A Birder’s Haiku

 

Dedicated to the birder, as we start our week.

An old women with bread

Waves the geese down

From the sky

Happy Thanksgiving

To all my loyal readers, I would like to say Happy Thanksgiving. I would like to share one of my favorite holiday songs with you. I hope you’ll enjoy it.

Caesar Creek/ Harveysburg Road

So on this Thanksgiving eve, with temperatures hovering in the mid 30’s, and this real nasty rain coming down in a steady stream, what would you be doing? Now if your me you’d be out birding. I know I need my head examined, however, they say that the crapper the weather the better the birding. Especially waterfowl.

I arrived at about 3:30 and stayed for about 45 minutes to an hour. Or was it till I couldn’t keep the water off my spotting scope eye piece. There were a good amount of quantity, but not a great variety. The rain was definitely keeping the ducks on the water, and bunched together, though the different species of waterfowl left a lot to be desired. I spotted a couple of 20+ rafts of Common Loons and Ruddy Ducks and Buffleheads.

So with the light fading, and losing the battle of keeping the spotting scope dry, I took my freezing fingertips and soggy rain jacket home. Here’s my trip list.

1. Ruddy Duck
2. Redhead
3. Bufflehead
4. Common Loon
5. Bonaparte’s Gull
6. Horned Grebe
7. Double-creasted Cormorant
8. Hooded Merganser

A Birder’s Haiku

 

Dedicated to the birder, as we start our week.

Morning mist hangs low

Crow flies away to safety

Dead squirrel in road

Caesar Creek/ Harveysburg Road

 

With the holidays rapidly approaching, Kathy has decided that this weekend we need to get some serious cleaning done. Especially with company coming over for Thanksgiving. So with this domestic field day upon me, when do I get any birding in? Today after work. So this morning before I went to work I stowed away the scope and grabbed a pair of binoculars. I really don’t like doing this. I get nauseous just thinking that someone might break into the bird mobile and steal my goods. But they were safe today. Since daylight is at a premium, I made a beeline to my favorite place, Harveysburg Road.

There was practically no wind to speak of, so there was hardly no chop on the lake. Which made for good viewing, even in the decreasing sunlight.

One thing I noticed was the increase in the amount of Common Loons. There were probably 100+ from where I was located. Also noticed a real large raft of Common Coots off in the distance. Their numbers would have easily reached into the hundreds.  However the highlight of this trip wasn’t the birds, it was seeing 3 deer swimming across the lake. Now I’m no expert of our 4 legged friends, I just think this was rather strange to see this.

After I left the end of the road, I drove to the top and parked. Followed the trail down to the lake to see if anything was in the bay. Left soon thereafter, and in the fading twilight, I went home. Birds of notice include:

1. Ring-billed Gull
2. Bonaparte’s Gull
3. Common Loon
4. Ruddy Duck
5. Wilson’s Snipe
6. Northern Shoveler
7. Lesser Scaup
8. American Wigeon
9. Red Head
10. Pied-bill Grebe
11. Horned Grebe
12. Ring-necked Duck

“On The Road” Lake Erie Pelagic Tour

We’re “On The Road” again, and this time we’re off to Cleveland for “The Sweet Water Sea, Lake Erie Pelagics”. This tour is sponsored by the Black Swamp Bird Observatory at Oak Harbor, Ohio. When I read about this trip on B.S.B.O. website, I think I was the first person to sign up. That seems like ages ago.

So now it’s time to prepare for this trip. And I’m not just driving up and back on the same day. Kathy suggested that I leave on Friday, and spend the night on the road, so I won’t feel so rushed on Saturday. So on Friday after I leave work, it’s off to Mansfield Ohio for the night. Believe you me it’s not the most palatial hotel in the world, but it will have to do. As a matter of fact, with a strip club right down the road, you might say this hotel might be rated as “seedy”. I’m afraid to ask if it has hourly rates. However it is an Econolodge, so I’m sure it will be fine.

The drive from my house to Columbus was rather uneventful. However, from Columbus to Mansfield, is where all sanity ceased to exist. To put it into simple terms, it was a madhouse. So what should have been a relatively short drive, took way too long. I arrived into my room at 7:30, put on some soft clothes, took 2 Tylenol PM’s, and a few swallows of Fra Fillippo, and it was lights out at 9:00.

I was a little nervous on this last leg of my journey. I had, what I thought were pretty good directions, but never been to Cleveland before, getting lost was not an option. I hate getting lost. So before I left town I went to Google Map and did a street view of the route after I left the highway. It went perfect. I was able to identify landmarks, and made it to my destination without a single problem. As I pulled into the parking lot I was greeted with this view.

The white building is where we left from. Meet up with birding buddy John Marvin and his father who spent the night in Cleveland before the trip. Both are very knowledgeable birders, and great to be with.

Another view of the city.

If you look real close, the top of our boat is visible in the lower left corner.

With a maximum of 50 people going, you can see it was rather cramped on the dock. In the background you can see a HUGH great lakes freighter navigating the Cuyahoga River.

As this freighter was making this turn you can see how many gulls it was kicking up in it’s wake. The gull population here is phenomenal.

This is like a Hitchcock movie.

Once we set sail, we  started looking for anything along the river. Someone did catch a Peregrine Falcon making it’s rounds. I did see a Sharp-shinned Hawk as we cruised the river. A few geese and Mallards were all we saw before we exited the river.

A look back at the city before we entered Lake Erie.

You can tell by this picture how calm the water was. It was pretty much like this the whole trip.

As you can tell, space was at a premium. Getting on board early guaranteed you a seat. But who sits. I was moving from left to right looking for birds the whole trip.

We made our way out to the pumping crib.

They started throwing bread and popcorn off the fantail to attract the gulls and anything else that might be in the vicinity.

It’s during this time of chuming for birds that we got our hit on a Pomarine Jaeger.

After we left the open waters of Lake Erie, we made our way to some breakwaters that run parallel to the coast.

Gulls followed us everywhere.

This is the area that the Snow Buntings were sighted. We’re running along the shore where an airport is located.

You can see the landing lights of the airport as we clear the corner.

Now here’s something you don’t see everyday. A U.S. World War II. era submarine. The Japanese flags on the side of the conning tower indicates that it served in the Pacific theater.

View of the city on our return trip to the dock.

A look back at the Cuyahoga River as we approach the dock.

So did I have a good time? Yes I did. Would I go back? Yes I would. Even though I did get 4 new birds for my life list, I was still disappointed in the lack of water birds. Having great weather conditions has a lot to do with the lack of water birds. The crappier the weather, the better the birding. So hopefully the weather will be better from a birding point of view for next year. So here is the list of birds for the trip.

1. Ring-billed Gull
2. Bonaparte’s Gull
3. Greater Black Backed Gull-Lifer
4. Herring Gull
5. Northern Harrier
6. American Kestrel
7. Bald Eagle
8. Red-tailed Hawk
9. Rough-legged Hawk (Dark Phase)
10. Cooper’s Hawk
11. Sharp-shinned Hawk
12. Common Crow
13. Pigeon
14. Mourning Dove
15. Starling
16. American Robin
17. Northern Cardinal
18. Northern Mockingbird
19. House Sparrow
20. Canada Goose
21. Mallard
22. Black Scoter-Lifer
23. Common Loon
24. Red-breasted Merganser
25. Horned Grebe
26. Great Blue heron
27. Pomarine Jaeger-Lifer
28. Snow Bunting-Lifer
29. American Coot