"What a thousand acres of Silphiums looked like when they tickled the bellies of the buffalo is a question never again to be answered, and perhaps not even asked." -Aldo Leopold
I don’t have much to say today, I just thought I’d share a few random Trumpeter images taken recently. My best wishes to anyone paying a visit during the holidays.
“Flyby”
“Beating Traffic”
“Warm Friends”
“…wildlife once fed us and shaped our culture. It still yields us pleasure for leisure hours, but we try to reap that pleasure by modern machinery and thus destroy part of its value. Reaping it by modern mentality would yield not only pleasure, but wisdom as well.”
-Aldo Leopold-
“Sedge Wren, Autumn 2012”
Did you know…?
The breeding range of the Common Yellowthroat is the most widespread of the American Wood Warblers.
“Common Yellowthroat, Autumn 2012”
“Eastern Bluebird, SNR, Autumn 2012”
“Changing Skies”
“I Never Dreamed Today Would Come, When Love Was Young”
“A sense of history should be the most precious gift of science and of the arts, but I suspect that the grebe, who has neither, knows more history than we do. His dim primordial brain knows nothing of who won the Battle of Hastings, but it seems to sense who won the battle of time. If the race of men were as old as the race of grebes, we might better grasp the import of his call. Think what traditions, prides, disdains, and wisdoms even a few self-conscious generations bring to us! What pride of continuity, then, impels this bird, who was a grebe eons before there was a man.”
-Aldo Leopold-
“Peid-billed Grebe with Fish”
“Hangin’ around, nothing to do but frown;
Rainy days and Mondays always get me down”
-Karen Carpenter-
“Caspian Tern”
Did you know…?
-The first nest of the Le Conte’s Sparrow was was not discovered until almost 100 years after the bird was first described by science.
“Le Conte’s Sparrow”
Hi everyone. It’s an absolute gorgeous Saturday here in the northern Ozarks. I hope the weather is to your liking wherever you are reading this.
This post is dedicated to my grandmother, Genny, who is currently recovering from a health crisis. Sarah and I are so glad you are getting better and we wish you all the best in a speedy recovery.
Today’s post is a result of one of the magical times I spent recently at Ellis Island at Riverlands. During an evening hike I noticed I was in the middle of a huge mayfly hatch. There seemed to mayflys in the millions. This rang the dinner bell for migrating passerines for miles around the confluence! This was definitely one of the coolest bird experiences ever for me. The bird pictured below, a Yellow Warbler, was one of near 50 of this species I came across. Also in huge abundance were Black and White Warblers, Empidonax Flycatchers, Red-eyed Vireo and many others. Thirteen total warblers, four vireos and a large handful of other species were all gorging on this insect feast. The swarm, so thick the flies were perching on me, lasted until sunset and unfortunately I had limited opportunities for getting decent lighting for photographs. That was frustrating, but being able to watch this natural wonder was reward enough.
This is one of those species that I’ll always remember the first time I found. It was a springtime male perched on a dead branch singing his heart out and touched by the morning sun. I never truly saw the color yellow until that morning! The image bellow does that guy no justice.
Enjoy the weekend and remember, in Missouri, dove and teal are in season so hunters will be out there doing their thing. There are places nature watchers and hunters use in close proximity, so be careful and considerate.
“Sunshine On My Shoulder”
In the field, the brief views I was fortunate enough to get suggested to me this was a Virginia Rail. The Virginia is only about half the size of the King and this obvious difference should usually make the identification quite easy. Unfortunately my brief, distant and mostly obscured view of this bird did not allow me to get a good estimate on the bird’s size. Once back home with the photo and field guides open I began to doubt my original ID call. I listed as many reasons to feel KIRA as VIRA. I quickly realized I needed help and rushed the photo and my thoughts to the three wise men of the birding community I knew would love the challenge. The single photo was less than the smoking gun I was hoping it was. All three agreed it was most-likely a King Rail, but there is still room for doubt. Although a photo of a Virginia Rail would have added a new species to my bird-photo-life-list it always makes me happy to find and watch a bird of conservation concern, as is the King.
You can see in this “bird in habitat” photo just the sort of habitat that rails and other waders need. Rails love to be in water about up to their knees with plenty of vegetation to use for cover. Most shorebirds like the mud, while larger waterfowl, obviously like a little more water. Heron Pond at RMBS is being managed to provide the habitat these groups of birds need. Check out a few images of young KIRA I took a while ago.
“King Rail”
This post/photo is dedicated to Paul Bauer, master birder, bird photographer, and steward – a responsible agent in the development and management of Heron Pond and other features of Riverlands Migratory Bird Sanctuary. Thank you, Paul, for leaving something worthwhile.
The Sora, or as I like to call them the Marsh Chicken is a small but quite abundant rail. They definitely are one of the easier to view rails to be found during migration, but I found out how common they can be during a magical morning spent recently at my usual haunt at RMBS. Arriving just before dawn I wandered the slow hike to a nice spot to watch the marsh of Heron Pond while waiting for the ol’ Sumatra brew to kick in. I had the entire place to myself for most of the next two hours, standing still and counting the birds. Besides being reminiscent of a chicken, I think Pete Dunn’s description of their bill as “candy-corn-shaped” to be quite fitting and a good field mark for identification. These guys are often vocal and at certain times of the year their whinny-type calls and grunts can be heard all day long. Being a rail these guys are definitely timid and spend a good amount of time hidden within the vegetation. However, I have found these guys to be much more willing to spend time on the open mud in search of food, making a run back to the greenery at the first sign of trouble. My total count for this particular morning was 62 birds! Looking around the pond it seems that you would not be able to run through the vegetation without kicking one of these guys with every step. Standing relatively still allowed me to catch this guy in a photo probably no more than 15 feet from where I stood.
“Sora”
A Thousand Acres of Silphiums 