Ever had a bird you really wanted to see, but until you learned its song, your sightings were few and far between? American Redstarts were one of those birds for me. However once I learned their song, I discovered they were all over the place in the Northwoods.
When I went looking for my owls yesterday afternoon, and could not find them I did not mind. Redstart males were everywhere having fights as they defined territory and waited for the ladies to arrive.
Don’t like the weather in northeast Minnesota, just wait a few hours and Lake Superior will throw something different at you. In the past three days we have had 1. cold (38F at sunrise), wet foggy conditions 2. hot warm (85F) and sunny with 25 mph winds out of the southwest 3. finally this morning a strong NW wind and temperatures at 46F. All this weather actually makes for neat bird migration activity if you understand the weather’s implications. The fog and NE winds yielded a warbler fallout. The strong winds out of the SW pushed migrants against Lake Superior as the birds tried to ride the wind north.
Yesterday I had fun viewing two bird species which normally do not grace our area, even during migration … an Orchard Oriole and an American Avocet. Here are a few of my pics:
American Avocet
Orchard Oriole (immature male)
I went hiking and looking for the Great Horned Owlets at 6:45 am this morning. I guessed that after all the rain locally, including last night, the owls would be somewhat out in the open trying to dry off. I was not disappointed, and found all three young owls and their Mom. My estimate is the owlets are about two months and ten days old. Notice in today’s photograph how almost all the down in gone, and the young birds are beginning to look very grown up. Although the parent owls will continue to help feed the owlets through early fall, very shortly the youngsters will have to start also hunting on their own. Normally, it becomes easier to find the owlets once they are hunting because they spend much more time down lower to the ground, rather than high up in the canopy of leaves.
Great Horned Owlets (pics taken this morning)
