Surprise guest

I know this is going to give Curtis all kinds of identification trouble (heck, I won't be too surprised is all of you have trouble), so I am going to make him/you suffer (mwaaahaaahaaa). After last night's full 12 inches of snow I was very surprised to see this at my feeder with the new frenzy:

without a doubt my latest ever for Michigan (!) by at least a month. Wonder where this bird has been over the last month or two? Also had the fall's first yard American Tree Sparrow today. Bring on the BRSP for a Spizella trifecta.

Waterbird counter gets me LALO

So during a visit by Tom Prestby, after a successful rendezvous for the ANMU in Saint Joseph, MI yesterday, I walked him around the golf course for a little bit this morning. Very few birds were around (5 shovelers and a pair of cacklers were the only things of interest). As we were about to head in Tom picked out the whistle of a Lapland Longspur and paused. Shortly after we both heard the rattle and repeated whistles. So I hustled back into the "yard" area so the bird would be legit much to Tom's ammusement.
Not too many more yardbird possibilities left this year unless smaller wetlands around freeze up and the larger pond here pulls some ducks in...

No new birds BUT...

Not just one but two Coyotes were seen today! This one initially bolted into cover when it saw me, not five minutes later it was leisurely giving me a 50 foot buffer as it made its way back towards its den (I found it about 1/2 mile away last month on the far brushy side of the biggest pond on the course system). I've never witnessed coyotes this fearless before...Here's a bad digi-bin of the fourship of shovelers I saw the other day:Basically just hoping for a few more ducks before freeze-over and maybe a flyover LALO or SNBU at this point... I checked out a bunch of patches near me today and managed 15 waterfowl species (GWFG, CANV, COGO, and a flock of 141 RNDU were the highlights).

Proposed new "yard"

Well here's my proposed new "yard". I'm not sure how to exactly measure an acre from an aerial view, but after looking at Caleb and Curtis' places from similar heights on google earth this is pretty close. I bent the line because there's a pond there and it's tough for me to stand in it. I choose this area because it's about the closest area to my place that actually affords a view of the ponds and has some cattails and a few trees in it (and stays off the active fairways for the most part...). I'll go back through my list from this place and figure out what I've seen from there assuming you guys are okay with this.

No swans overhead today, but there was a female Hooded Merganser on the water and four shovelers were also present (my second observation here).Let me know guys.

And again

Wow- the birds are really hitting. Just looked up in my backyard to see a flock of 17 Tundra Swans (116/116) headed south, SILENTLY. No wonder my mic hasn't yet paid off with this species. This also brings us cumulatively to 150, inching slowly toward Sean's old WI record.

And these ones would have counted even if we defined the contest as those birds either within or directly above one's yard- they were straight above the house at about maybe 500-1000 feet.

Sean- let's see some number from the new jaunt in Illinois- start by proposing a boundary to us, then letting us know what you've identified from within that boundary.

Life Yard Bird (115/115)!!

Well folks, my yard bird networking has paid off. My neighbor just called to inform me that some turkeys were walking behind his house in a recently mowed cornfield, and sure enough- a quick look across his yard through my living room window confirmed it. My only question is "what took so long?" I'd never have believed it would take over a year and a half to get this species (even by sound!) given my habitat.

Falconidae sweep

Isn't this a new one for the year's assault on Fitz? I bike underneath this cell phone tower on my way home from work every day. Today I saw these 2 Peregrines hanging out around the tower. I hurried home and got my scope out, and was able to nail this awesome photo.

Late House Wren - 10/30

I braved the rain on Friday and went out in hope that the rain had grounded some waterfowl or something. The fairways had all flooded and there were geese and mallards everywhere. Not many passerines to be had, but a lone House Wren surprised me (from my eBird entries I have never had a HOWR past the last week of Sept in WI, MI, IL, IN, or even NJ!). Also had a female Rusty Blackbird land among the robins in the top of some cottonwoods and then flyover a little bit later. A handful of YRWAs and one Palm Warbler were also noted. Also had a single DCCO flyover (they'd all but disappeared over the past ten days here).
Currently in a hotel in Ft Lauderdale listening to BTGRs sqwack outside. Now I have to not pay attention to birds the rest of this trip...

Slobber and Dorkstra alive?

Yo Dave and Curtis, quit slobbering and dorking around and let us know what you think about Sean's yard rules, eh? You'd think there were no birds in any of our yards the way you guys are(n't) responding lately. Oh wait...

Sean's yard listing rules

Guys-

Please read my comments under Sean's 2nd oldest post below this one. I'd like to get clarity on Sean's rules for counting yard birds before he gets too far on here...

