My wife and I had a great day, yesterday, having taken our friend’s grandchildren out birding. We started at the Old Cedar Avenue bridge and ended the day at the opulent Stivland ranch in Plymouth. The 8 year old was keeping meticulous notes in her journal and ended the day ticking off 21 species - not bad for your first day of birding. Old Cedar yielded a good selection of waterfowl, a Bald Eagle on the nest, a couple gulls, a pair of swans and some small birds. We all missed the Peregrine fly-by. Even the 21 year old nanny looked up from her iPhone long enough to pick out a singing Song Sparrow.
The Stivland ranch was pretty good, too – and it included lunch! The kids were impressed with the Wood Ducks through the scope, noting the colorful feathers, unique “haircut”, and bright red eye. The 8 year old was into her project and was excited about 3 species of Woodpeckers, two species of finches, Cardinals, Mallards, Wood Ducks, and Chickadees. Still better were the pair of Pine Siskins still hanging around (like a couple of engineers looking for a free lunch), three Juncos scratching under the feeder, and a visit from our resident Red-shouldered Hawk – who first did a fly-by and later perched nearby for a good look (he showed up here two weeks ago). Last good bird of the day was a small flock of Cedar Waxwings cleaning off the last buckthorn berries on the other side of the pond (see Val Cunningham’s article in this morning’s Strib). The 11 year old got into my wife’s iPad and eBird Pro and got a huge kick out of fooling “uncle Sid”. Wow – warblers already!; oh it is just the iPad and a grinning 11 year old. Great sport! This morning the Wood duck hens are doing the Plymouth version of “House Hunting”. At least two hens checked out one nest box this morning. I swear I heard one of them reporting to her mate that “Well, the view is great but there is no granite or stainless in there”. Oh, and the “Hoodies” just showed up. Sid Stivland Plymouth, MN ---- Join or Leave mou-net: http://lists.umn.edu/cgi-bin/wa?SUBED1=mou-net Archives: http://lists.umn.edu/archives/mou-net.html
