take over the driving duties. Plus we both were able to enjoy the view of sunset on Lake Erie.
What a great way to start out the Midwest Birding Symposium. This is a look at South Bass Island. The tower is Perry's Victory and International Peace Memorial.
The cruise had a "Chum Master" who tossed out popcorn which attracted flocks of seagulls behind the boat. I wasn't able to get close to the back of the boat, but it sounded like those who did saw a good variety of gulls.
This is Kelleys Island. Some participants of the Midwest Birding Symposium were able to sign up for a Sunday cruise and birding adventure on Kelleys Island.
Sunset's getting closer. The cruise was about 2 hours long and included a wonderful buffet supper that we enjoyed very much.
Here's a closer look at Perry's Memorial.
And now it's almost dark and our cruise is almost over. You can see the light in the top of Perry's Memorial. What a beautiful sunset and a perfect end of the first day of our Midwest Birding Symposium adventure.
After our sunset boat cruise, we checked into our motel and were greeted by this little spidey in our tub. I'm not arachnophobic, but still, spiders in the bathtub just aren't cool. Thankfully, Lynne took care of this little matter.

I hope you'll stay tuned for the rest of my posts from the Symposium and maybe I'll even convince you to think about attending the Midwest Birding Symposium in Lakeside, Ohio in 2013. Save the date -- they're already accepting preregistrations!

Midwest Birding Symposium

Have you ever been to a birding festival? I've been to a few and enjoyed them very much. That's why in a couple of months I will be heading over to Lakeside, Ohio with my best birding friend Lynne, for the Midwest Birding Symposium. This will be the first time either of us have attended this festival, but because it's billed as "the world's friendliest birding event" we're looking forward to haveing a great time AND seeing some great birds!

We'll be meeting up with several of our birding/blogger/Facebook friends there -- some of whom I've never actually met in person before, but looking forward to this chance to meet and bird with them. If you're interested in attending this festival, registration information can be found at this link. Early bird registraion ends today (July 15th), but even if you don't have a chance to decide and sign up today, I would still encourage you to take advantage of "Ruthie's group discount code" if you're registering for the entire weekend (GROUPCODE MBS2011BB25). I've heard the meals are going to be fantastic too!

Sunday at the Sax-Zim Bog Winter Birding Festival

Valentines Day (Sunday) was our final birding day at the Sax-Zim Bog Winter Birding Festival. We were supposed to be at the Meadowlands Community Center by 6:30, so you can bet that we weren't looking forward to hearing that alarm go off at 4:30! After a short check-out delay while the hotel clerk tried to figure out our bill, we hit the road around 6:00 AM (already 15 minutes behind). But traffic was light, the sunrise was beautiful and while Lynne and I were solving the world's problems we actually missed our turnoff to Meadowlands! When we drove into a town neither of us recognized, Lynne pulled out her Garmin and we "recalculated" our way back -- YIKES, a 16 mile detour! Fortunately, there was plenty of coffee and donuts at the Community Center, so the rest of our birding party seemed more than happy to wait for us.

Our birding caravan was headed deep into the interior of the Sax-Zim Bog where we were hoping to see a Boreal Chickadee, Gray Jay, Evening Grosbeak and if we were really lucky maybe a wolf or a moose!


All during the winter, there were a couple locations in the Bog where feeding stations had been set up with birdseed and a deer ribcage attached to a tree in order to attract birds for viewing and photographs. We found out early on Saturday morning that some of the local residents had complained about this and the DNR felt compelled to come and remove the deer rib cages. I'm not sure why they couldn't have waited just a couple more days until the festival was over, but then again, this isn't the first DNR decision that's left me scratching my head in disbelief. Anyhoo, when we got to that first feeding station we found that one of the local nature photographers had taken it upon himself to put out some birdseed and dogfood and also attach another ribcage to the tree, so festival participants who wanted to take pictures could do so. (He also told us that when he left that day, he would be removing the rib cage and taking it with him.)

There were several Gray Jays visiting the dogfood that had been sprinkled on the ground. Unfortunately, this was the best photo of a Gray Jay I managed to get. They're really pretty birds, so you might want to look in your field guide to get an idea of what they really look like!

Lots of different birds were enjoying the deer rib cage, but the clinging birds (like this Downy Woodpecker and Red-Breasted Nuthatch) seem to have a definite advantage when it comes to enjoying this feast!

The seeds on the ground were being gobbled up by Pine Siskins, Purple Finches, and Chickadees. Here are a couple of Pine Siskins enjoying sunflower seeds.

