World Bird Wednesday

This years migration has been very unusual.  Many of the birds came through early, some have stayed around for a longer period of time, others have gone to their more northerly destinations already and there are a few that haven't arrived yet.  This has made tracking the birds more complicated. I have a favorite reserve that I like to go to because it is a  natural stop over for many of the migrating birds.  The birds that I see depends greatly on when I go, but this year it has been hard to guess when a good time would be.  So today, my friend and I ventured out, not knowing what to expect.  For the most part what we saw were birds that will be here all summer, but even at that, we saw many that we don't see in our area so it was still a treat. 

Richard Bong State Recreation Area
The recreation area encompasses 4,515 acres of rolling grassland, savanna, wetlands and scattered woodland. Most of it is in Wisconsin's Southern Lake Michigan Coastal Ecological Landscape; a bit at the western edge is in the Southeast Glacial Plains.

This reserve is so open and  immense that you can be looking right at something and not see it.  We drove for quite awhile before we spotted something of interest.  I realized that our timing was bad ... it was high noon and the sun was glaring making it difficult to get good pictures but, hopefully, they are good enough for you to appreciate the birds.

Our first find was not a migratory bird.  It is the beautiful Meadow Lark.  We could hear him singing,  but it was hard to spot him.  They are as beautiful as their song.

At this point I took a picture of another bird on the ground close by.  I thought it was the female Meadow Lark, and I was right.  She is so sweet.

The Eastern Bluebird could be migrating or he may be staying.  We don't have them by our lake so it was a welcome site for us.

There were a lot of Tree Swallows because they have nest boxes everywhere ...

               There seemed to be some contention over whose nest box this
                 was.

          These two little Tree Swallows and having a heated conversation ...

                                         And a new contender comes into the picture ...

                                             Somethings not right here ...

    It seems a truce was finally made, but it is hard to say who will end      up in the nest box ... Probably no one until someone closes the side.


        Our next find, and probably our most unusual bird was this pair of Lesser  Yellow Leg Sand Pipers.                   

 

Last but not least is a bird that is common in our area ... probably in every area, but this time they blessed us with a little surprise  ...

Our first baby siting ... and these are really young

     Canadian Geese are wonderful parents ... it is a pleasure to watch them tend to their young.

     That's all for today ... see you all next week.  Andrea