It was SO calm this morning when I arrived at work, and fairly warm. Lizzy Berkley, Refuge Biologist, and I stood outside the office for 5 minutes, just listening to bird song. It's Spring! From a distance we heard loons wailing, turkeys gobbling, the unison call of sandhill cranes, the metallic trill of the swamp sparrow and the winnow of a Wilson's snipe. Bald eagles flew down the river and landed in a tree just below the office and one was doing that kek, kek, kek call. By noon, I think the temperature must have dropped by at least 10 degrees!
Just at the HQ this morning, Lizzy and I identified either by song, call, or sight, the following 42 species. Do I have a GREAT job, or what? Canada Goose Trumpeter Swan Wood Duck Mallard Wild Turkey Common Loon Pied-billed Grebe Bald Eagle Sandhill Crane Killdeer Wilson's Snipe Mourning Dove Belted Kingfisher Red-bellied Woodpecker Yellow-bellied Sapsucker Downy Woodpecker Hairy Woodpecker Northern Flicker Pileated Woodpecker Eastern Phoebe Blue Jay American Crow Tree Swallow Black-capped Chickadee White-breasted Nuthatch Brown Creeper Ruby-crowned Kinglet American Robin European Starling Yellow-rumped Warbler American Tree Sparrow Fox Sparrow Song Sparrow Swamp Sparrow White-throated Sparrow Dark-eyed Junco Northern Cardinal Red-winged Blackbird Eastern Meadowlark Common Grackle Brown-headed Cowbird American Goldfinch Fox and tree sparrows are here most of the day, scratching on the ground around my bird feeder that's on the river side of the building. The white-throated sparrow shows up off and on during the day, usually early a.m. and afternoon for sure. Same with the cardinal - morning and afternoon. The BEST time to catch most species is early - just as it's getting light - and for about an hour afterward. No surprise to anyone there! The Prairie's Edge Wildlife Drive opens tomorrow morning - Saturday, April 23 - at sunrise! Betsy Beneke Visitor Services Manager Sherburne National Wildlife Refuge http://www.fws.gov/midwest/sherburne [email protected] ---- Join or Leave mou-net: http://lists.umn.edu/cgi-bin/wa?SUBED1=mou-net Archives: http://lists.umn.edu/archives/mou-net.html