During our tour of the bog, we also visited a couple of residences where the home owners had set up their bird feeding stations so people could stop by and watch the birds. Since I never see many Purple Finches at my feeders here in southern Minnesota, I was more than happy to take pictures of the Purple Finches I saw at these feeders. There seemed to be many more female finches than males, so I was particularly happy to get this photo of a handsome male.

A couple of female purple finches enjoying sunflower seeds.

Shortly after our lunch break, the snow flurries started and our bird sightings and visibility decreased with the increase of snow flakes.

We took advantage of a short break in the weather and had one of our trip leaders take a picture of Lynne and I with WildBird magazine so Lynne could submit it to Amy Hooper for the next issue.

Finally it was time for us to think about turning the car south and heading for home. We said good-bye and thanks to our trip leaders and all of the good people who worked so hard at making the Sax-Zim Bog Winter Birding Festival another rousing success. I would strongly encourage anyone who's interested to plan on attending this festival someday (always the second weekend in February). We had a great time and I know you would too!

Here's the list of birds we saw during this festival.

For more stories and much bettter photos, please check out Lynne's blog also (just click on this link).

Saturday at the Sax-Zim Bog Winter Birding Festival

Day 2 of the Sax-Zim Winter Birding Festival started early on Saturday morning where we were to meet our carpool partners in the EconoLodge parking lot at 7:00 AM. It was pretty cold, but the skies were clear as a bell and we were looking forward to predicted highs in the mid-20's for later in the day. I thought it was a particularly good sign to see these 2 Common Ravens atop a billboard right in the EconoLodge parking lot! This was the first of many ravens we saw on our Saturday birding adventure.

After picking up the final member of our Duluth birding group, the first stop for our caravan was the frozen Port of Duluth where we were hoping to spot a Snowy Owl. Being a landlubber from southeastern Minnesota, I loved seeing all the huge ships frozen in this bay for the winter. We never did see a Snowy Owl, but were excited to spot our first Northern Shrike of the day in this area.

Our next stop was over to Canal Park to try and spot some waterfowl--hopefully Barrow's Goldeneye or Long-Tailed Ducks. Unfortunately for us, a recent shift in the wind had blown the ice close in to shore, so there was no open water here (meaning no ducks either!) However I couldn't leave without getting this nice shot of the Duluth Lift Bridge. (It was the consensus of several members of our group that the reason the right end of the bridge was all covered up was because the bridge was being sandblasted and repainted.)

Here's a look at all the ice that had blown into the harbor plus a good look at the City of Duluth.

Our next destination was Two Harbors, but we did make a stop along the way where some open water was evident and managed to spot a few Common Goldeneyes, but pretty far from shore. At that distance, there was no way to determine if there was a Barrow's Goldeneye in the group (as you can see by this picture).

On our way up to Two Harbors, I did get to see what for me was the highlight of my trip: A Bald Eagle and several Common Ravens feasting on a road-killed deer right along Highway 61! Yes, for non-birders, this sounds really disgusting, but it was just so neat to get a quick, close-up look at a Bald Eagle on the ground and be able to appreciate the sheer size and beauty of this raptor. It turned out to be a really good day for spotting Bald Eagles and we had numerous sightings--mostly along Highway 61 and the Lake Superior shore.

Even though we hit all hot spots in Two Harbors where Bohemian Waxwings had been seen previously, we weren't able to spot any. A stop along the Lake Superior shore in Two Harbors also left us "duck-less," but I did have the chance to snap this postcard perfect photo. We definitely got more than our recommended daily allowance of Vitamin D from the sun on this beautiful Saturday.

Here's another close-up look at the ice along the shore and coating rocks on the bay here at Two Harbors.

We stopped for a tailgate lunch at Lester Park in Duluth where we were really surprised with a flyover by a couple of American Robins. It's always nice to hear their cheerful chirp in the middle of winter!

After lunch, our caravan headed east to the northlands favorite gull hotspot: the landfill in Superior, Wisconsin! There were plenty of gulls here and it was mesmerizing to watch them fly up from the landfill and soar around with the gorgeous blue sky as a backdrop. The majority of these gulls were Ring-Billed Gulls (they're the ones with the black wing tips in the photo below). However, we all got some good looks at several large Glaucous Gulls and a couple of smaller Iceland Gulls (lifer!)

It was finally time for us to head back to Duluth and we made one more stop down at the waterfront still hoping to see that Snowy Owl (which we didn't). However, we did all get a lucky and unexpected look at a Rough-Legged Hawk that was perched on one of the light poles along Highway 2 from Superior (sorry, no picture of that bird either!)