Here is Sean's earlier post showing the location and habitat of his yard:

http://theyardbirds09.blogspot.com/2009/08/moving.html

Putz

Dodging golfers while digiscoping...

So I brought the scope out since I was kicking myself yesterday as normally secretive stuff like Swamp Sparrows were just lining up for me left and right and all I had on me were my bins...
Of course, the numbers of sparrows were much lower today and as I set up and waited for the birds to drop back along the edge of the goldenrod, a young Sharpie zipped over my head and freaked the flock out until further notice...
I did see a few different things today, including three Northern Shovelers in the far back part of the large pond surrounded by dead trees. As I was waiting for some sparrows to come back out along a different stretch of cattails, I heard a club hitting a golf ball and I looked up to see the follow through of an obviously disgruntled man and then heard the ball hit the fairway about 40 feet from me...awesome! No "Fore" or anything like that, I guess I was crazy to think that with the fairway half flooded and nothing but mud and goose crap all over the place, that there wouldn't be golfers...WRONG! Anyways, I moved on and used a little more caution trying to anticipate where this guy was gonna be as he looped back and glared at me even though I was in the midst of Cottonwoods well out of his way... Yeah you can't please some people.
While in that area I did pish in a Savannah Sparrow which teed up long enough for a few shots before dropping down to feed with CHSPs and juncos.





I picked up a couple of Wood Ducks flying over and they circled a few times giving me a chance to digi-bin the female before they circled up and cleared out.






There were 22 Cacklers with less Canada's today and I got one decent digiscoped shot but they were being rather skittish today.







Other new birds from yesterday include a couple of Hermit Thrushes, GC Kinglet, a flyover Pine Siskin (heard first) among many AMGOs. A different Orange-crowned Warbler was present today (much duller than yesterdays). My third Winter Wren in 8 days was also noted today (different spot). I'm a bit surprised with how many of these are around considering the habitat...
And here are a few photos just for the heck of it:For Caleb's benefit:

A new start

Well I tore myself away from unpacking ridiculous amounts of boxes and took advantage of the nice dry weather to spend some time walking around the golf course that is adjacent to my apartment complex (since my actual yard consists of a balcony...).
Below is my eBird checklist from two hours walking around:

Cackling Goose (Richardson's) 20 (5 in below photo)
Canada Goose 700
American Black Duck 1 (good look and the bird was surprisingly pure)
Mallard 45
Pied-billed Grebe 1









Great Blue Heron 2
Sharp-shinned Hawk 1
Red-tailed Hawk 2
Killdeer 1
Ring-billed Gull 2
Rock Pigeon 2
Mourning Dove 28
Great Horned Owl 1 (Flushed out of a large weeping willow and flew across the ponds, probably the biggest surprise of the outing)
Red-bellied Woodpecker 1
Downy Woodpecker 2
American Crow 2
Horned Lark 1
Black-capped Chickadee 7
Brown Creeper 3












Winter Wren 1 (my second here in a week, a bird I missed completely at W468...)
Ruby-crowned Kinglet 11
Eastern Bluebird 5 (all migrants flying over way up high, call notes giving them away)
American Robin 55
European Starling 40
American Pipit 1 (another flyover given away by the flight call)
Cedar Waxwing 18
Orange-crowned Warbler 2
Yellow-rumped Warbler (Myrtle) 9
Chipping Sparrow 1
Clay-colored Sparrow 1
Field Sparrow 2 (all three spizella was surprising, esp with FISP outnumbering the other two and so few CHSP)
Fox Sparrow (Red) 10
Song Sparrow 14
Lincoln's Sparrow 1
Swamp Sparrow 12
White-throated Sparrow 120
White-crowned Sparrow 15 (really thought I might snag a HASP with the numbers of Zonotrichia around..just scads of white-throats...)
Dark-eyed Junco (Slate-colored) 25
Northern Cardinal 4
Red-winged Blackbird 10
Common Grackle 6
Purple Finch 5 (2 flyovers and 1 male and two females feeding on buds in the brushy trees with HOFIs and AMGOs)
House Finch 7
American Goldfinch 5
House Sparrow 10

What you guys want to do about restricting the size I'm able to count as my "yard" is up to you. The wooded habitat is very minimal. There's some goldenrod/brushy stuff that the sparrows and OCWAs are primarily in. Everything else is cattail marsh or large ponds with large snags around them (I've had BCNH on two other visits when we were moving in).
As of right now I'm trying to get as much as I can before these ponds freeze and the birds disappear with the water...