Photo: Common loon by Jory Teltser

Hello everyone,

We are now at the point in the season where our goal is to have more bird species than birders. Happily, we achieved our goal this week, but not by much. But, no matter how low our species count, we always find something interesting to look at and today was no exception.

We had a lovely American Kestrel sitting at the top of a tree on the west side of the west lagoon. And a very cute muskrat was swimming along the wall of the museum in the Columbia Basin. It ducked into one of the culverts to hide from us.

As we crossed the north bridge at the start of our walk, for the third week in a row we spotted a Great Blue Heron along the bank of the east lagoon, sitting on its knees with one leg stretched out in front of it and the other bent. Although we had been advised that GBHs sometimes sit like this, no one in our group had ever seen this behavior before, and since it was the third time we had seen it like this, we became concerned. We discussed whether or not we should call the Chicago Bird Collision Monitors, decided we should, and Cheryl made the call.

Nora from CBCM was nice enough to drive down from the north side to try and capture our bird. A group of us met her on Stony Island and led her to our heron. She brought nets on poles and two sizes of pet carriers. Cheryl and Mark donned their high waterproof boots in case they had to go in the water to assist. Nora crept slowly down the hill towards the bird. What did our heron do? It stood up tall on two strong legs and flew across the lagoon, landing perfectly on the shore of an island. It stood there for a few minutes, glaring at us for disturbing it, and then flew gracefully east, over our heads, and make another perfect landing on the shore of the west lagoon, where it stood, once again, on two strong legs. I can only imagine what it thinking about us, but I’m sure it wasn’t nice thoughts.

We apologized to Nora for bringing her out for nothing, but she was very nice and said she didn’t mind at all. She told us a few stories about rescuing raptors and another GBH, and showed us her wounds from a couple recent rescues. She is very brave to be willing to work with upset birds with talons and sharp beaks. She is amazing.

BIRDERS: Mark C., Cheryl, Marian, Mike, Jennie, JC, Leslie, Gary, Mark W., Tracy, Renate, Pam.

TIME:   8:00am to 10:00am   

WEATHER: low 30s, sunny, light winds

Compiler: Cheryl

Photographer: Gary   

1. Canada Goose   Number observed: 175

2. Mallard   Number observed: 2

3. Ring-billed Gull   Number observed: 5

4. Double-crested Cormorant   Number observed: 1

5. Great Blue Heron   Number observed: 3

6. Downy Woodpecker   Number observed: 3

7. Northern Flicker   Number observed: 2

8. American Kestrel   Number observed: 1

9. American Crow   Number observed: 2

10. Black-capped Chickadee   Number observed: 6

11. European Starling   Number observed: 4

12. American Robin   Number observed: 1

13. House Finch   Number observed: 1

14. American Goldfinch   Number observed: 6

15. American Tree Sparrow   Number observed: 2

16. Dark-eyed Junco   Number observed: 4

17. Northern Cardinal   Number observed: 4

If you’d like more information about a bird, check out the All About Birds ID guide:

https://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/

Corrections, additions and comments are welcome.

Good birding everyone,

Jennie

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This outing qualifies as a prerequisite for participating in Chicago Audubon's Birding Gear Exchange Program. Please check in with the trip leader the day of the event.