Our day was far from over as we headed back to festival headquarters in Meadowlands where we were scheduled to board buses at 4 PM for an owl search into the Sax-Zim Bog.
Our bus headed down Owl Avenue. Unfortunately owls were conspicuously absent from the area and we saw only one Northern Hawk Owl perched at the top of a tree at the end of a distant fence row.
Even though we didn't get to see any owls, we were lucky enough to see several Ruffed Grouse perched in birch trees and feasting on catkins at the end of the branches. I've never had the chance to see this before and it was really fun to see these large birds try and balance out near the end of the branches and stretch to reach their favorite food.

We were treated to the sight of a beautiful northwoods sunset while riding the bus back to the Meadowlands Community Center. Saturday's excellent birding adventure ended with a delicious banquet, some knitting with friends, and an entertaining presentation from Al Batt, the evening's keynote speaker.

Day 1 - Sax-Zim Bog Winter Birding Festival

Hello from Duluth, Minnesota! This morning I caught the shuttle bus from Rochester to the Minneapolis/St Paul Airport where Lynne picked me up. It was the first time I had ridden the airport shuttle with another knitter! She was knitting up a pretty little pink scarf with a lovely angora/wool blend yarn.

This morning was really foggy, but the skies cleared up around 10 AM and it turned out to be a beautiful sunny day. After lunch at Art's Cafe in Moose Lake, we were ready to head up to Hasty Brook. We arrived to find that Lynne's neighbor had the driveway all cleared out for us and the birds were there and waiting for the birdseed Lynne had brought along. Here's what I saw at Lynne's beautiful Hasty Brook retreat:

A sweet little Red-Breasted Nuthatch (one of my favorites!)

We were both thrilled to see these Snow Buntings fly by and then perch in a nearby birch snag. Can you see all three of them in this picture?

Pine Siskins were there too.....

Black-Capped Chickadees and Common Redpolls were also visiting the birdfeeders, but I wasn't quick enough to snap any photos of them.

Lastly, here are a couple views from the balcony of Lynne's Hasty Brook Retreat....

Isn't it beautiful? This is the second time I've been there and both visits have been during the winter. I hope I get a chance to visit again someday when everything isn't covered with snow! Thanks Lynne for sharing your beautiful Hasty Brook homestead with me!

Tomorrow morning we set off at 7:15 for our day-long birding tour of Duluth. Hopefully I'll have some good photos to share with you tomorrow night (and hopefully I'll be able to stay awake long enough to post them!) Stay tuned!

A Practice Post

I'm calling this a practice post because it's the first post I've ever created using my Toshiba Netbook. This coming Friday morning, my best blogging friend Lynne and I are heading north.....no, not to Alaska, but to Duluth, Minnesota for the 3rd Annual Sax-Zim Bog Winter Birding Festival. I'm taking my netbook along with the hope that I'll have some time to do posts of all the great birds I'm anticipating seeing over the weekend (and also because I can't bear the thought of being "off-line" for 3 whole days!) I'm taking a shuttle bus from Rochester to the Minneapolis airport where Lynne will pick me up. Amazingly enough, the shuttle service offers free Wi-fi, so if I don't feel like pulling some knitting needles and yarn out of my backpack, I can always pull out my netbook and check out what my friends are doing on Facebook or get caught up on some of my blog reading. Should be an interesting trip.....

So anyway back to this practice post.....I was able to plug the USB cable of my little SanDisk CF Card Reader and use the Windows Live Photo Gallery software to edit the photos I took this afternoon. I think they turned out just as good as photos I normally edit in PhotoShop and the software is pretty similar.

If you haven't heard, we had a little snow the past couple days. Of course our almost 8 inches certainly can't compare with what the East Coast has had dumped on them, but it's still enough to close area schools and make our morning commute a bit more thrilling than usual.

Here's another view from the deck. There's still an awful lot of snow around here. We had a couple above freezing days a few weeks ago, but they really didn't do anything towards melting the snow at all. And as I'm writing this, I can hear Mr. Johnson firing up the snowblower and preparing to go out and open my paths to the backyard birdfeeders again.

If you click on this picture to enlarge it, there in the center you can see only the tiniest remainder of the backyard dog statue above the snow. I'm guessing there's probably at least 18" on snow piled up there in the backyard now.

And here's a pretty decent drift that always grows on the garage roof when the wind blows from the northwest. It was a really light and fluffy snow, so it didn't take much wind to create a snow sculpture like this. (It also didn't take much effort with the shovel to remove it either!)

So, it looks like I'm all set to do some blog posts from the northwoods. I've already checked the Duluth forecast for the weekend and it sounds like we should have some pretty decent weather with daytime highs in the 20's and mostly sunny skies. Sounds like perfect birding weather to me! Maybe I'll even get a chance to see that Varied Thrush that Lynne's seen near Hasty Brook. Be sure to check back here this weekend for photos and stories of another excellent birding adventure......

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.....