Sing Out for Summer!

Year 8

Okay … summer is still one month away, and last year we actually had snow during late May. Regardless, the summer bug eating birds have reappeared and are looking for mates. One of those birds is a Bobolink.

When I was a young boy in the 1960’s, bobolinks were one of the birds in my National Geographic Song and Garden Birds of North America book which I most wanted to see. However growing up in the Boreal Forest meant seeing a bobolink was a pipe dream. Although my parents liked birds, none of us knew about Sax-Zim Bog (only 35 minutes away). This book moved with me to prep school (Exeter), college (Dartmouth), my job in the Twin Cities (Honeywell), and finally back to Duluth! Some books are worth keeping! I think the combination of this book and our two bird feeders drove my interest in birds. What made you become interested in birding???

Make certain to read the comments to this post. Folks are starting to add how they became interested in birds!

Yesterday morning I had a grand time watching and listening to Bobolinks. Not many females are yet back in northern Minnesota, but the males were singing up a storm (email subscribers view / listen to this bobolink video). All the birds in this post were seen yesterday in the non Boreal portion of Sax-Zim Bog.

Bobolinks

Eastern Kingbird

The Sandhill Crane Family (wait for me!!!)

Caution! Whirlpool Ahead! Wilson’s Phalaropes

Year 8

May and June are a great time for birding in northern Minnesota. Migration is in full force in May, and then birds are singing out as they define territories and find mates. Yesterday I had a fantastic experience when I found a small flock of Wilson’s Phalaropes. These birds were migrating north, and it was only the second time in my life I had ever seen such a bird. They do not inhabit the Boreal Forest where I live, but a drive over to Meadowlands (only 35 miles) and hanging out amongst the farms and meadows just south of the Bog yielded this fantastic sighting.

Why whirlpools? Because this bird is darn smart! If one spins in a tight circle fast enough it creates a small whirlpool which sucks bugs up to the surface of the water to be gobbled up.  Here are two videos of whirlpool eating (video links for email subscribers … video 1 and video 2).

Interestingly enough, the female is the much prettier bird of this species. She mates with multiple males during a breeding season, but then has nothing to do with incubating or feeding … not much of a motherly instinct!

Wilson’s Phalaropes

The less colorful male …

Part of the flock with two Semipalmated-Plovers

Female Swimming by herself

Birding Cross-Country Knicker Socks

There were lots of requests to see me wearing my knee socks. As promised, here I am! If you would like to find knicker socks, I have purchased mine from this company (red is my favorite color for skiing). If you want to see more options, search via Google for the words “trachten” and “socks”.

Cardiac Owl Rehab

Year 8

Strange title, eh?! (I live near the Canadian border and am allowed to talk in this manner) However, as strange as the blog post title may seem, it is perfectly correct. I don’t write many posts about my health, but folks keep asking …

For those who don’t know, last October I collapsed while trail running and almost died. My Garmin data showed I was motionless on the ground for 30 minutes. Thankfully, with help I eventually hiked to the trailhead. Thus started my “Cardiac Owl Rehab”  program. It seems I had a genetically misshapen heart valve which needed replacement. Now seven months later after three heart surgeries (including open heart to replace my valve), and an additional three heart procedures, my strength seems to be returning.

Enter my owls and their personal specialized rehab program just for me. The past two years the owls nested a 2/3 mile hike away from my house. This winter, such a hike would have been difficult for me. The Amity Great Horned Owl family knew they had to get me up and walking, and decided to nest 30 yards from the end of my driveway. The net effect is I would visit their nest many times per day starting mid February. This got me out of the house and insured I climbed the hill up to our house quite often daily.

Now that my health is returning, the owls have continued their special rehab program. When the owls fledged this year, they flew to a new pine grove and hung out there for many weeks. This location required a 2/3 mile hike for me to reach their new home. This past Sunday now that I was handling the longer hike, they decided it was time to “up my game significantly” and they moved again. The owl family now requires me now to hike one mile uphill to reach their new location. However, the owls wanted even more out of me. This third location is off trail and requires significant bushwhacking off trail by me including “high stepping” over lots of deadfall. In addition I am taking a 12.5 mile bike ride up the shore of Lake Superior 4-5 times per week.

Yes, I have been on an active cardiac owl therapy program. The staff at my local hospital who I see often even know me as “the owl guy”. I accept the title with pride (download and read a free copy of Do You Hoot?). There is one strange item I now wear to my owl therapy sessions … cross-country skiing knee socks. I love wearing shorts, but all the bushwhacking was resulting in torn and cut up shins. Given my blood thinner medication my legs were cut daily with lots of blood (long time to clot). My solution has been knee socks. I am definitely not winning any fashion awards while out birding, but “we birders” are supposed to look a bit strange anyhow, eh?!

Here are three photographs I took of the youngest owlet yesterday morning. As a reminder this owlet was born 7 to 9 days after its siblings, and the size difference is still noticeable to me.

Great Horned Owlet directing my “Rehab” yesterday morning

My official owl Pandemic masks which Molly made for me