I started the day at 2 am photographing the Milky Way over my Northwoods camera. It was a beautiful night and the starts were glorious.

As the sun rose I decided to take an early morning kayak paddle. However, my loons have totally ignored me all summer indicated my presence was most definitely not desired. I have to assume their chicks hatched last night, and I was now an intruder. As a fyi, I was kayaking through the middle of the lake and was over 200 yards from shore. Obviously I do not want to upset the new parents, thus for the time being my kayak paddles will take a different direction from my cabin.

Last night … the loons were totally unconcerned about my presence

This morning … Uff Dah!

Another cabin season has started, and we are at our small northwoods cabin near the Canadian border. We are north of the Laurentian Divide. Thus, our water flows up to Hudson’s Bay. Given ice-out was only a little over two weeks ago, the water is very cold, and the birds seem to be a bit behind in starting their nests.

Two of my favorite Northstar Lake birds are Bald Eagles and Common Loons. We have a pair or each species which nest within 600 yards of the cabin. Surprisingly, even through loons fear eagles, the loons always nest right underneath the white pine where the eagles call home … thus strange bedfellows. This is our 30th summer season, and this odd nesting arrangement has been present every year.

Bald Eagle on Northstar Lake

Common Loon (and tons of black flies)

In this second photo, I finally realized after all these years that the loon’s neck band does not completely circle its neck. One is always learning something new!

The Common Loons of Northstar Lake will soon leave for warmer southern climates. However, after an entire summer of swimming and fishing with little flying, our loons are now making frequent flights to strengthen muscles in preparation for migration. For some reason, all of these short flights seem to mean a huge increase in yodeling frequency, both while in flight and on the water.  Over the course of the past few days I frequently kayaked out onto the lake to see if I could capture a take-off or landing, which is basically a controlled crash. Loons which land on wet blacktop (for instance mall parking lots) are not able to get re airborne. They need a runway.

Last Yodel and Take-Off of the Common Loon

And the resulting splash stream!